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“We believed in a good God, a bad Devil, and a hot Hell, and more than anything else we believed that same God did not intend man should ever fly.”
all was amazingly simple
“We had seen the glider fly without an engine,” remembered John T. Daniels, “and when these boys put an engine in it, we knew that they knew exactly what they were doing.”
“workingest boys”
It wasn’t luck that made them fly; it was hard work and common sense; they put their whole heart and soul and all their energy into an idea and they had the faith.
their calm faith in ultimate success,
Nor did anyone seem to appreciate the kind of minds, not to say the extraordinary skill and courage, needed to succeed at so daring a venture.
quite free to pursue a whole range of active interests.
the Wrights were not just the sort who love machinery, but were “interested in the modern developments of science and art.”
the extent of their library
“they were thoroughly versed not only in regard to our present knowledge, but everything that...
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how much more there was to Wilbur and Orville tha...
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He had succeeded with his ideas only by close study.
“My imagination pictures things more vividly than my eyes.”
No wonder he could visualize flying like a bird
reaping “a harvest of money.”
Great metaphor
Wilbur Wright is a zealot.
He and his brother made the conquest of the sky their existence.
phlegmatic
someone who seemed so devoid of the elemental human emotions and desires.
“Wilbur Wright is the best example of strength of character that I have ever seen.
“The impatience of a hundred thousand persons would not accelerate the rhythm of his stride.”
not because that was the fashion of the moment, but because of “their grit, because of their persistence, because of their loyalty to conviction, because of their indefatigable industry, because of their hopefulness and
They say that I, too, am a workman.
Pride
The Bishop liked to preach the futility of craving fame.
“Enjoy fame ere its decadence, for I have realized the emptiness of its trumpet blasts,”
And false the light on glory’s plume As fading lines of even.
isthmus
Signal Corps
campaign hat,
Charles Flint
Founded IBM
That Orville’s passenger that day could well have been Theodore Roosevelt was not mentioned.
“We learn much by tribulation, and by adversity our hearts are made better.”
“No, we have solved this problem. With us flying is not an experiment; it is a demonstration.”
in nine years experience.”
Alexander Graham Bell and two members of his Aerial Experiment Association came to the hospital to see Orville, but learned he was not yet ready for visitors.
“Your sister has been devotion itself,”
Strong family support
Alexander Graham Bell invited her to take a drive one evening along with Octave Chanute, after which they dined at the Bell home on 33rd Street in Washington.
“Have lost eighty-two and a half dollars already,”
The family monitored money closely
Not since Benjamin Franklin had any American been so overwhelmingly popular in France.
not just his feats in the air that aroused such interest but his strong “individuality.”
The “accommodating attitude of this man that we took great pleasure in depicting as a recluse, is inexhaustible,”
Only by escaping out into the countryside on his bicycle could he have time to himself.
achieving “through straightforwardness, intelligence, and tenacity . . . one of the most beautiful inventions of the human genius.
we believe each other, and we are friends. I thank you for this.
a tribute to an idea that has always impassioned mankind.
curio
full-hearted,
men of eminence.”
Edwardian Era.
Nor were they ever again to enjoy such a time together.
