in The Wright Co., except that of his friend, Robert J. Collier, who,
for sentimental reason, wished to retain his interest. Orville’s motive
in acquiring almost complete ownership of the company had been as a
step toward getting entirely out of business. Both he and Wilbur Wright
had agreed to stay with the company for a period of years, not yet
expired, and he could not honorably dispose of his own holdings so long
as those with whom he had made the agreement were still in the company.
But almost immediately after buying the shares of the others, he let it
be known that he might be willing to sell his entire interest. To this,
Collier, the only other shareholder, agreed. In 1915, Orville received
an offer and gave an option to a small group of eastern capitalists
that included William Boyce Thompson and Frank Manville, the latter
president of the Johns-Manville Co. The deal was closed in October,
1915.
Just after Orville had given his option to the eastern syndicate,
Robert J. Collier came to tell him an important piece of news, and to
urge him not to sell just yet.
Collier had been having some talks with his friend, the wealthy Harry
Payne Whitney, and had urged upon him the idea of doing what Collier
thought would be a wonderful piece of philanthropy that would mean
much for the future of aviation in the United States. What Collier
wanted him to do was to buy the stock of The Wright Co., thus gaining
ownership of the Wright patents, and then immediately make the patents
free to anyone in the United States who wished to manufacture airplanes.
Whitney was willing to carry out the Collier suggestion. To do so he
was also ready to pay more for the stock of The Wright Co. than the
syndicate had offered.
But Orville explained to Collier that the option already given was
legally drawn and the holders presumably wished to exercise it.
Collier’s daring idea and Whitney’s generous acceptance of it had come
just a little too late.
XVIII
PATENT SUITS
The Wrights had found that patents covering the basic features of
their invention were not enough protection against infringers. Indeed,
having the technical details on file in the Patent Office, where anyone
who desired might see them, was, in a way, to the advantage of those
who would help themselves to an inventor’s work and ideas. Only a
decision in the courts could determine the justice of an inventor’s
claims. But the courts work slowly and legal procedure is expensive.
Except for their good fortune--never contemplated when they started--in
realizing substantial sums from their invention, the brothers might
not have been financially able to carry on the fight that finally gave
them world-wide recognition as the first to contrive a successful
flying-machine.
Altogether the brothers had active part in a dozen different suits in
the United States against infringers--and there were suits in France
and Germany in each of which about a dozen infringers were involved.
Most of the suits in the United States did not go beyond the early
stages, as the infringers were not disposed to continue after a
preliminary injunction had been issued. But three suits were of special
importance. One of these was against Louis Paulhan, French aviator,
who was about to give exhibitions in the United States, using planes
made in France. Another was against Claude Grahame-White, English
aviator, also about to give exhibitions in the United States with
planes that infringed the Wright patents. The most important suit of
all was against the Herring-Curtiss Co. and Glenn H. Curtiss. This
case was bitterly contested and was carried up to the U. S. Court of
Appeals. It was brought by the Wright brothers, late in 1909, but
The Wright Co., formed shortly afterward, succeeded the brothers as
complainants.
Because of the importance of this suit in aviation history, it is worth
while to examine the background of the relations between the Wrights
and Glenn Curtiss. The Wrights’ personal acquaintance with Curtiss
began in May, 1906, when he wrote to them in regard to the light motors
of which he was a manufacturer. Then in early September, 1906, Curtiss
visited the Wright office and workshop. He was brought there by his
friend, Captain Thomas S. Baldwin, a well-known aeronaut, who was
giving exhibition flights in Dayton with his dirigible balloon on which
he used a motor he had persuaded Curtiss to build for him. It was to
make repairs on that motor that Curtiss had come to Dayton.
After that meeting, the four men, Curtiss, Baldwin, and the Wrights,
were together much of the time for several days. When in response to
questions about their work, the Wrights showed a number of photographs
of their flights made at the Huffman pasture during the two previous
years, Curtiss seemed much astonished. He remarked that it was the
first time he had been able to believe anyone had actually been in the
air with a flying-machine.
Long afterward, in an interview in the New York _Times_ (February 28,
1914), Baldwin recalled the many talks he and Glenn Curtiss had with
the Wrights in that fall of 1906. “I sometimes suggested to Curtiss,”
Baldwin told the interviewer, “that he was asking too many questions,
but he kept right on. The Wrights had the frankness of schoolboys in
it all and had a rare confidence in us. I am sure Curtiss at that time
never thought of taking up flying.”
A year after the Wrights’ first meetings with Curtiss, in October,
1907, the Aerial Experiment Association was formed by Alexander Graham
Bell and others, with headquarters first in Nova Scotia and later
at Hammondsport, N. Y., where Curtiss lived. He became “Director
of Experiments.” This was the first time Curtiss had been directly
connected with aviation except as a manufacturer of motors, and three
months later, a letter he wrote to the Wrights indicated that motors
rather than aviation were still his chief interest. “I just wish to
keep in touch with you,” he wrote, “and let you know that we have been
making considerable progress in engine construction.” After listing
and describing the various engines he was building, he proposed to
furnish to the Wrights “gratis” one of his fifty-horsepower engines.
But the offer was not accepted. The letter mentioned that Captain
Baldwin was a “permanent fixture in this establishment”--a fact not
without importance, considering information that Baldwin was later to
reveal. Further on in the letter, Curtiss told of Dr. Bell’s reading
to the members of the Aerial Experiment Association the United States
Government’s specifications for the purchase of a flying-machine, and
added: “You, of course, are the only persons who could come anywhere
near doing what is required.”
About a fortnight after receipt of that letter from Curtiss, the
Wrights got another letter dated January 15, 1908, written on Aerial
Experiment Association stationery, and signed by Lieutenant T.
Selfridge, whose name appeared on the letterhead as secretary of the
association. (This was the same Selfridge who was killed a few months
later in the tragic airplane accident at Fort Myer.) In that letter,
Selfridge, on behalf of the Experiment Association, said:
I am taking the liberty of writing you and asking your advice
on certain points connected with gliding experiments, or rather
glider construction, which we started here last Monday.
Will you kindly tell me what results you obtained on the travel
of the center of pressure both on aerocurves and aeroplanes?
Also, what is a good, efficient method of constructing the
ribs of the surfaces so that they will be light and yet strong
enough to maintain their curvature under ordinary conditions,
and a good means of fastening them to the cloth and upper
lateral cords of the frame?
I hope I am not imposing too much by asking you these questions.
Supposing the information would be used only for scientific purposes,
the Wrights obligingly replied at once as follows:
You will find much of the information you desire in the
addresses of our Mr. Wilbur Wright before the Western Society
of Engineers, published in the Journals of the Society of
December, 1901, and August, 1903.
The travel of the center of pressure on aeroplanes is from
the center at 90 degrees, toward the front edge as the angle
becomes smaller. The center of pressure on a curved surface is
approximately at its center at 90 degrees, moves forward as the
angle is decreased until a critical angle is reached, after
which it reverses, and moves toward the rear edge. The critical
angle varies for different shaped curves, but is generally
reached at some angle between 12 and 18 degrees. With the
angles used in gliding flight the travel will be between the
center of the surface and a point one-third back from the front
edge.
The methods of construction used in our gliders are fully
described in an article by Mr. Chanute in the _Revue des
Sciences_ in 1903 (we do not remember the month) and in the
specifications of our United States patent, No. 821,393.
The ribs of our gliders were made of second growth ash, steamed
and bent to shape.
Selfridge replied in a few days saying he had been able to obtain a
copy of the patent and would endeavor to get the other references the
Wrights had supplied.
The data must have been useful to the Aerial Experiment Association for
early the following summer, Glenn Curtiss, “Director of Experiments”
had a power-driven airplane, called the “June Bug,” in which he
made a flight on July 4, 1908, at Hammondsport. That flight created
the belief in the minds of many who were not fully informed that
the Aerial Experiment Association must have done an amazing job of
original research. This belief was encouraged by the fact that after
the Aerial Experiment Association began building and experimenting
with flying-machines, using much information they had obtained from the
Wrights, they neglected, in public statements about their work, to so
much as mention the Wright brothers.
Soon after the report of the flight of the “June Bug,” there appeared
in the press a statement that the Aerial Experiment Association was
disbanding, and that Glenn H. Curtiss was going to engage in exhibition
flying. That news led Orville Wright to send to Curtiss the following
letter:
I learn from the _Scientific American_ that your “June Bug”
has movable surfaces at the tips of the wings, adjustable to
different angles on the right and left sides for maintaining
the lateral balance. In our letter to Lieutenant Selfridge of
January 18th, replying to his of the 15th, in which he asked
for information on the construction of flyers, we referred
him to several publications containing descriptions of the
structural features of our machines, and to our U. S. patent
No. 821,393. We did not intend, of course, to give permission
to use the patented features of our machine for exhibitions or
in a commercial way.
This patent broadly covers the combination of sustaining
surfaces to the right and left of the center of a
flying-machine adjustable to different angles, with vertical
surfaces adjustable to correct inequalities in the horizontal
resistances of the differently adjusted wings. Claim 14 of our
patent No. 821,393 specifically covers the combination which
we are informed you are using. We believe it will be very
difficult to develop a successful machine without the use of
some of the features covered in this patent.
The commercial part of our business is taking so much of
our time that we have not been able to undertake public
exhibitions. If it is your desire to enter the exhibition
business, we would be glad to take up the matter of a license
to operate under our patents for that purpose.
Curtiss replied that, contrary to newspaper reports, he did not expect
to do anything in the way of exhibitions; that his flights had been in
connection with the Aerial Experiment Association’s work. The matter
of the patents he had referred, he said, to the Secretary of the
Association.
A few weeks later, when Orville went to Washington in preparation for
the Fort Myer tests of the Wright machine, Captain Baldwin was there
teaching Army officers to operate a new dirigible balloon for which
Curtiss had furnished the motor. In speaking of the experiments in
aviation being carried on by Curtiss and other members of the Aerial
Experiment Association at Hammondsport, Baldwin said warningly to
Orville: “I hear them talking.” He went on to caution Orville that the
work those men were doing would infringe the Wright patents.
By the following year, Curtiss had formed a commercial company, The
Herring-Curtiss Co., to make or exhibit airplanes.
On January 3, 1910, Judge John R. Hazel, of the Federal Circuit Court,
at Buffalo, New York, granted a temporary restraining order against
The Herring-Curtiss Co. and Glenn H. Curtiss to prevent them from
infringement of the Wright patents. In handing down his decision, Judge
Hazel said:
It appears that the defendant Curtiss had notice of the success
of the Wright machine, and that a patent had been issued
in 1906. Indeed, no one interfered with the rights of the
patentees by constructing machines similar to theirs until
in July, 1908, when Curtiss exhibited a flying-machine which
he called “The June Bug.” He was immediately notified by the
patentees that such machine, with its movable surfaces at the
tips, or wings, infringed the patent in suit, and he replied
that he did not intend to publicly exhibit the machine for
profit, but merely was engaged in exhibiting it for scientific
purposes as a member of the Aerial Experiment Association.
To this the patentees did not object. Subsequently, however,
the machine, with supplementary planes placed midway between
the upper and lower aeroplanes, was publicly exhibited by
the defendant corporation, and used by Curtiss in aerial
flights for prizes and emoluments. It further appears that
the defendants now threaten to continue such use for gain
and profit, and to engage in the manufacture and sale of
such infringing machine, thereby becoming an active rival of
complainant in the business of constructing flying-machines
embodying the claims in suit, but such use of the infringing
machine it is the duty of this Court on the papers presented to
enjoin.
Then, in February, 1910, Judge Learned Hand, in the Federal Circuit
Court, at New York, issued an injunction to prevent the French aviator,
Louis Paulhan, from making exhibitions in the United States unless he
would put up an indemnity to the amount of $25,000. The Court declared
that both the Bleriot and Farman planes that the defendant was planning
to use were infringements of the Wright patents.
Not until January 13, 1914, did the U. S. Circuit Court of Appeals hand
down its decision in the Wright suit against Curtiss. The decision was
in favor of The Wright Co.
In his interview in the New York _Times_, already quoted from,
published in the New York _Times_, February 28, 1914, Captain Thomas
S. Baldwin, though a close associate of Curtiss, heartily endorsed the
final decision in the Wright _vs._ Curtiss case. Referring to that
decision he told the interviewer:
“It is high time for all the rest of us to step up and admit that not a
one of us ever would have got off the ground in flight if the Wrights
had not unlocked the secret for us.
“I want to go on record as saying that the Wrights are fully entitled
to the decision they have at last received....
“Mr. Curtiss is a friend of mine today,” said Baldwin, “and I have
served in his companies as a director. But it is due to the Wrights as
a simple matter of justice to have the story of the actual genesis of
flight fully established.”
By that time, Captain Baldwin had abandoned the dirigible balloon for
the airplane, and thus he, too, had been an infringer of the Wright
patent. But as his public statements indicated, he showed an attitude
quite different from that of most other infringers. Glenn Martin was
another, like Baldwin, who acknowledged indebtedness to the Wrights.
After the Wrights had won their important suit against Curtiss in the
Circuit Court of Appeals, Curtiss made no secret of the fact that
he still hoped to find a possible loophole to get around the Wright
patent. Since the decision of the Court enjoined him from using two
ailerons operating simultaneously in opposite directions, he thought
perhaps he could escape penalty by using just one aileron at a time,
while the other remained inoperative. This, however, was covered
by Claim 1 of the Wright patent, if the claim were given a liberal
interpretation, as the Court had said the Wright Patent was entitled
to, on account of the Wrights being the pioneers in the art of flying.
But Claim 1 had not been cited in the former suits, and so had not as
yet been adjudicated. If Curtiss could just show, or seem to show,
in some way that the Wrights were not exactly pioneers, that some
other machine capable of flight antedated the Wright machine, then
he would be in a stronger position to defend himself against Claim 1
if it should be cited against him. Anticipating a suit, Curtiss took
astounding means to prepare for combating it--as will appear.
But after all the evidence was taken in that case and just before
the case was to come to trial, Orville Wright sold his interest in
The Wright Co. to New York capitalists. Curtiss then contrived to
gain delay after delay by approaching the new owners with proposals
of settlement. These negotiations dragged on until the United States
entered the First World War, and the Manufacturers Aircraft Association
was organized for cross-licensing manufacturers who were building
machines for the United States Government. Through this cross-licensing
agreement, The Wright Co. received royalty on all planes manufactured
for the Government. Consequently, this last case against Curtiss never
came to trial.
The Wrights won their patent suits, too, in the highest courts of both
Germany and France. The court in Germany made the comment in its oral
decision that their discovery that a rear rudder was a balancing device
rather than a steering device should entitle them to a basic patent.
Without going into too much detail about the various patent suits,
the important point is that the priority of the Wright patents was
sustained by the courts in both the United States and Europe. Every
airplane that flies, in any part of the world, even today, does so by
use of devices and discoveries first made by the Wright brothers.
These patent suits were a terrible ordeal for the attorneys and judges
concerned, for aviation was so new that many of the technical terms
were beyond the knowledge of nearly everyone. It was as if lawyers and
judges had to learn a new language and take a course in the theoretical
side of aeronautical engineering as they went along.
In a case against a foreign aviator, Wilbur Wright was called upon
in Court to explain the function and operation of a rudder when an
aeroplane is making a circle. Wilbur got hold of a piece of string and
a fragment of chalk and went to a blackboard, where he made it clear to
the Judge that when a machine is making a turn the pressure is on the
opposite side of an aeroplane rudder from what it is on a ship’s or a
dirigible’s rudder when they are making the same turn.
After the Judge had issued a temporary restraining order, at the end of
the day’s proceedings, Clarence J. Shearn, attorney for the defendant,
gloomily remarked: “If it hadn’t been for Wright and that damned piece
of string, we would have won.”
One bit of testimony in another case was in regard to the accuracy of
observations of men who fly airplanes. To show the inaccuracy of most
people’s observations on phenomena having to do with physical laws,
Wilbur used for illustration what a man thinks happens when riding a
bicycle.
“I have asked dozens of bicycle riders,” said Wilbur, “how they turn
a bicycle to the left. I have never found a single person who stated
all the facts correctly when first asked. They almost invariably said
that, to turn to the left, they turned the handlebar to the left and
as a result made a turn to the left. But on further questioning them,
some would agree that they first turned the handlebar a little to the
right, and then as the machine became inclined to the left, they turned
the handlebar to the left and made the circle, inclining inwardly. To
a scientific student it is very clear that without the preliminary
movement of the handlebar to the right, a movement of the handlebar to
the left would cause the bicycle to run out from under the man, who
would continue headlong in his original direction. Yet I have found
many people who would deny having ever noticed the preliminary movement
of the handlebar to the right. I have never found a non-scientific
bicycle rider who had particularly noticed it and spoke of it from
his own conscious observation and initiative. I found the same
condition among aviators with whom I have flown. Some have almost no
consciousness of whether the machine is rising a little or descending
a little, or whether it is sliding somewhat to the right or to the
left. The ability to notice these things, even in small degrees, is
the main quality which distinguishes skilled aviators from novices and
born flyers from men who will never be able to handle flying-machines
competently.”
Even though the Wrights won all their patent suits, collecting
royalties proved to be something else!
XIX
WHY THE WRIGHT PLANE WAS EXILED
Why was the original Wright airplane, the first flying-machine in the
world capable of flight, deposited in the Science Museum at South
Kensington, London, England, rather than in the United States National
Museum, administered by the Smithsonian Institution, at Washington?
Why should Exhibit A of one of the greatest of all American scientific
achievements be in exile?
For the answer to these questions, puzzling to a vast number of
patriotic Americans, we must trace events back a number of years.
It will be remembered that Dr. Samuel P. Langley, while Director
and Secretary of the Smithsonian, with a $50,000 government fund
at his disposal for experiments (besides $20,000 from the Hodgkins
fund), had failed in his attempts to build a successful man-carrying
flying-machine. At each trial, in 1903, his machine promptly fell from
its launching platform into the Potomac. Doubtless Langley’s failure
was a bitter disappointment to him--all the more so because he was
derided in the public press for having even tried what was commonly
believed to be impossible. But when the Wrights flew, only nine days
after Langley’s final unsuccessful trial, they in a measure saved the
Langley reputation. No one could any longer say that he was a “crank.”
The Wrights had vindicated his belief that man could fly.
Langley uttered no word to minimize the importance of the Wrights’
feat. Nor was anything unfriendly toward Langley ever said by either of
the Wrights. On the contrary, the Wrights more than once gave Langley
credit for having been a source of inspiration to them, from the simple
fact that he, an eminent scientist, considered human flight possible.
Indeed, the Wrights took advantage of an opportunity to save the
Langley name from being made ridiculous. After Dr. Langley’s death, the
Smithsonian Regents ordered the erection in the Smithsonian building
of a tablet in his memory. The plan was to inscribe on the tablet the
“Langley Law,” as Langley’s chief contribution to aeronautical science.
Dr. Charles D. Walcott, who succeeded Dr. Langley as Secretary of the
Smithsonian, sent the proposed inscription to the Wrights for their
opinion of it. Wilbur Wright replied that it would be both unwise and
unfair to Langley to rest his reputation in aerodynamics especially on
that so-called Langley Law or upon the computations which gave rise
to it. The Wrights knew at that time, as all aeronautical engineers
know today, that the Langley Law was simply a mistake and not true.
Because of what Wilbur Wright pointed out in his letter, the Langley
Law was omitted from the memorial tablet. But, having eliminated the
discredited Law that _was_ Langley’s, Dr. Walcott then put in its
place on the tablet an inscription crediting Langley for a discovery
that _was not_ his! The inscription claimed for Langley that he had
“discovered the relations of speed and angle of inclination to the
lifting power of surfaces moving in the air.” (His tables of air
pressures had been antedated by both Duchemin and Lilienthal.)