细节
WRIGHT, ORVILLE. Typed letter signed to Lester D. Gardner, Dayton, Ohio, 28 November 1923. 1 1/2 pages, 4to.
SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT REGARDING "THE FIRST FLYING MACHINE"
An excellent letter in regard to Gardner's proposal to publish a reworked article based on some early writings of the Wrights, in which Orville clarifies some of the early published accounts of the Kitty Hawk experiments. and their aircraft design. "Your letter...enclosing copy for a proposed article entitled 'The Story of Mechanical Flight, by Orville Wright' was received....After looking it through I telegraphed you that I could not let the article go out under my name as I have consistently refused to sign articles not written by myself.
"But aside from this there were other reasons why I could not have signed the article. The greater part of the copy furnished is taken from 'Aeronautics' of May 26th and June 15th, 1915....I was surprised with a number of statements which did not appear to me to be Wilbur's because they did not properly represent his or my idea. I found this morning...the original of his deposition in the case against [Glenn] Curtiss that the article in 'Aeronautics' is a mutilated copy of it, and that the heading 'The Story of Flight' was one furnished by the editor of the paper and not by Wilbur. Wilbur's deposition did not purport to give a history of flight excepting in the one particular which was involved in the suit. I further notice that the editor speaks of this 'Story of Flight' as a 'series of articles' (which is entirely misleading) in which 'the late Wilbur Wright...sets forth in full the origin and sequence of his experiments,' which is again untrue....The attempt was made to conceal that this was a court document, by dropping out those parts which indicated the fact....Appendix G of [Griffith] Brewer's 'Wilbur Wright Memorial Lecture' evidently came from the same source...for I notice both of them are paragraphed alike...and both are mutilated in many of the same particulars.
"The only statement ever put out either by Wilbur or myself intended to be a 'Story of Mechanical Flight' was the article in the September, 1908, Century Magazine entitled 'The Wright Brothers' Aeroplane by Wilbur and Orville Wright.' I prepared this article while Wilbur was in Europe, but as I used a number of expressions taken from his writing I added his name as one of the authors. This is the only article that I know of that gives a statement...of the work done in producing the first flying maching.
"I am sending...seven photographs of the machine at Kitty Hawk in 1903....These originally were pretty good photographs but the negatives were in the water for some days at the time of the Dayton flood and suffered as a consequence...."
SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT REGARDING "THE FIRST FLYING MACHINE"
An excellent letter in regard to Gardner's proposal to publish a reworked article based on some early writings of the Wrights, in which Orville clarifies some of the early published accounts of the Kitty Hawk experiments. and their aircraft design. "Your letter...enclosing copy for a proposed article entitled 'The Story of Mechanical Flight, by Orville Wright' was received....After looking it through I telegraphed you that I could not let the article go out under my name as I have consistently refused to sign articles not written by myself.
"But aside from this there were other reasons why I could not have signed the article. The greater part of the copy furnished is taken from 'Aeronautics' of May 26th and June 15th, 1915....I was surprised with a number of statements which did not appear to me to be Wilbur's because they did not properly represent his or my idea. I found this morning...the original of his deposition in the case against [Glenn] Curtiss that the article in 'Aeronautics' is a mutilated copy of it, and that the heading 'The Story of Flight' was one furnished by the editor of the paper and not by Wilbur. Wilbur's deposition did not purport to give a history of flight excepting in the one particular which was involved in the suit. I further notice that the editor speaks of this 'Story of Flight' as a 'series of articles' (which is entirely misleading) in which 'the late Wilbur Wright...sets forth in full the origin and sequence of his experiments,' which is again untrue....The attempt was made to conceal that this was a court document, by dropping out those parts which indicated the fact....Appendix G of [Griffith] Brewer's 'Wilbur Wright Memorial Lecture' evidently came from the same source...for I notice both of them are paragraphed alike...and both are mutilated in many of the same particulars.
"The only statement ever put out either by Wilbur or myself intended to be a 'Story of Mechanical Flight' was the article in the September, 1908, Century Magazine entitled 'The Wright Brothers' Aeroplane by Wilbur and Orville Wright.' I prepared this article while Wilbur was in Europe, but as I used a number of expressions taken from his writing I added his name as one of the authors. This is the only article that I know of that gives a statement...of the work done in producing the first flying maching.
"I am sending...seven photographs of the machine at Kitty Hawk in 1903....These originally were pretty good photographs but the negatives were in the water for some days at the time of the Dayton flood and suffered as a consequence...."