The Idaho recorder. [volume] (Salmon City, Idaho) 1886-1927, 1917-09-28


impatient If at first our progress seems slow Only
men who have tried It know the difficulties Of
building high-power alrplane motor"
In the matter of personnel, II may be noted, our
aircraft promoters believe we have great supe-
rlority over the rest OF the world for this reason
II takes an exceptional sort of man 10 make q
good flyer He must be quck-witted and have the
steadiest sort of nerves. Otherwise, he TO
grief and smashes an expensive machine Men OF
this type volunteered extensively In Britain and
Canada early In the war. They constituted the
armies that went into the battle line without
adequate artillery protection and largely
destroyed The same forces operated 10 destroy
the strong and vigorous young men Of France and
Germany who would have made good ayiators.
SO today America is the greatest reservoir In the
world of the right sort OF material for the per-
sonnet OF the aircraft service. While the other
countries are having difficulty In getting proper
men for nyers-Enf!and has invited us TO send
men to her aviation schools because she cannot
keep them filled-our problem is merely to train
them and provide them with equipment
/ asked Mr. Wright what speed plane might
expect to develop.
1T is a complicated problem, the limit Of useful
speed" he replied. "A good many reckless state
ments are made on the subject 10y persons with
vivid imagnations. 1t Is safe 10 say there are
machines on the western front that can make $50
miles hour. So far as speed is concerned there
are no inherent impossibilities Ia developing "A
plane that might make high two hundred
miles hour. The difficulty Is in the landing,
"A machines landing speed Is about half It's
maximum speed. That is, II plane Is designed
to make a speed of fifty miles an hour It's wings
will not sustain II In the air II II travels slower
than twenty-five miles 1t must be moving at
~peed of at least twenty-five miles an hour TO
make Il successful landing so a plane with Il
speed Of 100 miles an hour cannot land at n speed
Of much less than sixty-hve miles"
From the field drove to the laboratory. II
is simply a development OF the crude shop In
which he and his brother together worked out the
problem Of air flight. The airplane was no lucky
find 1t was not developed by rule Of thumb.
Wilbur and Oryllle Wright sons Of Dayton
United Brethren bishop. after getting through high
school, set up bicycle repair shop They had a
natural taste for mechanics and for sports. Iwen'
tyone years ago they became Interested In the e1-
periments of LllIenthal, the German experimental,
In q glider. His death attracted their attention to
his work. For two years they worked on data
and laws that other investigators had produced
only to find that the work so far done was
worthless.
SO in their own shop In Dayton they devised a
wind tunnel chute through which nm niT
blast was driven by electric fan. and set e
work measuring the resstances Of curved sur
faces by a wonderfully ingenious method Of thelI
own deyislng. by long series Of exact measure
ments and elaborate mathematical calculations In
vol,ing snes and cosines and such, they worked
out the problem Of the curvature OF the planes
aud OF the propellers.
The problems Of balance were enormously In
tricata Bot these too, they solved They wer'
pioneers They had TO discover the difficulties
and then find the way out. So thes had 20 dc
wise the methods II took unlimited patience
rpsourcefulucss and hard thinking TO win success
Both the brothers were primarily scientific men
They were impatient 10 devote themselves to th'
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