Vol. XVIII, No. r WASHINGTON 



January, 1907 



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MATEONAIL 

 ©OMAIPIHIB 

 'A(SAEIINII 



AERIAL LOCOMOTION 



With a Few Notes of Progress in the Construction 

 of an Aerodrome* 



By Alexander Graham Bell 

 Formerly President of the National Geographic Society 



THE history of aerial locomotion 

 is full of tragedies, and this is 

 specially true where flying-ma- 

 chines are concerned. Men have gone 

 up in balloons, and most of them have^ 

 come down safely. Men have launched 

 themselves into the air on wings, and 

 most have met with disaster to life or 

 limb. There have been centuries of effort 

 to produce a machine that should fly like 

 a bird, and carry a man whithersoever he 

 willed through the air ; and previously to 

 1783, the year sacred to the memory of 

 the brothers Montgolfier, all experiments 

 at aerial locomotion had this end exclu- 

 sively in view. 



Then came a period when the conquest 

 of the air was sought through the agency 

 of balloons. For more than one hun- 

 dred years the efforts of experimenters 

 were chiefly directed to the problem of 

 rendering the balloon dirigible ; and the 

 earlier experiments with gliding ma- 

 chines, and artificial wings, and the pro- 

 jects of men to drive heavy bodies 



*An address read before the Washington Academy of Sciences, December 13, 1906, and spe- 

 cially revised by Dr Bell for publication in the Nationai, Geographic Magazine. 



through the air by means of propellers 

 were largely forgotten. The balloon was 

 changed from its original spherical form 

 to a shape better adapted for propulsion ; 

 and at last, through the efforts of Santos 

 Dumont, we have arrived at the dirigible 

 balloon of today. But in spite of the 

 dirigibility of the modern balloon, it has 

 so far been found impracticable to impart 

 to this frail structure a velocity sufficient 

 to enable it to make headway against 

 anything but the mildest sort of wind. 

 The character of the balloon problem has 

 therefore changed. Velocity of propul- 

 sion rather than dirigibility is now the 

 chief object of research. 



THE BIRDS are once MORE RECOGNIZED AS 

 THE TRUE MODEES OE FLIGHT 



It has long been recognized by a grow- 

 ing school of thinkers that an aerial 

 vehicle, in order to cope with the wind, 

 should be specifically heavier than the air 

 through which it moves. This position 

 is supported by the fact that all of Na- 



