The First Airplanes

When it comes to flight, people have been fascinated from the beginning, but it was in the 1700's that the real breakthroughs that enabled the development of the first airplanes were made. 

In 1799, more than a century before the dream of powered flight would be realized, the English engineer Sir George Cayley had already developed things like self-righting rowboats and caterpillar tractors.  His interests were broad and varied, but he is chiefly remembered for his contributions to aeronautical engineering.  His early work included non-movable wings and flappers to create thrust.  The tail of the craft was movable and could control the descent.  These first gliders were the ancestors of our modern airplanes; they were aircraft that flew with fixed wings.

By 1804, Sir Cayely had designed and flown a small glider with a single wing that, along with the rudder-like tail, was mounted on a common joint.  With a weight that could be maneuvered to adjust for the center of gravity, this glider was the first fixed-wing airplane in the world that could actually fly.  A short five years later, Sir Cayley had built a glider that was capable of carrying a man's weight.  Though the wing was around 300 feet in length, it was still somewhat functional; it was able to carry one of Sir Cayley's assistants into the air, albeit briefly.  With more than a decade's worth of findings, Cayle published "On Aerial Navigation," a long article on man-made flight. 

Sir George Cayley was widely regarded as a prodigy in his time, but it would take years before his work was truly recognized for what it was; Sir Cayley had isolated the three elements necessary for powered flight, that is, lift, propulsion and control, concepts that would power every aircraft in the years to come.  Though Sir Cayley could not rouse enough interest for an association to study the problem of flight, his work remained an instrumental tool towards helping people uncover the secrets of travel through the air.

Still unsatisfied with his results, Sir Cayley built a small craft in 1849, which he called his Boy Glider.  This glider was specifically meant to bear a person; the one that preceded it had necessitated his assistant clinging to the fuselage.  The Boy Glider lifted a ten-year-old boy off the ground for a few yards at a time in the first incident of manned fixed-wing airplane flight.  In 1843, Sir Cayley convinced his coachman to fly a larger craft, this time in a shaky glide that lasted a few hundred feet.  Although the coachman immediately withdrew from Sir Cayley's employ after getting back on the ground, Sir Cayley's work had assured him a place in aeronautical history.

In 1870, a Frenchman by the name of Alphonse Penaud created a miniature helicopter through the use of several twisted rubber bands.  Although this was first picked up by toymakers, Penaud went on to invent the rubber-powered planophore, a model airplane that would be instrumental on the later design of real airplanes.  The planophore measured only 20 inches, but  when launched flew 131 feet in 11 seconds.  This is the first example of a mono-winged airplane that evidenced stable, uninterrupted flight.    Penaud was also responsible built and sold ornithopters, which mimicked the up and down movement of the wings of birds, as well as other models which were driven through the use of propellers.

The years after Penaud's work were filled with mixed successes; several remarkable concepts and ideas came into play that would influence the aviation industry that was to come.  For instance, Felix Du Temple would build a monoplane powered by steam, but though it does manage to perform a take-off with the use of the ski-jump, it cannot sustain flight.

With more development taking place on the airplanes themselves, more work was also being done with the pilots.  Louis Moulliard, another Frenchman, proposed that all would-be aviators should have experience with gliders to familiarize themselves with the principles of flight before trying to ascend.  As previous pilots had either been volunteers or whoever seemed to be handy at the time, the advent of pilots with a scientific grasp of flight helped the fledging field a great deal.

The progress of the first aircraft came about slowly and with a great deal of hard work.  Every small advancement led to the innovations that came later, and even if the early planes never flew much further than 100 feet at a time, they still pushed the field ahead.  For instance, although his monoplane only flew 100 feet before it crashed, Alexander Mozhaiski's steam-powered craft was only the second power-assisted take-off recorded at the time.  Similarly, Clement Adler's bat-winged airplane rose 8 inches in the air and flew for 165 feet in 1890, making it the first manned plane to take off from level ground; earlier planes had relied on being pushed from a high surface.

Influenced by Sir Cayley and Penaud, Orville and Wilbur Wright studied the efforts of all of the researchers and engineers that came before them.  They incorporated what became known as three-axis control, something that allowed the pilot to control the aircraft and keep its equilibrium.  Rather than spending their efforts on more powerful engines, which was the trend of the time, the Wright brothers instead chose to concentrate on how best to manage the weight of the aircraft.  They worked with a wing that could twist and adjust itself to the various atmospheric conditions, and chose Kitty Hawk in North Carolina as a testing ground due to its powerful winds.

Finally, after a great deal of testing with gliders, the Wrights moved on to work with engines and propellers.  On December 17th of 1903, Orville Wright piloted the first fully-controllable aircraft that was able to sustain itself in the air independently.  Though the flight lasted for less than twenty seconds and covered only 120 feet, subsequent flights later that day would stretch the distance to 850 feet.  This ended when a gust of wind rolled and smashed the plane beyond repair, but history had been made.

From Sir George Cayley to the Wright brothers, the history of the first airplanes is an important one that showcases both ingenuity and determination.