Orville WRIGHT (1871-1948)

Lot 123
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20000 - 30000 EUR
Orville WRIGHT (1871-1948)
Lettre dactylographiée signée à Mark Sullivan. Dayton (Ohio), 17 juin 1926. 3 p. sur 3 f. in-4 (26,8 x 18,5 cm) de papier vélin à à en-tête gravé, encre noire. Très importante lettre d'Orville Wright, célèbre pionnier américain de l'aviation, au journaliste Mark Sullivan. C'est UNE DES PLUS COMPLÈTES DESCRIPTIONS PAR WRIGHT LUI-MÊME DES ESSAIS ET DÉMONSTRATIONS DE VOL HUMAIN QU'IL RÉALISA AVEC SON FRÈRE WILBUR: «You ask why it was that the public took so little notice of our 1903 flights and not until 1908 awoke to the fact that human flight had actually been accomplished. I think this was mainly due to the fact that human flight was generally looked upon as an impossibility, and that scarcely any one believed in it until he actually saw it with his own eyes. Only a few, probably less than a dozen, saw these first flights of 1903. In 1904 and 1905 the number of witnesses was increased to a hundred or two; in 1908, to thousands. Hundreds of people have told me that they saw the first real demonstration of mechanical flight. But as hardly any two of these had seen the same flight, I have come to the conclusion that almost no one ever really believed who had not himself actually seen a flight. It amuses me that practically every one now thinks he has always believed in its possibility and that many think that before 1903 they had predicted its early accomplishment! At the time we couldn't find a half dozen such. [...]» Dans la suite de sa lettre, Wright revient longuement sur l'influence déterminante que les travaux de Samuel Pierpont Langley, Octave Chanute et Otto Lilienthal eurent sur leurs propres expérimentations. Quelques traces de rouille et petites taches
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