New-York tribune., 1911-10-29
Could Have Stayed There
Nine Hours Just as Easily,
He Declared, but
Won't Tell More.

or, Of twisted rubber bands. would die
down.
The little toy soon became broken. butl
the inquisitive brothers Investigated its
construction. and quickly replaced the orig-'
inal model with others OF larger dimen-
sions. gradually increasing the size Theyl
found, however, that the smaller ones few
better than the larger ones. and IN their,
efforts TO discover thc reason why. laid
the line of reasoning that eventually result
ed in their ability to construct heaSier-i
than-air fixing machines OF practically
twice ,he size Of any previously c"nsrueteI,
and hy them with success
When Otto Liienthal. the German sctS1
enlist. was experimenting with htns ma
chimes before losing his life, in iSo. ms
Wrghts became greatly Interested IN MS
achievements. In the newspaper arucies
which chronicled his tragic death refer
ence was made 10 some papers the German
inventor had published. They studied his
essays on the subject, and through refer"
ences made therein they got into toinmuni-
cation with Octave Chanutc. a noted au-' '
thorty on aviation. who gave them data,
which he had compiled on the subject and
referred them 10 other works Of emlncnT
/ inventors.
/ Within a few months after they iirst de-
! termned TO solve the problem Of iiyins tne
Wrights had gathered together most OF tho
available books On the subject and thor
oughly digested them. Combining new
! ideas with the ones they had acquired by
means of experiments with the Httle hello
copter, they began flying box kites and
building gliders Il was then that the In
ventors met with rebuffs that proved upon
them more heavily than the knowledge that
their funds were being rapidly depleted-
| While experimenting with their kites and
glider about the hills surrounding DAYTON
the inventors were subjected to eXasperat-
ing ieers and referred to as being "dtppY."
This doubtless had much - do with their
reticence I'm after years.
However. i'm spite of discoura gernents ths
brothers continued their struggle, being
compelled 10 borrow money repeatedly from
their sister, Katherine, school teacher
who was as enthusiastic as Wilbur and Or
Vile. and who encouraged them 10 go
ahead at times when they were utterly de-
jected because Of the scarcity Of funds To
the sister much OF the credit for the flying
machine is due She was better educated
than either of the boys, and her school
work kept her mind better trained for cal<
culations She also assisted in the research
| work and laboratory experiments
The first workshop where the virgins
carried on their airship experiments was
a little frame building in the rear OF a.
brick store near their Dayton home. lr
could be reached only by passing along the
side Of another building on narrow
board walk, and was thus well secluded
from the gaze Of the public cat that times
however scarcely "A hundred people in Day-
ton knew the Wrghts by sight, so Closely
had they confined themselves to their Wolk
during the day and spent their evenings
at home. When they began to test ther
gliders they became more conspicuous buo
then only being generally looked upon IS
''pranks 4" a