Last Thursday a great anniversary in the annals of aviation, for it was on December 17, 100%, that the Wright brothers successfully made the rst fight in an aeroplane fitted with o petrol motor. The two brothers had been interested in the problems of flight since 1900 and had made ex. periments with gliding machines at Kittyhawk, N. Carolina, but on this occasion they succeeded in flying 260 yards In a powered machine. The performance created no great amount enthusiasm, and though just short of two years ater, near Dayton, they made a flight of more than 24 miles ata speed of 38 miles an hour, proving the practicability of Aight In heavy-than-air machines, they still failed to enlist financial support in the United States. In 1908 Wilbur Wright went to France and won the Michelin prize by flying 56 miles, securing International fame and a greater interest in his projects. In December of the same year he flew '77 miles in 2hr. 20 min, and after a few more demonstrations including tone in which he flew from the Hudson River {o Grant's Tomb and back, in Merch, 1900 the brothers were awarded a special gold medal by the USS. Congress. Later the government bought a machine for $20,000, fatter which the invention was offclally adopted by the American Army. The rapid development of the acroplane since that time, " principally owing to the influence ofthe Great War, has so accustomed the world {to aviation that it comes almost as fa surprise that so short a while as thirty-three years ago Its possibility was looked " upon with no small amount of scepticism.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.