History of Planes
Sometimes, I forget how large the world really is. There are hundreds of places, of borders, of islands. Recently, I have been thinking about getting places. How to get places. How fast you can get to places. I think we are much faster than we used to be when it comes to getting to places. One reason for this is the invention and existence of planes. We would not get across the oceans or great distances anywhere near as fast if we did not have these inventions.
Before the successful invention of the airplane, there were tales and attempts at flight by humanity. Greek myth spoke of Daedalus and Icarus creating wings from feathers and wax to try and fly to their freedom, though the attempt did end in some disaster. There was also tell of a Grecian named Archytas who created a bird-like structure that flew two hundred meters. In the 9th and 11th centuries, there were experiments with gliders that ended in the injury of those who took the flights. There are also the drawings and schematics of Leonardo Di Vinci. He had researched the wings of birds, noting the difference between the center of mass and the center of pressure.
The most famous story in the development of planes has to be that of the Wright brothers. Wilbur and Orville Wright worked on the idea of a vehicle for flight and in 1901, Wilbur Wright presented the problems with creating such a machine in Chicago. One, the construction of the sustaining wings. Two, generation and application of power are required to keep the aircraft in the air and moving. Three, the balancing and steering of such a machine. For many years, the idea of wings for such a craft was based on those of birds, most of which have the power of flight by simple nature. It was George Cayley who discovered that it was the curve of the bird’s wings that helped them fly higher and applied this idea to aircraft wings in the 18th century. The Wrights used his theory and those that built on it to help their problems in regard to sustaining wings. There were many names that worked on the production of an engine that would be sustainable for such a flight including the earliest in 1829, F.D Artingstall. With the final problem, a solution was the balance, once again solved by a string of suggestions and minds.
So in actuality, flight wasn’t solved by one person or one group, there is no entity to thank for the faster travel that we now have. There so many things in life that coe from gradual progress and each idea contributed in its own way to development. There is something to be said in our own individual lives. Perhaps this to applies to the people we surround ourselves with or ourselves but either way, it demonstrates the importance of gradual progress and collaboration in life.
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