The Wrights were only twice charged with having plagiarized others'
work, a somewhat unusual record in view of their successes, and both
times apparently entirely without foundation. A statement was
published that the 1903 flight engine was a reworked Pope Toledo
automobile unit, and it was repeated in an English lecture on the
Wright brothers. This was adequately refuted by McFarland but
additionally, it must be noted, there was no Pope Toledo company or
car when the Wright engine was built. This company, an outgrowth of
another which had previously manufactured one-and two-cylinder
automobiles, was formed, or reformed, and a Pope license arrangement
entered into during the year 1903.
The other incident was connected with Whitehead's activities and
designs. Whitehead was an early experimenter in flying, about the time
of the Wrights, whose rather extraordinary claims of successful flight
were published in the 1901-1903 period but received little attention
until very much later. His first engines were designed by a clever
engineer, Anton Pruckner, who left at the end of 1901, after which
Whitehead himself became solely responsible for them. It was stated
that the Wrights visited the Whitehead plant in Bridgeport,
Connecticut, and that Wilbur remained for several days, spending his
time in their machine shop. This was not only categorically denied by
Orville Wright when he heard of it but it is quite obvious that the
1903 or any other of the Wright engine designs bears little
resemblance to Pruckner's work. In fact, its principal design features
are just the opposite of Pruckner's, who utilized vertical cylinders,
the 2-stroke cycle, and air-cooling, which Whitehead at some point
changed to water-cooling.[15]
[Footnote 15: Considerable doubt surrounds Whitehead's actual flight
accomplishments, but Pruckner's engines were certainly used, as
several were sold to early pioneers, including Charles Wittemann. It
is probable that the specific power output was not very great, for the
air-cooled art of this time was not very advanced and Pruckner had a
rather poor fin design. But the change to water cooling eliminated
this trouble, and the engines were most simple, should have been
relatively quite light, and with enough development could probably
have been made into sufficiently satisfactory flying units for that
period.]
The Four-Cylinder Vertical Demonstration Engine and the First
Production Engine
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