218 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1914. 
Such an accident, occurrmg now, would be regarded as a passing 
mishap; but at that time it seemed to most people to demonstrate 
the futility of all aviation experiments. The press overwhelmed the 
inventor with ridicule; the great scientist himself referred to the acci- 
dent as having frustrated the best work of his life. Although he felt 
confident of the final success of his experiments, further financial 
support was not granted and he was forced to suspend operations. 
Scarcely could he anticipate that a decade later, in a far away little 
hamlet, workmen who had never known him would with keenest 
enthusiasm rehabilitate that same tandem monoplane, and launch it 
again and again in successful flight, and that afterwards in the Na- 
tional Capital it should be assigned the place of honor among the 
pioneer vehicles of the air. 
When in March, 1914, Mr. Glenn H. Curtiss was invited to send a 
flying boat to Washington to participate in celebrating ‘‘Langley 
Day,” 1 he replied, ‘‘I would like to put the Langley aeroplane itself 
in the air.’ Learning of this remark Secretary Walcott, of the 
Smithsonian Institution, soon authorized Mr. Curtiss to recanvas 
the original Langley aeroplane and launch it either under its own 
propulsive power or with a more recent engine and propeller. Early 
in April, therefore, the machine was taken from the Langley Labora- 
tory and shipped in a box car to the Curtiss Aviation Field, beside 
Lake Keuka, Hammondsport, N. Y. In the following month it was 
ready for its first trial since the unfortunate accident of 1903. e 
The main objects of these renewed trials were, first, to show whether 
the original Langley machine was capable of sustained free flight 
with a pilot, and, secondly, to determine more fully the advantages of 
the tandem type of aeroplane. The work seemed a proper part of 
the general program of experiments planned for the recently reopened 
Langley Aerodynamical Laboratory. It was, indeed, for just such 
experimentation that the aeroplane had been given to the Smith- 
sonian Institution by the War Department, at whose expense it had 
been, developed and brought to completion prior to 1903. After some 
successful flights at Hammondsport the famous craft could, at the 
discretion of the Smithsonian Institution, either be preserved for ex- 
hibition or used for further scientific study. To achieve the two 
main objects above mentioned, the aeroplane would first be flown as 
nearly as possible in its original condition, then with such modifica- 
tions as might seem desirable for technical or other reasons. 
Various ways of launching were considered. In 1903 the Langley 
aeroplane was launched from the top of a houseboat. A car support- 
ing it and drawn by lengthy spiral springs ran swiftly along a track, 
then suddenly dropped away, leaving the craft afloat in midair with 
1 May 6, the anniversary of the famous flight of Langley’s Steam model aeroplane in 1896, is known in 
Washington as ‘‘ Langley Day,” and has been celebrated with aerial maneuvers over land and water. 
