Evening star., 1928-12-09

great diScoverers. Nor did it occur to
their cotemporaries TO set up their c1n-
tributions to the map as marking an
outstanding event in human history.
To live in the time of the Reformation
was to be Intellectually perleXed, and
perhaps physically endangered for the
holding of unpopular views. But neith-
er leaders of thought nor common men
could conceive Of the revolution in the
spiritual outlook of centuries yet un-
born that was being wrought by Luther,
Knox and Calvin.
The transient waves that beat upon
the beach impress themselves on every
bystander, but the great geologic move
ments that form and reshape continents
begin so imperceptibly that their mag
nitude and significance can be judged
only after centuries or millenniums. So
with the beginnings of the great basic
tides in human affairs. Even 25 years
is too short a lapse of time across
which to regard them fairly, or to rate
their true scope.
It lacks just a few days now OF be-
ing Is years since that memorable De-
cember II, when the aspiration to
human flight, entertained and strug-
gled for through centuries, were real
lied at the hands of two young Anerl-
cans. We are about to celebrate the
anniversary of the day when those
patient, shrewd, obServant, painstaking
brothers from Dayton saw their ma
chine, with one of them at the con-
trolls. lift into the air from the lonely
wind-swept North Carolina beach
where they had gone in search of
favoring breeZes for their experiments.
Even now it is far too early t. ap-
praise Justly the place of that eTent
in history 1t still grows in n1agnl-
tude with the passage of time, but we
have gathered enough perspective to
make an attempt from which the eye
witnesses upon that December day early
In the century were debarred.
No engraved invitations were sent
out for the first flight. Only few
spectators were present. but some of
them still live near Kitty Hawk, end
one or two are still active members
of the Iife-Saving crew there, to which
they were detached in 1908. Looking
back across the span of. years, they
can summon up no recollection OF
marked emotional reaction. They were
swept by no realization that the dream
Of Icarus was coming true before their
ewes and that they were privileged 10
be the first to gaze upon what no eye
had ever beheld before. It takes time
to assinilate an idea like that.
TT takes so much time to overcome
a nearly universal reluctance to
novelty and to realize that something
new is actually going on that not even
after five years was the alrplane fully
accented. Not only its practical utility,
but its very existence, was stlll being
challenged.
The Wrights had been flying in an open
field just outside of Dayton through
Airnlanes had been flown successfully
and publicly in Europe during the two
succeeding years. Yet in 1908, when
Wilbur and Orville Wright went back
to Kitty Hawk. scene of their original
triumph, for further experimentation,
the reporters who furtively followed
them there and hid in the brush to
watch had their plain tales of fact
mercilessly blue penciled by editors who
suspected them of drawing on their
imaginations and recounting fantastic
impossibilitieS.
Mark Sullivan's exhaustive study OF
the cotemporary records has revealed
an editor whose immediate-Eeaction to
the story Of the flights of 1908 was to
telegraph his correspondent at the
scene to "cut out the wildcat stuff.
After the passage of 20 years that
gentleman is entitled to be written
down in the record as among the great
skepticS of history.
The record of those early days and
of the doubts of public and press Is
worth examining not only for its his
torical interest, but because 1t may
inpel us to humility in our judgments
now. 1t is as dangerous as ever TO
set arbitrary boundaries to progress or
to human ingenuity, or to conclude that
what is new is impossible.
Prof Langley once remarked that
every important invention or scientific
development had to pass through three
etages-the first. in which the popular
verdict was that the thing couldn't
possibly be done; the second, in which
1t began to be said that perhaps 1t
could be done, but even if it could 1t
wouldn't be of any use: the last, in
which it was impatiently asserted that,
of course, it could be done, and every
body had always known it. Prof. Lang
ley said that he himself had seen the
airplane pass through all three.
OrviIle Wright, who made the first
fight, has watched the strengthening
of the third stage and its transition into
a fourth, where the airplane is uni
fly, one of the things taken so much
as a matter of course that we can
scarcely recall how We ever got along
without it.
The airplane has fought its battle
and won its place in the community,
but we still must be watcllful lest we
estimate its development incorrectly or
plant ourselves in the path of new
basic discoveries. fortifying ourselves
and opposing them with the stubborn
, conviction of impossibility. which the
previous generation as whole enter
tanned toward human fight in any
form.
CKEPTICISM did not terminate with
~ 1908. Driven reluctantly from its
front-line trenches and compelled to
admit that there was such thing as
an airplane, popular conservatism dug
in on the tenet that it was only
scientific toy, tricky and dangerous and
incapable of practical use. One need
not be a veritable pioneer Of aeronau-
tics to recall the amused tolerance with
which aircraft enthusiasts were regard
ed almost up to 1914.
new industrial art or new form
of transportation sometimes has to
overcome that sort of opposition by
steady and gradual progress, unmarked
by sudden changes in public attitude.
So, for example, did the automobile
First there were a hundred cars, then
a thousand. ten thousand, a million.
The rate of increase was phenomenally
rapid. but fairly constant
The airplane had started along the
same road, but other factors intervened
A World War broke out and became the
controlling element, determining both
the amount and the nature of aero
nautical development. The wars infiu
ence dominated directly, both in bel
-iigerent and in neutral countries, for
four years Indirectly it is strongly felt
even up to the present time.
Tn Iulv 1914 the air forces Of the