"Ron Wanttaja" wrote in message
...
On 23 Jun 2004 09:59:41 -0700, (Corrie) wrote:

Ron Wanttaja wrote in message
. ..
It took about forty years from the date the first government-sponsored
manned aerospacecraft left the atmosphere and glided down to a safe
landing
in the California desert to the successful flight of the first private
one.
If the same timescale was used for conventional airplanes, the first
privately-owned aircraft would have flown in 1943.

As opposed to 1903? The first airplane WAS privately-owned. Not to
mention amateur-built. The government-funded program wound up in the
Potomac. ;-)

Sure, I know the Wrights were private, it was just a way to make a
comparison. Interesting to note that the Wrights attempted to use
lawsuits
to deter those who wished to duplicate their feat; in retrospect, the
desire for the technology overcame the legal issues involved.

Ron Wanttaja

Well, strictly speaking, they used lawsuits to force other people to pay for
profiting from the use of their ideas. They gave permission for the use of
their patented system in experimental work. They were perfectly willing to
license their technology, but other manufacturers wanted to use it, both for
manufacturing airplanes and doing exhibitions, without paying for it.

There was a lot of suing, in all directions -- and thus the "patent pool"
solution of 1917, when the government wanted to start letting contracts for
airplanes without having to worry about who was suing whom.

The longest-running suit, which at least had the beneficial side-effect of
getting Orville to write and testify about how he and Wilbur developed the
airplane, was filed _against_ the Wright-Martin Aircraft Company (owner of
the Wright patents and to whom Orville was just a consultant at that point)
and the U.S . government by the heirs of John Montgomery. It was filed on
the basis of a 1905 patent by Montgomery covering the use of parabolic
curves as airfoils. The Wrights didn't use parabolic curves as airfoils,
but I guess you can always file a suit. The heirs eventually lost in 1928.

Tim Ward