Pilot Proficiency

Wright Brothers: Little Known Secrets to their Success

Tuesday, March 19, 2013 at 12:31 AM ET

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Key Takeaways:

The Wright brothers' *Flyer* featured a canard configuration and wing warping that quickly became obsolete, replaced by a conventional aft-tail design conceptualized by earlier pioneers like Cayley and Pénaud.
Despite the *Flyer*'s "flawed" and inherently unstable design, the Wrights achieved success by prioritizing control over stability, a critical factor that distinguished them from contemporaries and enabled sustained, maneuverable powered flight.
The article deems the debate over "who flew first" largely inconsequential, asserting that the Wrights' true achievement was the first genuinely controlled and sustained powered flight, rather than brief, uncontrolled "hops" possibly made by others.

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The following article, Wrightophilia, is from the December 2003 print issue.

Peter Garrison taught himself to use a slide rule and tin snips, built an airplane in his backyard, and flew it to Japan. He began contributing to FLYING in 1968, and he continues to share his columns, ""Technicalities"" and ""Aftermath,"" with FLYING readers.