Flying the Atlantic : 399 



speed; how this support varied with an increase in speed; how a 

 machine, made up of plane surfaces, could be controlled in the air. 

 These men all hoped finally to succeed in power-driven flight but 

 they were aware that they needed to know more and to have bet- 

 ter machines before they could risk putting power into them. 



Two of the most important problems were the problem of sufficient 

 power in relation to weight of the engine and the problem of stability 

 and control. The first man to feel confident that he had solved both 

 these problems was Professor Samuel P. Langley who was then the 

 head of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, 



Langley devised a type of machine that was in effect a tandem bi- 

 plane with the supporting surfaces virtually in the same horizontal 

 plane. At the extreme end of the framework there was placed a sort 

 of tail of intersecting plane surfaces that were to provide control by 

 acting as horizontal and vertical rudders. For this machine Langley 

 coined the name "aerodrome." As early as 1896 Langley created a 

 model of a machine of this type and designed for it a miniature steam 

 engine. When launched from the roof of a houseboat on the Potomac 

 this model flew for 3,000 feet. 



As a result of this demonstration Langley secured from President 

 McKinley a grant of funds to permit the construction of a man-carry- 

 ing aerodrome. By this time the gasoline motor was proving its gen- 

 eral efficiency and its ability to develop relatively large horsepower at 

 low weight. Therefore Langley and his associates decided to try the 

 aerodrome with a gasoline engine rather than with steam. 



The engine was built by Charles M. Manley, Langley's assistant. 

 Manley devised a novel and highly interesting engine. He arranged 

 five cylinders in a radial design, thus cutting down the weight of the 

 crankshaft and crankcase. Thus, he achieved an engine delivering 

 fifty-two horsepower at a weight of only 120 pounds. 



His radial engine was the first example of what was to be for many 

 years one of the basic successful types of aircraft motors. Manley, who 

 had solved the motor problem, also served as pilot. On two successive 

 attempts to achieve flight the machine fell into the river when launched 

 from a houseboat on the Potomac. It appears that the machine was 

 inherently unstable and also lacked adequate control surfaces. 



It was just nine days after Langley's machine flopped into the Poto- 

 mac for the second time that the Wright brothers made the world's 

 first flight in a power driven heavier-than-air machine. Langley was 

 a well-known scientist. His experiments and his aerodrome were 



