Talk:Gustave Whitehead/Archive 10

1945 Charles Whitehead
I commented out the following sentences:

"Whitehead's son Charles was interviewed on a 1945 radio program, which led to another magazine article, which led to a Reader's Digest article that reached a very large audience.(Howard, Wilbur and Orville, p. 437) Orville Wright, then in his seventies, countered by writing an article, "The Mythical Whitehead Flight", which appeared in the August 1945 issue of U.S. Air Services, a publication with a far smaller, but very influential, readership."

What was the purpose of this paragraph? What did Charles say that Orville refuted? Binksternet (talk) 18:17, 28 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Wasn't it just the fact that the Reader's Digest article reached a very large audience that made Orville write an article to discredit Whitehead?


 * I would very much want to be able to read Orville's article. Does anybody have a copy of the text? Roger491127 (talk) 19:37, 28 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Gibbs-Smith quoted it in 1960 for his book on early aviation. I don't know if he quoted all of it or a portion. I typed Gibbs-Smith's version out for you back in September 2010; you can see it in Archive 6. Cheers - Binksternet (talk) 00:05, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

Binksternet's many changes to the article
I see that Binksternet has made a number of changes to the article. I support DonFB in any changes or reverts he wants to do to these changes.

Some of them are very doubtful in my view. Especially:

+	 |first_flight_aircraft=Whitehead No. 21 (disputed)

+	 |first_flight_date=August 14, 1901 (disputed)

"He is claimed by some to be the first man to achieve powered flight, before the Wright brothers; an assertion which is dismissed by mainstream aviation scholars."

What "mainstream viewpoint dismissive or doubtful"? Sources? Original research?

In section Legacy

Opinions about Whitehead's work and accomplishments differ sharply among researchers, with the mainstream viewpoint dismissive or doubtful.

What "mainstream viewpoint dismissive or doubtful"? Sources? Original research?

At the end of the article

The strange and unmotivated shortening of the ==See also== list.

The strange and unmotivated shortening of the ===Sources=== list and the change of its name to Bibliography. Roger491127 (talk) 20:20, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

If it was up to me I would simply revert the article to before the bunch of changes Binksternet just made, because it is such a massive change of the whole article, and demand that he discuss changes he want to make here on the discussion page before he makes them. Roger491127 (talk) 20:36, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

I just tried to revert the article to the version before all Binksternet changes. Reason: Such massive and numerous changes should be discussed before they are made. I hope other editors agree and revert it again if Binksternet changes it back to his version. But Binksternet had writeprotected it so it wasn't reverted.Roger491127 (talk) 20:52, 28 May 2011 (UTC)


 * I can understand the ==See also== "Links already integrated into the body of the text are generally not repeated" and aviation history covers the whole of avaition while the important (related) part is "early flight"  GraemeLeggett (talk) 20:44, 28 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Bibliography is a standard terms across the aviation project articles.
 * The additions to the infobox are necessary because if someone just read the infobox they would not pick up that whether or not the No. 21 flew or not and when is disputed. Whereas the Wrights are known to have flown on certain dates in certain machines and the dispute is whether or not someone else did similar before them.
 * The lede should be a summary of the rest of the article, and the rest of the article says some people think he flew, and sone (supposedly) better respected people think he didn't. GraemeLeggett (talk) 20:50, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

"sone (supposedly) better respected people think he didn't."

Sources? Who supposes? original research? Roger491127 (talk) 20:58, 28 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Regarding reversion - I see Binksternet's near-simultaneous editing effectively jumped your revert but having gone through his edits, I would have undone your revert. There were several basic editing changes that would not be disputed and to blindly revert them IMHO bad practice. GraemeLeggett (talk) 21:04, 28 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Regarding sources not OR - because those who say Whitehead didn't fly (didn't fly first) are well respected and outnumber those he think he did get up in the air before the Wrights. GraemeLeggett (talk) 21:04, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

Whitehead No. 21 (disputed)

How can the name of the airplane be "(disputed)"?

"because those who say Whitehead didn't fly (didn't fly first) are well respected and outnumber those he think he did get up in the air before the Wrights."

Didn't you read my criticism of most of Binksternet's "well respected" sources above, where I show that most of them are faulty or very doubtful? And that the authors who say that Whitehead didn't fly first outnumber the authors who say the opposite is simply wrong. Roger491127 (talk) 21:21, 28 May 2011 (UTC)


 * The infobox now says "(disputed)" after the name of the aircraft because it is disputed that he flew in it. It also says disputed after the date because the date is disputed.
 * You, personally, are not able to show that mainstream viewpoints are faulty or doubtful with respect to how we write a Wikipedia article. You can only bring in sources to show the mainstream sources to be doubtful or faulty. However, the fact remains that the mainstream viewpoint is against Whitehead, utterly dismissive of him.
 * Please wait until I release the article from its "in use" template before you edit it. We can discuss my article changes, mostly cleaning up, after that. Binksternet (talk) 21:28, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

In the "scholarly sources" Binksternet refers to, where are the evidence? Most of them just say they do not think Whitehead flew in August 1901, without referring to any substantial evidence. They ignore all evidence which support that he flew.

"William F. Trimble, aviation historian, professor and scholar at Auburn University doesn't say anything about Whithead's flights in 1901. He talks about 1899.

John B. Crane, Harvard professor of economics in the 1930s and '40s. It is well known that he reversed his view in 1937 and in 1949 he again wrote that the evidence showed that Whitehead flew in August 1901. So why does Binksternet refer to him as a "scholarly source" who supports the view that Whitehead didn't fly in August 1901?

"Biographiq, an organization that composes standard biography texts: The Wright Brothers: Beyond the First Flight, Filiquarian Publishing, LLC, 2008. "Those who promote the legacy of Gustave Whitehead now accuse the Smithsonian of refusing to investigate claims of earlier flights.""

Biographiq didn'say that Whitehead did not fly in 1901.

Louis Chmiel and Nick Engler didn'say that Whitehead did not fly in 1901. They say that even if he flew it would have no historical significance.

"Stephen Kirk, Wright brothers author, earned a masters degree (MFA) at University of North Carolina-Greensboro. He wrote First in Flight: The Wright Brothers in North Carolina, in which he says Whitehead changed his story of 1901 from flying a half mile to flying a mile and a half."

Stephen Kirk did not deny that Whitehead flew in 1901, he just does not understand that more than one flight was made August 14, 1901.

If we delete the authors which did not say that Whitehead did not fly in August 1901, and maybe also those which are obvious mistakes, how many books remain on Binksternet's list of "scholarly sources"?

How does that number of books compare with the number of books and authoritative web pages which support Whiteheads flights in 1901.

It is easy to see that the latter number is much bigger than the few books that remain on Binksternet's list of sources?

So what does the "mainstream view" today say on the issue?

Why did Binksternet fill out his list with so many sources which do not support his view? Was the real list far too short? Roger491127 (talk) 00:20, 29 May 2011 (UTC)


 * To counter a mainstream view that is reliably sourced, you cannot simply describe how you think it is not worthy. You must instead find a reliably sourced rebuttal to it, ideally one that is attached to a more reputable author. That is where you will get hung up! The most reputable sources we have are the ones who think Whitehead did not fly. Binksternet (talk) 01:35, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

It wasn't reliably sourced. Many of the sources you listed did not say that Whitehead did not fly in 1901, see above for details. And answer the question: Why did Binksternet fill out his list with so many sources which do not support his view? Was the real list far too short? Roger491127 (talk) 03:34, 29 May 2011 (UTC)
 * A list of sources that says that Whitehead did not fly first includes would include all those that say someone else did. You do not need a source to say Alan Shepard was not the first person in space when there is one that says another person was first.GraemeLeggett (talk) 09:46, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

That reasoning still leave the questions unanswered: Why did Binksternet fill out his list with so many sources which do not say that Whitehead did not fly in 1901? I want Binksternet to write a new list, with only books which explicitly say that Whitehead did not fly in 1901. Author, name of book, the year it was written and a quote that says that Whitehead did not fly in 1901. The issue is not who flew first, the issue is what sources explicitly say that Whitehead did not fly in 1901, or any other year. One of his sources said that Whitehead did not fly in 1899, but said nothing about 1901 or 1902, so that source does not qualify. Another source said that even if he flew it doesn't matter, so that source does not qualify. See above for more sources he listed which do not qualify. Roger491127 (talk) 00:34, 30 May 2011 (UTC)


 * A good many of our sources dismiss Whitehead because of his many lies, starting with the ridiculous steam engine flight of 1899 where he supposedly has a stoker etc. Once the well is poisoned by such a fabricated story, observers of Whitehead will not be able to give him a fresh start in examining 1901. That's how our sources appear to go. Binksternet (talk) 04:29, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Also, I am not going to make a new list showing only 1901 deniers. The sources I supplied dismiss Whitehead in total. Because of the scholarship of the sources, this is significant. We do not always know how the scholars arrived at their conclusions (some do not show their work) but the conclusions are important anyway. Binksternet (talk) 04:33, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Replicas
Modern-day replicas of No.21 are mentioned in the lead section but not in the article body. Per WP:LEAD, the lead section should not introduce any facts absent from the body. The solution, of course, is to write a section about the replicas. Any takers? Binksternet (talk) 01:42, 29 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Simple job. I changed the name of the section Reproductions to Replicas. Roger491127 (talk) 04:25, 29 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Ha! I should have seen that easy solution. Thanks! Binksternet (talk) 12:37, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

Don't Ha! too soon. I searched hundreds of versions back, put that page in edit mode and copied the reproductions section, then I returned to the present version for a suitable place for it, only to find that the section is still there. That made me a little angry because I had wasted work because you had missed that the section already existed, so I just changed the name there. But according to technical discussions earlier the proper name is reproductions not replicas. So I left it to you to change both occurrences of word replicas to reproductions. Roger491127 (talk) 00:24, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

About the new version
From the new version:

"an assertion which is dismissed by mainstream aviation scholars."

"led to renewed examination and dismissal by aviation scholars."

"The Smithsonian Institution rejects claims that Whitehead flew an airplane."

None of these expressions are referenced to any source. Add references or I will delete them with the reason: No source, no reference, original research?

"Orville Wright, then in his seventies, countered by writing an article, "The Mythical Whitehead Flight", which appeared in the August 1945 issue of U.S. Air Services, a publication with a far smaller, but very influential, readership. Wright wrote, "I personally do not believe that Whitehead ever succeeded in making any airplane flights. Here are my reasons: 1. Whitehead did not possess sufficient mechanical skill and equipment to build a successful motor. 2. Whitehead was given to gross exaggeration. He was eccentric—a visionary and a dreamer to such an extent that he actually believed what he merely imagined. He had delusions.""

This quote is probably selected in a tendentious way. Show us the full text so we can quote the faulty and obviously mistaken parts too. Roger491127 (talk) 03:36, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

This sentence which DonFB and I agreed upon I chose to place in the Witnesses section, it was earlier in the Connecticut 1901 section, was deleted by somebody, so I re-inserted it.

In his first letter to American Inventor, Whitehead claimed he made four "trips" in the airplane on August 14, 1901; and that the longest was one and a half miles. Roger491127 (talk) 03:54, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

It serves 3 purposes: 1: It explains the following sentence: "Discrepancies in statements by witnesses about different flights they said they saw on August 14, 1901, raised questions whether any flight was made." 2: It supports Harworth's affidavit about one and a half mile. 3: It puts Whitehead himself on the witnesses list, and in this single sentence he both asserts that he made 4 flights that day, and that the longest was one and a half mile. Roger491127 (talk) 04:04, 29 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Mainstream dismissal. The first consideration about text in the article is, is it supportable by reliable sources? The answer to all of the mainstream dismissal sentences is yes, it is. I put those into the article to tell the reader that the details he is reading about, ones that are listed in support of Whitehead being first in flight, are not accepted by mainstream aviation history. This major, major fact bears repeating as appropriate. Binksternet (talk) 12:36, 29 May 2011 (UTC)


 * You still need to reference all three of those expressions to a source.  Roger491127 (talk) 00:50, 30 May 2011 (UTC)


 * 1945 Wright quote. I added this quote taken from the Gibbs-Smith book of 1960 in which Gibbs-Smith quotes Wright at length. I selected this quote because it perfectly sums up Wright's 1945 position without going into too much detail. The fuller version can be found at our talk archive 6 where I typed it all out from the 1960 book. Binksternet (talk) 12:36, 29 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks, I will check out the "fuller version", but I would like to read the full version. Orville's version, not Gibbs-Smith's version. Roger491127 (talk) 00:50, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Witnessese section
having read through the article just know I feel that some of the witnesses section is a bit jarring. Could some of it could go into the section on the investigations, as that is the reason they were given? I presume the witness statements were part of those books. And where there were differences between witnesses did the books authors comment or interpret them? GraemeLeggett (talk) 15:55, 29 May 2011 (UTC)


 * A section called Witnesses should contain all important witnesses to the two most important flights, the early flight witnessed by a journalist, and the longest flight of the day, one and a half miles. And also other important witnesses which can tell the reader something important about the ability of Whitehead to make motorized flights and the level of control he had over the airplane, Harworth's statement about the flights from one Avenue to the next and back again, for example. The problem I have with this section is that it starts with the most confusing witness and the research about him which resulted in that he refused to say anything about what happened that day, which makes him a witness of minor, if any, importance. To make the section a lot easier to read he and the research about him could be moved to the Research or investigations section, or moved to the end of the Witnesses section. Roger491127 (talk) 00:59, 30 May 2011 (UTC)


 * How can you say he is a witness of minor importance when every Whitehead denier uses him as an example? You cannot classify the most-quoted witness as the least important. He's the opposite! Binksternet (talk) 04:18, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Of course Dickie is the favorite witness for Whitehead deniers, as long as they chose to ignore O'Dwyer's phone interview with Dickie, where it becomes obvious that he hated Whitehead intensely and would never give him credit for anything.

"O'Dwyer had known the older Dickie since childhood. Early in his research, O'Dwyer spoke by telephone to Dickie. O'Dwyer learned that Dickie had a grudge against Whitehead. O'Dwyer described the conversation:

...his mood changed to anger when I asked him about Gustave Whitehead. He flatly refused to talk about Whitehead, and when I asked him why, he said: "That SOB never paid me what he owed me. My father had a hauling business and I often hitched up the horses and helped Whitehead take his airplane to where he wanted to go. I will never give Whitehead credit for anything. I did a lot of work for him and he never paid me a dime." [12]" Roger491127 (talk) 06:30, 30 May 2011 (UTC)


 * This does not at all help your argument that Dickie is unimportant or should go last. Everyone, even the pro-Whitehead poeople, agrees that Dickie is a crucial witness because of his damning of Whitehead. He is either quoted straight or character assassinated because of his anger about debt. In other words, Dickie is the perfect witness to discuss first in a section about the notable witnesses. Binksternet (talk) 06:53, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Your second sentence in this paragraph defies all logic and everything I have read. Dickie does not need to be character assassinated by others, he makes it perfectly all by himself. The problem is still that readers will be very confused by the first 25-30 lines in the Witnesses section and will hardly read the rest of the section. Roger491127 (talk) 08:48, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

About Gibbs-Smith book of 1960 in which Gibbs-Smith quotes Wright at length
Gibbs-Smith quoting Orville: "The myth of Gustave Whitehead having made a power flight in 1901 was founded upon the story which appeared in the Bridgeport Herald of August 18, 1901. Although this mythical flight was alleged to have taken place on August 14th, and to have been witnessed by a Herald reporter, the news was withheld four days and appeared as a feature story in a Sunday edition of that paper! Would the editor of the Herald have held back for four days a story of such great human and historical interest, if he believed it to be true? "

Then Orville goes on to refer to Dickie, Dvorak and Beach to discredit Whitehead.

Orville quoted Dvorak saying: '"I personally do not believe that Whitehead ever succeeded in making any airplane flights. Here are my reasons: 1. Whitehead did not possess sufficient mechanical skill and equipment to build a successful motor.

Of course, now we know that Bridgeport Herald was a weekly newspaper, and that Orville quoted the three people who were very angry at Whitehead. Dvorak because Whitehead had told him that his motor construction would never work, and Beach because Whitehead had told him that his airplane design was faulty, and Dickie, well you know why he hated Whitehead. And we know that Whitehead was a very good engine builder. Dvorak said that only because he was very angry at Whitehead for telling him that Dvorak's motor design was faulty.

Note that Gibbs-Smith accepts all these five mistakes without further research and he is making his judgement of Whitehead based on these five mistakes, or very tendentious selections of faulty facts by Orville. Roger491127 (talk) 06:34, 30 May 2011 (UTC)


 * So find some scholar equal to Gibbs-Smith who counters his supposed errors. Binksternet (talk) 06:54, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Gibbs-Smith also based his judgement of Whitehead on what the Smithsonian said about Whitehead. From this article: "Orville Wright's critical comments were later quoted by the both the Smithsonian Institution and by British aviation historian Charles Harvard Gibbs-Smith."

I have put forward criticism of the Smithsonian earlier, but I stumbled upon criticism of the Smithsonian put forward by Orville Wright too.

From http://www.flyingmachines.org/DougMalanGWArticle.html

"I believe my course in sending our Kitty Hawk machine to a foreign museum is the only way of correcting the history of the flying-machine," Invention & Technology reported Mr. Wright saying. "In its campaign to discredit others in the flying art, the Smithsonian has issued scores of these false and misleading statements. They can be proved false and misleading from documents. But the people of today do not take the trouble to examine this evidence."

His comments could not have been more ironic, considering the position of the pro-Whitehead faction.

The injustices directed at the Wrights then are now directed at Mr. Whitehead and anyone else with pre-1903 claims, Whitehead supporters assert.

An example from this article: "Former Connecticut State Senator George Gunther said O'Dwyer's book History by Contract was too heavy-handed. Gunther said he had been having "cordial" conversations with the Smithsonian about giving credit to Whitehead, "but after O'Dwyer blasted them in his book, well, that totally turned them off.""

Is that a reaction you should expect from a prestigious scientific institution like the Smithsonian? It is more like a reaction you could expect from a 5-year old child.

It is obvious that that people who run the Smithsonian, and have run it for 110 years, do not possess the disciplined behavior and respect for scientific methods or truthfulness you should expect from a prestigious scientific institution like the Smithsonian. But Gibbs-Smith doesn't hesitate to rely on the Smithsonian in spite of all criticism directed at the Smithsonian for more than a hundred years. Roger491127 (talk) 07:52, 30 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Did Gibbs-Smith solely quote Wright as evidence or use his words as commentary on the Whitehead claim? What were Gibbs-Smith's words wrapping the Wright quote? GraemeLeggett (talk) 08:06, 30 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Graeme, I copied the entire Gibbs-Smith bit about Whitehead, written in 1960, into the talk page last fall. You can see it here: Talk:Gustave_Whitehead/Archive_6. Cheers - Binksternet (talk) 14:23, 30 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Aha, I have it now. My reading is that the key statement is Gibbs-Smith making a claim that mainstream opinion is against Whitehead rather than that he quotes Orvilles opinion of the matter.GraemeLeggett (talk) 15:09, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

From the new version:

"an assertion which is dismissed by mainstream aviation scholars."

"led to renewed examination and dismissal by aviation scholars."

"The Smithsonian Institution rejects claims that Whitehead flew an airplane."

None of these expressions are referenced to any source. Add references or I will delete them with the reason: No source, no reference, original research?

Note that for years we have been forced to reference every statement positive for Whitehead. It is just fair that you have to follow the same rules.

In the Legacy section:

"Orville Wright, then in his seventies, countered by writing an article, "The Mythical Whitehead Flight", which appeared in the August 1945 issue of U.S. Air Services, a publication with a far smaller, but very influential, readership. Wright wrote, "I personally do not believe that Whitehead ever succeeded in making any airplane flights. Here are my reasons: 1. Whitehead did not possess sufficient mechanical skill and equipment to build a successful motor. 2. Whitehead was given to gross exaggeration. He was eccentric—a visionary and a dreamer to such an extent that he actually believed what he merely imagined. He had delusions.""

This paragraph is faulty. It was Dvorak, not Orville who made that statement. See the text in archive 6. Roger491127 (talk) 08:27, 30 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks for pointing that out. I changed the text to reflect that Gibbs-Smith was quoting Wright who was quoting Dvorak. As well, I made certain that Dvorak was not described only as being pro-Whitehead in the Legacy section. Binksternet (talk) 15:49, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

You could, of course, explain what happened between Dvorak and Whitehead that made him change from a pro-Whitehead person to an anti-Whitehead person, if you are interested in giving the reader the complete picture. I have read about how angry Dvorak became when Whitehead told him that Dvorak's engine design would never work, so the story is available in the documentation.

That story is very similar to the event that happened when Beach got so angry at Whitehead so he sent some men to disassemble Beach's airplane and remove it from Whitehead's workshop. Roger491127 (talk) 23:25, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

The revised introduction
The latest revision to the intro (as of the date/time of this Discussion post) is a bit problematic, in my opinion. It makes a couple of fairly sweeping statements that are not referenced; hence RJ's objections.

The statements I refer to are:

"...an assertion which is dismissed by mainstream aviation scholars."

and:

"renewed examination and dismissal..."

These phrases need references, or attributions, to specify who is doing the dismissing, and something that indicates why they are considered "mainstream".

Similarly, the phrase: "He is claimed by some..." is an example of weasel-wording. The text should either specify who "some" are, or insert a footnote after that word to support the statement, or both.

I am going to try my hand at rewording the intro, using either footnotes or attributions, or both, to fix these issues. DonFB (talk) 23:44, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Similarly, the Legacy section includes the phrase:

"with the mainstream viewpoint dismissive or doubtful"

but does not clearly specify who the "mainstream" is. I will also mull over how to reword or attribute or cite that idea. Of course, any other editor is free to revise these phrases and add appropriate supporting references. DonFB (talk) 23:52, 30 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Per WP:LEAD, the lead section is a summary of what is said in the article. Typically, the lead does not need to have cited references when the article body has them. The lead section phrases "an assertion which is dismissed by mainstream aviation scholars" and "renewed examination and dismissal by aviation scholars" are a reflection of cited text in the article body. Your changing to "renewed controversy" is not accurate because there is only controversy about Whitehead from the point of view of Whitehead supporters. The Whitehead deniers do not see it as controversy as much as they reject it outright.
 * The mainstream is the establishment. None of the Whitehead supporters are established scholars.
 * You described one group as "establishment" (with scare quotes) though they are exactly that. You described the other group as "researchers dedicated exclusively to the subject of Whitehead." This second group, however, does not have any established scholars in it, and so suffers from the greater weight of mainstream opinion belittling their findings. The two groups are not equals. Binksternet (talk) 13:14, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Binksternet, your changes to the Legacy section, especially the added citations, go a long way toward satisfying a problem I had with the article: namely, that it did not clearly identify who is "mainstream" and who is not. However, I continue to believe that the lead should include citations (not necessarily as many) and/or attribution to make this issue clear at the outset.

You wrote above that, "Typically, the lead does not need to have cited references when the article body has them." There is almost no evidence for that concept in the relevant paragraph in WP:LEAD, which I quote nearly in full below, with italics added to emphasize the pertinent issues:


 * "The lead must conform to verifiability and other policies. The verifiability policy advises that material that is challenged or likely to be challenged, and quotations, should be cited. Because the lead will usually repeat information also in the body, editors should balance the desire to avoid redundant citations in the lead with the desire to aid readers in locating sources for challengeable material. Leads are usually written at a greater level of generality than the body, and information in the lead section of non-controversial subjects is less likely to be challenged and less likely to require a source; there is not, however, an exception to citation requirements specific to leads. The necessity for citations in a lead should be determined on a case-by-case basis by editorial consensus. Complex, current, or controversial subjects may require many citations; others, few or none. Contentious material about living persons must be cited every time, regardless of the level of generality...."

The MOS does recognize that editors may desire "to avoid redundant citations in the lead," but that's hardly the same as saying, "Typically, the lead does not need to have cited references when the article body has them."

So, for the forgoing reasons, I believe we should include citations and/or attributions in the lead. Likewise, we should eliminate the weasel-phrasing of "He is claimed by some..."

I am not wedded to the phrase "renewed controversy," or any use of the word controversy. However, a controversy does exist, instigated by Whitehead fans. Whitehead debunkers may have no doubts regarding the perceived lack of merit for GW claims, but they too partake in the controversy anytime they write something that dismisses, debunks, belittles or denies the claims, as they have been doing, literally for decades. In short, there is a controversy--not among scholars, of course, but between scholars and lay researchers. DonFB (talk) 16:28, 31 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Right, I see that I was pulling from memory regarding WP:LEAD rather than reading its current statements. No sweat; let's put named refs up in the lead section, ones that echo refs found in the article body. Binksternet (talk) 16:44, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Synthesis in the final paragraph
The final paragraph appears to have synthesis of two sources which is not allowed per WP:SYNTHESIS. This is the paragraph under discussion:


 * "Whitehead expressed his own dedication to heavier-than-air flight in a letter to American Inventor magazine in 1902. He wrote that because "the future of the air machine lies in an apparatus made without the gas bag, I have taken up the aeroplane and will stick to it until I have succeeded completely or expire in the attempt of so doing."[8] Newspapers around the world had reported about Santos-Dumont's experiments with motorized and steerable gas bags for a few years when Whitehead wrote this. Whitehead's words were remarkably similar to those in a letter written in 1900 by Wilbur Wright who said, "For some years I have been afflicted with the belief that flight is possible to man. My disease has increased in severity and I feel that it will soon cost me an increased amount of money if not my life."[46]"

The cites are a 1902 letter from Whitehead to American Inventor and the Wright brothers autobiography In Their Own Words. None of these sources make the comparison of being "remarkably similar" to the other. This final paragraph should be deleted entirely. Binksternet (talk) 13:34, 31 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Regarding possible "synthesis" in the final paragraph: I agree that neither source points out the similarity of the letters. But I don't equate identifying to the reader two similar statements with "synthesis" of some new concept or idea. Perhaps the word "remarkably" is improper editorializing. I suppose one test that could be applied would be to ask ourselves if we can reasonably say the quoted statements from the two letters are not similar. DonFB (talk) 16:28, 31 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Looks like the comparison was first made by you back in 2010. I don't think the editorializing is limited to the word "remarkably", I think it is unneeded synthesis which is not connected in any way to the standard scholarship surrounding the Wrights or Whitehead. As this is an encyclopedia summarizing published thought and not a source for new thought, I would remove this bit. Binksternet (talk) 16:50, 31 May 2011 (UTC)


 * From WP:SYN "Do not combine material from multiple sources to reach or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by any of the sources." In this case, it would be better to retain the quote by Whitehead, drop Wright's words and either source the reference to Santos-Dumont or reduce it to a note mentioning Santos-Dumonts work with "gas-bag". As to whether it would be reasonable to expand the quote from the start of the sentence and link to Maxim... GraemeLeggett (talk) 17:25, 31 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Sure, I originally added the parallel quotes; I found them too interesting to ignore and thought they would offer readers insight into the thinking of the man who, by mainstream consensus, failed in his dream and the man who succeeded. The text draws no synthesis from the two quotes; it simply presents them for reader edification. It's true that "standard scholarship" on GW and the Wrights, as shown in this article, typically makes comparisons between them about things like distance flown and height above the ground, rather than what they were thinking as expressed in their letters. Can it be claimed that it's a "new thought" that both GW and WW were dedicated, possibly to the point of death by their own words, to building a flying machine? The idea that it's a new thought seems very unlikely. What the quotations do is show readers the men's voices, expressing a feeling they each had that is already well-established in the scholarly research.


 * I appear now to be in the minority on this issue, counting Roger's opposition. If the parallel Wilbur quote does not stay in body of the text, I think it can reasonably be shown in the non-citation notes, linked from a footnote after a citation footnote for the GW quotation, which is worthwhile on its own. The mention of Santos Dumont can be cut; I think the GW quotation is sufficiently self-explanatory. If the GW quotation does remain, I think it would be a misapplication of the synthesis rule to deliberately exclude the parallel Wilbur quote from either the body text or the notes. DonFB (talk) 20:17, 31 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Let me assure you it is no slight against you or your fine research when I say that I think the SYNTH guideline would be violated if the Wright quote is placed next to the Whitehead quote so that the reader can compare the two. Binksternet (talk) 20:40, 31 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't see how that is any different from presenting people's similar (or opposing) ideas/opinions/desires, cited, on any given subject. That happens all the time, in articles on a myriad of subjects. DonFB (talk) 21:48, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

I deleted the last sentence, about Wilbur. I left the sentence about Santos-Dumont, because it puts Whitehead's statement in the context of what was happening in the world at that time. I hope this change is accepted by other editors, it seems likely considering the discussion above.

Wilbur's sentence hardly influence Whitehead to write his declaration of intent, I even doubt very much that Wilbur wrote his sentence before Whitehead wrote his. Even if he did nothing suggests that any of the two were inspired by the other. So there is no connection between those sentences.


 * Nothing in those quotations, or the way they were shown, denotes or implies an influence of one person upon the other, or any cause-and-effect relationship. They were presented straightforwardly as information for readers on the similarity of the expression of their ambitions. If you doubt that WW wrote his private letter in 1900, you can, even in faraway Sweden, browse to the U.S. Library of Congress website and read it in his own handwriting, with the date. Presumably, you believe GW wrote his in 1902, as stated on the gustavewhitehead.org website, the source for a great amount of material in this article.
 * I haven't yet seen any response to my idea of putting the parallel Wilbur quotation in a non-citation note, as a point of information for readers. DonFB (talk) 01:51, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

Restored external links
Restored list of external links, which was cut down far too extensively, future deletions should be discussed, one by one, before being deleted. For example the History net link is essential to this article. We need this list to find all available documentation. And the reader needs it too, to get more information about what is referred to very shortly in the article. Even if it could be argued that the reader could find the sources by clicking on a reference number and then click on the reference, that is a much more complicated method than going through the external links list. We cannot expect the reader to find the sources in this complicated way. I don't want to do it that way myself, so I cannot expect the reader to go through that process. A complete list of external sources is much better. Roger491127 (talk) 21:59, 31 May 2011 (UTC)


 * The external links should be weighed for inclusion and brought back if judged worthy.
 * In general, URLs that appear in the reference section are not needed as external links. They are already represented on the page. Binksternet (talk) 22:33, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

If you weighed them before deleting I cannot understand why you deleted the History net link, to take just one example. I have used that list hundreds of times to check up things, and I think it is essential. I have already explained how complicated it is to find sources through references. If it is complicated for me it is probably close to impossible for a new reader. The reader of this article should have an easily accessible list of all the documentation he needs to make his own judgement. As this is a controversial article it becomes even more necessary to give the reader easy access to all sources available. Roger491127 (talk) 23:21, 31 May 2011 (UTC)


 * The history net article is in the Reference section, so it is already represented. Also, I have questioned why it is that we are relying on that article so much: who is the author?
 * Regarding your wish to let the reader have easy access to all the links: per WP:LINKFARM, Wikipedia does not assume the role of helping the reader find all the available websites. Binksternet (talk) 23:38, 31 May 2011 (UTC)


 * "Who is the author?"


 * From the article:
 * "This article was originally published in the March 1996 issue of Aviation History and written by Frank Delear, a native of Boston and a retired public relations director of Sikorsky Aircraft, Stratford, Conn. He is the author of five books and many newspaper and magazine articles, including a feature on Harriet Quimby in Aviation History, January 1991. For further reading: History by Contract, by William J. O'Dwyer; and Before The Wrights Flew, by Stella Randolph."


 * Though holding a differing opinion, Carroll Gray spoke approvingly of him. DonFB (talk) 00:31, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

I reorganized the talk page so DonFB's reply comes directly after the question it answers. They had been separated further and further apart by text inserted between them. Roger491127 (talk) 05:28, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Back to Flight Journal magazine and other external links
WP:LINKFARM contains this text: " Wikipedia is neither a mirror nor a repository of links, images, or media files.[2] Wikipedia articles are not: Mere collections of external links or Internet directories. There is nothing wrong with adding one or more useful content-relevant links to an article; however, excessive lists can dwarf articles and detract from the purpose of Wikipedia. On articles about topics with many fansites, for example, including a link to one major fansite may be appropriate."

It is obviously intended for other types of articles than this, this list of external sources does not "dwarf" such a long and well researched article. I refer again to my reasons explained above. Your attempt to use the rule WP:LINKFARM which is obviously intended for a completely different type of article makes me suspect that you want to delete practically all sources readers in general all over the world can access, while you want the Bibliography section, which very few people can access to dominate the lists of sources. Here in Sweden I have no possibility to access any of the books in the Bibliography list, but I can access all the sources in the external links list. There is also a lot of information about the research since 1960 in the external links list, while the most of the sources in the Bibliography list are older.

In 1960 or earlier there is no doubt that the mainstream view was that Whitehead did not fly in 1901, but I doubt that you can find a majority of scholars today who will say that without reasonable doubt Whitehead did not fly in 1901, if they have read through all the sources we have access to today. And most of the new sources are accessible from the external links list. Roger491127 (talk) 00:51, 1 June 2011 (UTC)


 * If they try this External Link -- Flight Journal magazine, "The Who Flew First Debate" Oct 1998 by O'Dwyer, William J. -- http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3897/is_/ai_n881581 in the restored section, they'll be disappointed; it doesn't work. DonFB (talk) 03:31, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

Ok, but don't delete it. I will check if there is a more recent version, or another way to access to the same material. Tonight, when I'm back from the dentist. We experience loss of links now and then, Then we do not delete the link immediately, first we research if the same material can be found on a new url or in some other way. I cannot find it in the Bibliography list, by the way. It should be included there, because it can be accessed by readers who can find access to old issues of the Flight Journal magazine. Even if it has disappeared completely from the web, as long as it is in the Bibliography list, we can always hope that someone makes a new copy of it and puts it up on a web page. Roger491127 (talk) 06:23, 1 June 2011 (UTC)


 * If there is a copy of the Flight Journal article on the web, we shouldn't be linking to it unless it is clear it is there with the approval of the author/Flight Journal as the article will be still in copyright. GraemeLeggett (talk) 09:25, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

I have written an email to the owners of Flight Journal, asking them if this article or issue is available to the public in any way. Through public libraries, on pay-sites or for free on the web, as many other newspaper and magazine articles are, or if that issue is still for sale, etc.. In any case we can put it in the Bibliography list. In that list it doesn't matter if the publication is still for sale or out of print, if it is available through libraries, web pay sites, or not. Roger491127 (talk) 16:53, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

I now move the Flight Journal magazine link from the External links list to the Bibliography list. If somebody knows how to rewrite it in the same fancy way as the other links in the Bibliography list you're welcome to do so. Right now it at least looks just like the other entries to the reader. Roger491127 (talk) 05:28, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

I have found the beginning and a short description of the article which was earlier hosted at: http://www.flightjournal.com/articles/wff/wff1.asp

"THE "WHO FLEW FIRST" DEBATE by William J. O'Dwyer, USAF Reserve (Ret.) FLIGHT JOURNAL

"In late 1963, the dilemma of attempting to determine how Gustave A. Whitehead fit into early powered flight history was more or less thrust upon our then very active 9315th USAF Reserve Squadron in Stratford, Connecticut. The question we were to answer was a tough one: did or did not Whitehead fly with power before the December 17, 1903, events at Kitty Hawk? There had never been a formal inquiry into that matter. At the request of the Connecticut Aeronautical Historical Association's (CAHA) vice president, Harold "Hal" Dolan, our squadron became the first to embark on that mission. Dolan felt we should dig into the 1901 accounts of flights alleged to have taken place in and around Bridgeport, Fairfield and Stratford, Connecticut. CAHA (now known as the New England Air Museum) was attempting to chronicle aviation history in Connecticut. " The magazine article which comes from the Flight Journal, begins with the preceeding remarks from the author, William J. O'Dwyer: It is continued for several pages which tell the whole fascinating story, with pictures, of the Gustave Whitehead saga. I highly recommend it to those of you who are curious about this pioneer inventor and aviator. You can access it by clicking on the title above." Roger491127 (talk) 10:16, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Found an interesting web page about early flight pioneers at http://www.ctie.monash.edu.au/hargrave/timeline4.html Index page at http://www.ctie.monash.edu.au/hargrave/index.htm Roger491127 (talk) 11:41, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

At http://aerofiles.com/bio_w.html an article about Whitehead. Here a short sample showing interesting terminology:

In Bridgeport CT, Weisskopf found employment in 1900 as a mechanic—because of his "dangerous" experiments, police had ordered him out of Pittsburgh. At his new home he had room for a small workshop, and neighbors, as well as police, showed more understanding. Scientific American of June 1901 reported of Weisskopf's newly rebuilt hang-glider (a term then used for motorized aircraft). Two months later, with hang-glider "Number 21," he reportedly completed a flying distance of about 2.5 kilometers at about 10-15 meters altitude. In so doing, he proved it was possible to start a flight without artificial aids from land and with two motor-driven propellers, and to land without damage. He had recognized the basic precept that a successful take-off requires a definite minimum speed. Roger491127 (talk) 12:02, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

At http://aerofiles.com/_ba.html a mysterious text probably produced by Stanley Y Beach: (maybe the Beach airplane Whitehead refused to work on any further)

"Beach-Whitehead, Beach Stanley Y Beach & Gustave Whitehead, Bridgeport CT; Scientific Aeroplane Co, 125 E 23rd St, New York NY.

Gyroscopic Biplane 1908 = 1pOB; two 8' tractor props belt-driven by a 50hp 5-cyl Whitehead located under the fuselage between the wheels; span: 40'0". Pointy-nosed, V-shaped, boatlike fuselage. Allegedly employed a gyro device (the one invented by Augustus Herring?) to "hold it on an even keel so that all you have to do is steer," according to a brief magazine review and an ad in Nov 1911 Aeronautics (in which Whitehead's name was conspicuously missing). No data other than it did not fly, but there is a Gyroscopic Monoplane mentioned, which could be an error in reporting or a second machine."

The search result page http://aerofiles.master.com/texis/master/search/?s=SS&q=Whitehead gives several interesting Gustave Whitehead related results.

Another example:

"Ludlow, Israel Ludlow, Jamestown OH or Norfolk VA.

INFORMATION NEEDED 1905 Ludlow (Leo J Opdyke / Skyways)

1905 = Boxkite-type creation with a motor "weighing 75 pounds" and four 8'0" props mounted in pairs. Flight history, if any, is unknown.

1907 = Undescribed entrant in Flying Machine events at 1907 Intl Aeronautic Tournament at St Louis MO (10/21-24/07).

1908 = Unknown type with a 22hp Whitehead (Weisskopf) motor, but described as having "six surfaces measuring 22' across." (Data: Nick D'Alto in Skyways #145.)

Obviously, Whitehead motors were used by a lot of early flight pioneers. Roger491127 (talk) 12:17, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

"THE "WHO FLEW FIRST" DEBATE by William J. O'Dwyer, USAF Reserve (Ret.) FLIGHT JOURNAL
I found the article, using the wayback machine. http://web.archive.org/web/20070221112854/http://www.flightjournal.com/articles/wff/wff1.asp

It contains several very interesting paragraphs. The two most revealing are:

"In Beach's April 10, 1939 "Statement," he wrote, "I was with him [Whitehead] frequently from 1901 to 1910 and at no time did he ever say that he had flown, even though he built several machines after the date on which he was supposed to have flown … I met him in May 1901, photographed his machine and described it in an illustrated article [Looking at the bare trees and the way people are dressed, I would say these photos have to be March 1901 photos—not May! These photos were used in Beach's Scientific American article of June 8, 1901.] … I found that he had built an aeroplane that was inherently stable and also was building engines. He built one of 20 horsepower to drive the two propellers of his monoplane and one of ten horsepower to propel it on the ground." Later in that seven-page statement, Beach writes, "I saw no 10 H.P. engine for ground propulsion." Then, in the same breath, it reads: "The Whitehead aeroplane had many interesting features. It was inherently stable and could be flown safely, always 'pancaking' and landing on a level keel." Note the contradictions: how can you not fly, yet have an "inherently stable" design that could be "flown safely" and land "on a level keel"? Beach claims he was the closest person to that subject, yet he contradicts himself repeatedly."

"Turn the pages of the same December 15, 1906, issue to catch what Beach also had to say in his reports of that period. Go to the right column, page 447. It is titled: "The Second Annual Exhibition of the Aero Club of America." Beach begins a three-page report, with photos, about who exhibited which aircraft and engines at the airshow. Near the bottom of page 447 he states: "The body of the framework of Gustave Whitehead's latest bat-like aeroplane was shown mounted on pneumatic-tired, ball bearing wire wheels …. Whitehead also exhibited the 2-cylinder steam engine which revolved the road wheels of his former bat machine, with which he made a number of short flights in 1901." Yet in 1939, Beach (conveniently?) fails to recall that clear credit!" Roger491127 (talk) 15:41, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

The importance of the external links list
I have used wikipedia for many years, and when I want to know more about something I always use the external links list. I do not try to find more information in the notes or in the bibliography, because I know I cannot access the books in the bibliography, and I never even thought that URL's to more information could be found among the notes, until I today noted that the URL to the Photocopy of Bridgeport Sunday Herald, August 18, 1901 has been moved from the external links list to one of the notes, practically impossible to find for a reader who wants to find more information and see the sources with his own eyes.

We should try to give the reader acess to all important source documents and more information, and the natural place people all over the world go to for more information and sources is the external links list, because those links point to documents and sources which can be accessed by all readers in the world, because they are available on the web.

People who live in USA and are familiar with using public libraries may also have some use of the bibliographies list, but for all others it is the external links list that is the key to more information and source documents about what has been very shortly described and summarized in the wikipedia article.

The Notes section is very small and placed between the see also list and bibliography list. So URL's placed in the Notes section are effectively hidden from discovery by all normal readers Roger491127 (talk) 09:27, 3 June 2011 (UTC)


 * The purpose of external links is for information related to but not already used in the article, assuming it isn't copyright infringing (documentaries uploaded to youtube etc). WP:EXTLINKS says " contain further research that is accurate and on-topic, information that could not be added to the article for reasons such as copyright or amount of detail, or other meaningful, relevant content that is not suitable for inclusion in an article for reasons unrelated to its accuracy." WP:ELRC says "Sites that have been used as sources in the creation of an article should be cited in the article,.... Links to these source sites are not "external links" for the purposes of this guideline, and should not normally be duplicated in an external links section." The Flight Journal article does not fit the exceptions by my reading. GraemeLeggett (talk) 10:44, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

WP:EXTLINKS says " contain further research that is accurate and on-topic, information that could not be added to the article for reasons such as copyright or amount of detail," and detail is the important word here. There are lots of details in URL'S in the external links list which have not been included in the article, so the reader who wants more details turns to the URL's in the external links list.

You left out the latter half of WP:ELRC "Exceptions—websites that can be both references and external links—include any official sites for the article topic, or websites that are specifically devoted to the topic, contain multiple subpages, and meet the above criteria."

So neither WP:EXTLINKS nor WP:ELRC are applicable for the purpose of deleting important sources or more detailed documentation from the external links list. I just contributed to the discussion about the article on Roald Amundsen, and noted that the external links list for that article is significantly longer than the external links list for this article.

And note that this article handles a very controversial issue, so the need for giving the reader a chance to go to the available documentation and draw his own conclusions is greater for this article than for most other articles in wikipedia. That is an important reason to give the reader access to all external information which he can use to delve deeper into the issue. Roger491127 (talk) 11:37, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

I have found another very good reason to use the external links as we have done for years in this article. I read 25 other articles and of those 1 had no external links at all, all the others are using the external links exactly as we have done here earlier, as a collection of the most valuable sources of further information for the reader who wants to delve deeper into the issue, no matter if the links have been used as references in the article. So the conclusion is that even if you can refer to rules which should prevent editors from using the external links list in this way, most editors are using the external links list exactly as we have done here for years. And I think it is the right way to use the list, as the place where readers who want to know more about the issue can find the best sources available on the web, all gathered in one single place, the external links list.

The reader should not be forced to waste many hours trying all references in the reference list, all notes, all links in the bibliography, of which only a few lead to usable and valuable source material and documents which the reader can use to find more information about what has been referred to very shortly and summarized in the article.

Wikipedia should not hide the sources from the reader, so the reader is forced to accept the view of the majority of the editors of an article. Wikipedia should let the reader have easy access to the sources, to allow the reader to go through the sources and draw his own conclusions. Wikipedia should not act as religious leaders and emperors have done for thousands of years, keep the sources to themselves and give the people only the view the rulers want them to conform to. Wikipedia should represent the new open world which the internet has opened up, a world where anybody can find all documents he needs to draw his own conclusions and form his own view on everything. Especially on controversial issues, like the issue this article is about. Roger491127 (talk) 21:23, 3 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Hours wasted in chasing down reference links? Hardly. Any web link in the references gets the reader to the material just as fast as a link in the "External links" section. Binksternet (talk) 21:59, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

I have just spent one hour testing every link in the Citations and Bibliography sections, and found that half of all links are totally useless to the reader who wants to find the sources and delve deeper into the issue. That's why I have never before tried to use these sections to find more information. I discovered many years ago that those sections contain loads of useless links. And what reader can be expected to find the Photocopy of Bridgeport Sunday Herald, August 18, 1901 in the notes section! This is one of the most important external links available to the reader, where he can see the original article in the Bridgeport Sunday Herald with his own eyes, and now somebody has moved it from the external links list to the notes section, where practically nobody will find it.

I am sure that most readers have adopted the same view as me, to find more information you use the external links list, because the Bibliography sections is about books which hardly can be accessed by readers, especially readers outside USA, and the Citations section contains so many useless links. And nobody expects to find a valuable external link in the notes section. Roger491127 (talk) 01:24, 4 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Don't put too much importance on the Sunday Herald link; yes it is part of the story, but Wilbur Wright considered it a joke, and Gibb-Smith agreed.
 * If you have useless links, what are they? Binksternet (talk) 02:03, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

It is the most important part of the story. Lacking photos the most reliable eyewitness is the journalist who witnessed the first flight August 14 1901. What the Wright brothers said about Whitehead has very little value, because 1: they were competitors and the Wright brothers obviously had a strong interest in discrediting Whitehead. 2: The thinking powers and knowledge level of the Wright brothers have been shown to be lacking in quality. In Orville's statements of 1945 we can easily see 5 big mistakes which makes his effort of discrediting Whitehead missing its goal. Unfortunately neither the Smithsonian nor Gibbs-Smith bothers to research and check up the argumentation put forward by Orville, they just accept and repeat his faulty argumentation and use it to create what some people call "the mainstream view".

A constructive suggestion
Many of the web links in the citations section belong to the same web site, for example all affidavits are located on http://www.gustavewhitehead.org/ so if we put http://www.gustavewhitehead.org/ in the external links list the reader can find both a lot of affidavits, photos and a lot of other material.

If we put the highest quality and valuable sites in the external links list the reader will find most of the important material there, including a lot of what also exist in the references.

Some links are of so low quality that they do not deserve a place in the external links list. An obvious example is http://www.flyingmachines.org/gwhtd.html. Note that the only quote from that site which has been included in the article is: "Perhaps the last word in the matter should be left to Gustave Whitehead's wife, Louise Tuba Whitehead, who never recalled seeing her husband fly in his flying machines." This quote was recently deleted from the article, obviously because it is so silly that it doesn't deserve a place in the article. There is nothing else on this web site which cannot be found in many other places, so this site should be removed from the external links list.

Through these kinds of discussions we could probably agree on which web sites are most valuable and contain the most important articles or most comprehensive collections of information to deserve a place in the external links list. Roger491127 (talk) 06:34, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

A few obvious candidates for the external links list:


 * Photocopy of Bridgeport Sunday Herald, August 18, 1901, because that's where the story begins for the public in general. Before that article only a few friends and neighbours knew about Whitehead's flight experiments.


 * http://www.wright-brothers.org/History_Wing/History_of_the_Airplane/Who_Was_First/Gustav_Whitehead/Whitehead_Articles.htm#herald, because it contains a readable version of the article above.


 * http://www.gustavewhitehead.org/ because it gives the reader access to many affidavits, photos, biography, etc..


 * "The 'Who Flew First' Debate". Flight Journal, because it describes how the research in modern times began. It also shows how US-American patriotism has stood in the way of research about Whitehead.

" At the request of the Connecticut Aeronautical Historical Association's (CAHA) vice president, Harold "Hal" Dolan, our squadron became the first to embark on that mission. Dolan felt we should dig into the 1901 accounts of flights alleged to have taken place in and around Bridgeport, Fairfield and Stratford, Connecticut. CAHA (now known as the New England Air Museum) was attempting to chronicle aviation history in Connecticut. .. Unfortunately, "Hal" Dolan told us he was forbidden to pursue research into Whitehead shortly after he began his probe and asked us to continue instead. He said a moratorium was called for by the chairman of the CAHA board of directors. The chairman had been taught to fly by Orville Wright, and he insisted that Dolan's Whitehead research "... "could be viewed as an effort to denigrate the Wrights." He was said to be adamant. To make matters much worse, most CAHA founders worked for United Aircraft Corp., and the CAHA board chairman was the CEO of one of their divisions. "If I went against him," Dolan remarked the night we first met at the Bridgeport Post editors' offices, "I'd lose my job."

By the way, a few hours ago I watched a US-American movie on tv, in which a priest used the Wright brothers in his Sunday speech, which shows how deep into the American collective mind the popular myth about the Wright brothers as the fathers of aviation has reached.

Actually neither Whitehead nor the Wright brothers can be called fathers of aviation. Santos-Dumont deserves that title much more. After he started motorized airplane flights in 1906 he published plans for building airplanes to the public worldwide. Then: "In 1908 Santos-Dumont started working with Adolphe Clément's Clement-Bayard company to build the Demoiselle No 19. They planned a production run of 100 units, built 50 and sold only 15 for 7,500 francs for each airframe. It was the world's first series production aircraft."

When USA entered WWI in 1917 the American pilots had to use French and British airplanes, because USA had still not started mass production of airplanes which could be used in the war. So Santos-Dumont rightfully deserves the title "the father of aviation".

That makes this fight between Whitehead and Wrights proponents rather pointless, doesn't it? None of them caused successful mass production of airplanes before 1917. By then both France, Britain and Germany had started mass production of airplanes. Roger491127 (talk) 07:05, 4 June 2011 (UTC)


 * It is the impetus the Wrights give to the rest of the world that accrues them credit. Have a look at Curtiss Model D, Curtiss Model F and Curtiss JN-4 (albeit the last by a British designer), the US was capable of producing viable aircraft and mass-production prior to 1917 but did not have the experience in military aircraft that 3 years of war had given the European nations. GraemeLeggett (talk) 09:40, 4 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I've never heard about those airplanes, but I've heard about Blériot XI, the first airplane used in a war, in 1911. I've heard about Fokker and Taube, Bristol Scout, Sopwith, Albatros, Sopwith Pup, Sopwith Triplane, and SPAD S.VII. Check out this page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Military_aircraft_of_World_War_I, a hundred airplanes produced 1910-1919 from 6 countries, none of them US-American. Roger491127 (talk) 16:59, 4 June 2011 (UTC)


 * No, it was Wilbur Wright who electrified observers in France in 1908, jolting them out of complacency into redesigning their lame kites and making real aircraft. Wilbur won the Michelin Cup! Santos-Dumont's famous first flight was a fluke. Binksternet (talk) 13:50, 4 June 2011 (UTC)
 * The Royal Aeronautical Society and the French Aero Club made awards to the Wrights in 1909. Here is contemporary reporting of the 1908 flight that won the Michelin Cup. later in the same issue some relative performances in terms of endurance. GraemeLeggett (talk) 17:08, 4 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Nothing you say changes the fact that Austro-Hungary, France, Britain, Germany, Italy and Russia started mass production of airplanes before USA. Roger491127 (talk) 17:10, 4 June 2011 (UTC)
 * All the result of Wilbur Wright waking up the sleep-walking aviation industry in 1908. Binksternet (talk) 17:13, 4 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Whatever the Wrights were doing they didn't mass produce airplanes that could be used for practical purposes. Roger491127 (talk) 17:20, 4 June 2011 (UTC)


 * What purpose does this line of investigation serve? All the mainstream sources, and some sources sympathetic to Whitehead agree that the Wrights were the stimulus which started the very active period 1908 to 1918 in aviation. The Wrights were the reason that the aviation industry got into action. There is no question on this point except from the most distant fringe fans of Whitehead. I cannot see what kind of change to article is being suggested. Binksternet (talk) 17:37, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

The Wrights were the reason why the development of aviation industry in USA was paralyzed until the government in WWI took charge and forced all competitors, especially Orville Wright, to start working together instead of blocking each other. If it wasn't for WWI these stubborn people could have gone on with their constant patent wars and litigations for one or more decades, while the rest of the world developed better and better airplanes.

USA is a very wide country. There is almost an infinity between the most rational and reasonable people in USA and the most stubborn, aggressive and reactionary people, and all kinds of people inbetween. The purpose of this reasoning is to make the most aggressive and stubborn editors here to realize that there is nothing to gain from taking sides in this article. Our task is to present the verifiable sources of evidence to the readers in the most accessible and readable way, and to make it possible for the readers who want to delve deeper into this controversial issue to do so, by giving them easy access to the most important sources in an external links list, because there is where most people will look for more information.

While you are sleeping in USA I will put together an external links list which I think will be the most valuable for the readers, according to the suggestions I started this section with. When you are back you can do whatever you like with it, but at least I get to show you what I think the readers should have easy access to. Roger491127 (talk) 03:29, 5 June 2011 (UTC)


 * It will be a very short list, as most of the websites worth going to are already used as references and don't need to be repeated. Binksternet (talk) 04:30, 5 June 2011 (UTC)
 * How did the NPR audio link go to Bibliography and not External links? Binksternet (talk) 04:38, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

Before you start to change or delete it, this is a copy of my suggested external links list:


 * Gustave Whitehead's Flying Machines Affidavits, Biography, Photos.
 * Photocopy of Bridgeport Sunday Herald, August 18, 1901
 * Readable version of the Bridgeport Sunday Herald, August 18, 1901 article
 * |url=http://www.flightjournal.com/articles/wff/wff1.asp Flight Journal magazine, "The Who Flew First Debate" Oct 1998 by O'Dwyer, William J.
 * History Net — Gustave Whitehead and the First-Flight Controversy
 * The response from Wright Brothers Org Arguments against Whitehead's flights.
 * The Aviation Pioneer Gustav Weißkopf The Whitehead Museum in Germany.

This contains the most important documents and web sites the reader needs to delve deeper into the issue, including an anti-Whitehead text from Wright Brothers Org summing up their arguments for why the Whitehead story is false. Roger491127 (talk) 04:39, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

The NPR audio link was of so low importance so it had no reason to be in the external links list, I had to put it somewhere else. I can put it back at the end of the list if you like. Unfortunately it probably won't be of any use no matter what I do, I am quite certain that you and Graemelegget will delete my proposed external links list anyway, referring to a lot of rules. But in my view this is close to a perfect list of sources the reader who wants to delve deeper needs.

If we follow the principles of GraemeLeggett, and follow the rules he referred to, the external links list becomes a scrap heap, for sources not worthy of mentioning in the article. If we instead do as many editors of many articles I read before creating this external links list, put the most valuable sources in the external links list for the reader who wants to delve deeper into the issues which have been very shortly and brutally summarized in the article we end up with a list very much like my suggestion. It can, of course, be added to with more important documents, but I didn't want to put too much work into a list I am pretty sure will be deleted very quickly. Roger491127 (talk) 05:28, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

If you revert all my changes tonight, note that you will then have a dead link in the very short ext links list that was there when I started. Roger491127 (talk) 05:03, 5 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I would move the NPR audio link back to External links because it is not a reference source. Binksternet (talk) 15:22, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

Done. Roger491127 (talk) 01:29, 6 June 2011 (UTC)

Some personal reflections
What has happened in the last week has changed my view of the external links list. For more than five years as a user of wikipedia I have seen the external links list as a collection of the most important sources I can use to get to know more about the subject of the article. And it has usually worked well for that purpose.

Until a week ago the editors of this article have put the most important sources in the external links list, as a service to the reader who wants to delve deeper into the issue of the article. Judging from my own experiences editors of most other articles have done the same, they have inserted the most important sources, no matter if they have been referenced in the article or not.

But now, after the drastic cut-down of the list, and the rules GraemeLeggett referred to, if they really support that drastic cut-down of the list, I will have to change my view and my use of the external links list when I read articles in wikipedia.

I have to realize that in some articles GraemeLeggett's rules have been applied, in some articles the external links list has been treated as we have treated it for several years. So when I read an article and want to use the external links list I first have to look at the external links list to find out if it is a scrap heap, which should more appropriately be called "Links to sources not used or mentioned in this article", or if it is a list of the most informative and valuable sources.

If the external links list is a scrap heap I have to search through the references lists to find the valuable sources among all the links there. I will also have to remember to check the notes, if somebody has put a valuable source document there.

So, whatever happens to the the external links list for this article, I have to change the way I use wikipedia, as I now know that some editors interpret the rules like GraemeLeggett, some don't. Roger491127 (talk) 09:02, 5 June 2011 (UTC)


 * If you participate in Good Article or Featured Article evaluations then you'll see a lot more articles with a reduced load of External links. The differences between editors and articles is that simple: the ones with people working to make them conform to Wikipedia guidelines are the most trim. Binksternet (talk) 15:28, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

This article will not be considered for evaluation for any of those categories for a very long time, considering that it is a very controversial issue and that editors now and in the future will have very different views on how to write this article.

By the way, I am writing on an email to the author of http://www.wright-brothers.org/History_Wing/History_of_the_Airplane/Who_Was_First/Gustav_Whitehead/Gustav_Whitehead.htm. My view of that page is partly positive, they link to and host a few very valuable texts and link to the best Whitehead web site, and the text is fair to Whitehead here and there. But I will also point out many places in the text which have been given a very clear anti-Whitehead spin. Like this, for example:

"In the June 1901 issue of Scientific American, Whitehead tells the readers that the No. 21 can make a turn in the air by varying the speed of the propellers. He has an engine which pumps gas under high pressure to pistons driving the propellers, and he can vary the pressure of the gas to each prop. The August 18, 1901 edition of the Bridgeport Herald tells us a little more about this engine - it is fueled by "rapid gas explosions" from acetylene generated from calcium carbide. Yet in that same issue Gustave Whitehead gives a firsthand account of a turn he made in the air to avoid a clump of trees and asserts, "I had no means of steering (italics ours) by using the machinery." This just two months after telling the Scientific American audience he could turn by varying the speed of the props! So he shifted his weight, the airplane banked into a turn, and he avoided disaster.

Much later, in a letter in The American Inventor in April 1902, Whitehead remembered that he could vary the speed of the props to make a turn over Long Island Sound in his January flight."

It would be fairly easy for a technical person to realize that slowing down one of the propellers worked well for a long, slow turn, like the one Whitehead wrote about over Long Island Sound, but not usable for very quick turns, to avoid a bunch of trees.

The page ends with: "Our thanks to Lewis Chmiel who provided much of the research for this page."

That name is too close to Louis Chmiel to be a coincidence, how many Louis (Lewis) Chmiel can there be who are spreading discrediting texts about Whitehead? If it is the same person, what is his real first name, and does he and his co-author Nick Engler work for Wright Brothers Company? Roger491127 (talk) 07:29, 6 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Roger491127 wrote
 * "This article will not be considered for evaluation for any of those categories [GA, FA] for a very long time, considering that it is a very controversial issue and that editors now and in the future will have very different views on how to write this article."


 * Few people in history are as controversial as Charles Darwin, but a Featured Article has been written about him. Featured and Good articles result when editors use a sincere NPOV approach and write with knowledge and respect for Wikipedia Guidelines and Policies. A Featured or Good article is unlikely to result when one or more editors bring a fanatically biased attitude to the subject and a generally disdainful attitude toward the rules. DonFB (talk) 19:51, 6 June 2011 (UTC)

The main reason why this article can not be finished for many years is because a lot of what has been written to discredit Whitehead has not been criticized by anybody we can quote, or summarize. O'Dwyer has done a little in that direction, like pointing out that the Bridgeport Herald is a weekly newspaper, so Orville's first point to discredit Whitehead, that the editor withheld the news for four days, is invalid. But that is a drop in the sea of all arguments that can be made to discredit the mass of argumentation the anti-Whitehead people have been spreading.

I can take the article I mentioned above as an example: http://www.wright-brothers.org/History_Wing/History_of_the_Airplane/Who_Was_First/Gustav_Whitehead/Gustav_Whitehead.htm. It contains a lot of invalid or unfounded statements which need to be criticized.

I have mentioned one example above which needs to be criticized by a source we can use. Here is another example from the same article: "He was, in fact, one of a several turn-of-the-century experimenters who regularly issued press releases that described successful flights with no real evidence to back his claims." Hasn't the author forgotten an eyewitness journalist article and a number of affidavits and recorded statements?

Has anybody criticized Gibbs-Smith's book and pointed out all the mistakes he made? No, not yet, as far as I know, so we can not refer to that criticism, which hasn't been written yet.

If this article would describe a soccer match only the first 10 minutes have been played, and right now the pro-Whitehead people have the ball, but they are very inactive, it can take many years before this match even begins to come near to a result we can write about.

That's why this article cannot be completely written any time soon, it is about a match which is only in its beginning stage. The match around Charles Darwin has been played practically completely to its end. We now know that he was right on the main points he made, we also know the he was wrong about a few details, and we have a lot of sources to refer to about all the turns of the debate about Darwin. Roger491127 (talk) 10:34, 8 June 2011 (UTC)


 * To apply your football analogy, we are writing about a match long ago. Where someone said they scored a goal and some others say they didn't. The whistle for full-time has been blown. The photograph of the team is lost, all of the spectators are long gone and the ground has been built on for housing. Should someone investigate the story again then we will have more material to add but we cannot take the investigating position ourselves. GraemeLeggett (talk) 10:55, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Read the article http://www.wright-brothers.org/History_Wing/History_of_the_Airplane/Who_Was_First/Gustav_Whitehead/Gustav_Whitehead.htm yourself. Don't you see all the holes in the argumentation, don't you see all the points that need to be met by criticism? Don't you understand that this criticism hasn't been written yet? And there are many more sources which have not been challenged by any source we can refer to. So this match is very far from being played to the end. And you are right when you say we cannot take the investigating position ourselves. So we have to wait until this match has been played to its end before we can write an article about the result, or rather, a fairly complete description of the arguments made by both sides. Roger491127 (talk) 11:13, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

I If somebody writes a well composed criticism of the article http://www.wright-brothers.org/History_Wing/History_of_the_Airplane/Who_Was_First/Gustav_Whitehead/Gustav_Whitehead.htm maybe the owner of the web site chooses to change the article, to avoid being seen as partial and putting forward arguments which are so easy to pick apart. Then somebody criticizes the new version, etc.. so this match can go on for decades before the involved sides can come close to a common view. It is not only the anti-Whitehead side that need to be criticized and be given a chance to change their standpoint. On a German web site there is a timeline of Whitehead's life where it is said that he returned to Germany and met with Lilienthal, which probably is wrong, so they have to fix that mistake. All in all, there is a lot both sides need to revise and rewrite. So this match is very far from over. Roger491127 (talk) 11:34, 8 June 2011 (UTC)


 * We write about the situation as it exists now and the resulting article can get to GA or FA even if the to and fro of investigations continue sometime in the future. Skylon is a Good Article and it's no further forward than calculations and computer aided drawing of a spaceplane let alone scheduled for take-off.GraemeLeggett (talk) 11:42, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Okay, but an article about the beginning of an argument, when both sides are far from re-conciliation is very complicated to write and the result will be confusing and probably misleading for the reader. The Skylon article is different, because there are not two sides who stand very far apart and use arguments which are obviously faulty. Roger491127 (talk) 11:51, 8 June 2011 (UTC)


 * The article need not be "confusing" and "complicated", if editors make a good-faith effort to adhere strictly to the principles of NPOV and verifiable sourcing. The article can become confusing and complicated if any editor insists on pushing a particular POV and fails to understand that Wikipedia articles are summaries of information, not dumping grounds for copy-paste text taken from sources that support one side of a controversy. The following quote from the comment by GraemeLeggett above is exactly correct, and worth repeating: "We write about the situation as it exists now and the resulting article can get to GA or FA even if the to and fro of investigations continue sometime in the future." Only an editor who fails to understand that Wikipedia's purpose is not to establish truth, and who believes that an article does not properly reflect his POV, will think that an article like GW will be "probably misleading" to the reader. DonFB (talk) 20:43, 8 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Well said. Binksternet (talk) 23:35, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Congratulations for having come to an agreement. But you are both intelligent enough to read http://www.wright-brothers.org/History_Wing/History_of_the_Airplane/Who_Was_First/Gustav_Whitehead/Gustav_Whitehead.htm and note the many glaring faults in only that small article, and in Orville's statements of 1945, for example. How do you report about those anti-Whitehead documents without doing original research and without a well formulated criticism of those documents to refer to?

Do you simply repeat arguments you know are faulty and illogical and give the reader the impression those documents were designed to give? And the view of the Smithsonian which were based on Orville's faulty arguments and probably other factors, like a preference for Cayley and anti-German sentiments in the beginning of 20th century, and the view of Gibbs-Smith which were based on Orville's faulty arguments and the view of the Smithsonian? The Smithsonian had easy access to Whitehead himself from 1901 to his death, and to his papers until after WWII but they treated Whitehead like a hot potato and avoided all contact, a way to handle the situation which has not been fully criticized by any source we can refer to. And nobody from inside the Smithsonian has so far come forward and told us about why the Smithsonian acted in this way. So there are loads of loose ends and undisclosed secrets we still have not found the answer to. Roger491127 (talk) 06:13, 9 June 2011 (UTC)


 * An editor who claims that a source's arguments are "faulty and illogical" is trying to impose his own opinion on both the source and the Wikipedia article. The source will indeed "give the reader the impression" it was written to give. An editor can challenge a source as unreliable, but if consensus disagrees, the source will be used, even if an editor disagrees with its logic. No amount of arguing or protestation by an editor, because he disagrees with a source's logic, can change the information given in the Wikipedia article by that source. Wikipedia articles are not based on editors' opinions about the logic contained in its sources. If a source is deemed acceptable by consensus, only another acceptable source can be used to present an opposing opinion about its logic. An editor's personal opinion about the logic is irrelevant. This is the meaning of No Original Research and Neutral Point of View.


 * "..there are loads of loose ends and undisclosed secrets we still have not found the answer to." If so, that's an area for original research and eventual publication in an outside source. Have at it. DonFB (talk) 07:20, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

So you have no problem quoting Orville Wright's statement about the four day delay even if you know that it couldn't be published earlier because the newspaper was only published on Sundays? In that single case you can, luckily, quote somebody who pointed out that it was a weekly newspaper. But how do you handle hundreds of other statements which you understand are faulty arguments, but nobody has criticized it yet, so you have no source to refer to?

"there are loads of loose ends and undisclosed secrets we still have not found the answer to." If so, that's an area for original research and eventual publication in an outside source. Have at it."

1: I do not have the time needed, because I have something a billion times more important to write about when I feel a surge of energy to write about it. 2: I would probably not be seen as a source we can refer to in this article, because I am one of the editors. So we have to wait, maybe for decades, before both sides have criticized each other to such a degree that we can write a fairly balanced article. It would also be very revealing if somebody from the Smithsonian came out and told the world why the Smithsonian has treated Whitehead in such strange ways for 110 years, but that is also something we may have to wait for decades before it happens. Roger491127 (talk) 11:25, 9 June 2011 (UTC)


 * "But how do you handle hundreds of other statements which you understand are faulty arguments?"
 * You're imputing to me your opinions about the subject.
 * Also, you seem not to have absorbed GraemeLeggett's simple but accurate explanation a few posts above that: "We write about the situation as it exists now". If reliable sources present new and different information later, it can be included. You're just repeating all your old arguments and absorbing little or nothing of the very good explanations people are giving you about how Wikipedia works. DonFB (talk) 17:20, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

I am not imputing you to anything, I just asked a question. I try to explain to you that you could be in trouble. If you read http://www.wright-brothers.org/History_Wing/History_of_the_Airplane/Who_Was_First/Gustav_Whitehead/Gustav_Whitehead.htm and find no problem with the text you are lucky. Then you can summarize the text and incorporate it into the article. But if you realize that several of the statements Lewis Chmiel is making are faulty or misleading you are in trouble. You cannot point out the mistakes in the text because that would be OR, you cannot ignore the text because that would be a selection of source documents based on your deduction, again OR. You are forced by the wikipedia rules to include statements in the article which you know are faulty or misleading.

Examples: ""In the June 1901 issue of Scientific American, Whitehead tells the readers that the No. 21 can make a turn in the air by varying the speed of the propellers. He has an engine which pumps gas under high pressure to pistons driving the propellers, and he can vary the pressure of the gas to each prop. The August 18, 1901 edition of the Bridgeport Herald tells us a little more about this engine - it is fueled by "rapid gas explosions" from acetylene generated from calcium carbide. Yet in that same issue Gustave Whitehead gives a firsthand account of a turn he made in the air to avoid a clump of trees and asserts, "I had no means of steering (italics ours) by using the machinery." This just two months after telling the Scientific American audience he could turn by varying the speed of the props! So he shifted his weight, the airplane banked into a turn, and he avoided disaster. Much later, in a letter in The American Inventor in April 1902, Whitehead remembered that he could vary the speed of the props to make a turn over Long Island Sound in his January flight."

It would be fairly easy for a technical person to realize that slowing down one of the propellers worked well for a long, slow turn, like the one Whitehead wrote about over Long Island Sound, but not usable for very quick turns, to avoid a bunch of trees. Is the author pretending he is dumb, or is he really dumb? In any case this is a misleading statement.

Here is another example from the same article: "He was, in fact, one of a several turn-of-the-century experimenters who regularly issued press releases that described successful flights with no real evidence to back his claims." Hasn't the author forgotten an eyewitness journalist article and a number of affidavits and recorded statements?" Again we have a misleading statement.

"Parts of Randolph and Phillip's tale were obvious fabrications. The account of the 1899 flight in a steam-powered airplane, with a fireman stoking the fire under the boiler, paints a wonderful picture in the best tradition of the American tall tale." Badmouthing the event and the affidavits of Darvarich and Devane with no evidence against their statements, the author just associates the story with a tradition of writing totally invented events.

About August 14 1901: "Owing to fantastic details like these, the story lacked what advertisers have come to call verisimilitude – the appearance of truth. So despite wide coverage and implications that mankind had successfully flown, the public yawned. After all, this was an old game in late Victorian America." Again referring to a bad press tradition, ignoring all witness statements and research performed by O'Dwyer and CAHA.

Lower down in the text: "In the June 1901 issue of Scientific American, Whitehead tells the readers that the No. 21 can make a turn in the air by varying the speed of the propellers. He has an engine which pumps gas under high pressure to pistons driving the propellers, and he can vary the pressure of the gas to each prop. The August 18, 1901 edition of the Bridgeport Herald tells us a little more about this engine - it is fueled by "rapid gas explosions" from acetylene generated from calcium carbide. Yet in that same issue Gustave Whitehead gives a firsthand account of a turn he made in the air to avoid a clump of trees and asserts, "I had no means of steering (italics ours) by using the machinery." This just two months after telling the Scientific American audience he could turn by varying the speed of the props! So he shifted his weight, the airplane banked into a turn, and he avoided disaster. Much later, in a letter in The American Inventor in April 1902, Whitehead remembered that he could vary the speed of the props to make a turn over Long Island Sound in his January flight."

Repeating the reasoning already used. Repeat a misleading statement many times to convince the reader is a well known propaganda trick.

"Andy maintained that Whitehead had some sort of "transmission" in the No. 22 to vary the prop speed, although Whitehead did not mention it in his letters to publications." If you look at the drawing and the photos you can actually see the belts which transfer the power from the motor to the propellers. That Whitehead could slow down the belt driving one propeller is not so hard to understand, unless you try really hard to not understand.

"Orville Wright was still living at this time. He was aware of the Whitehead story, but did not think anyone took it seriously until it made its way into Reader's Digest. The 1945 story prompted him to write a short rebuttal, "The Mythical Whitehead Flight," in the U.S. Air Services Magazine in August, 1945." The following quote of Orville's statement has been cleansed. The most glaring mistakes have been left out. The remaining statements about Dickie and Cellie have been refuted by O'Dwyer's research. The author pretends he has not heard about O'Dwyer's research.

How do you handle these statements? Do you include them into the article, knowing that they are misleading but according to wikipedia rules you cannot argue against them or exclude them, it would be OR in both cases. You simply have to write an article you know is faulty and misleading because nobody you can refer to has criticized and pointed out the faults in the misleading statements, yet.Roger491127 (talk) 06:24, 10 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I don't see anything "faulty and misleading" in the article. ~ DonFB (talk) 09:38, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Congratulations, lucky you. Then you have no problems referring to it and similar articles. I am sorry that somebody pointed out that Bridgeport Herald was a weekly newspaper, otherwise you could have used everything in Orville's article to discredit Whitehead. This article would have been so much easier for you to write if O'Dwyer hadn't made a phone interview with Dickie, and found out that Cellie was a mis-spelled name and interviewed Suelli's friends and relatives who said that Suelli all his life had said that he was present when Whitehead made his first flight August 14 1901.

Howell's article could have been called a typical example of the kind of imaginary articles journalists used to make up as fantastic stories with no connection to the reality at all.

If Stella Randolph hadn't written books, if Kosch, O'Dwyer and CAHA hadn't researched the issue this would have been a very simple article to write, you could have based it on everything in Orville's statement from 1945, the statements of the Smithsonian and Gibbs-Smith, and there would be no problems at all with this article. It could easily call Whitehead a compulsory liar and the article could have been a featured article with no contradictions and no problems. Roger491127 (talk) 01:51, 11 June 2011 (UTC)


 * And your point is....? DonFB (talk) 03:26, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

I am sorry, I learned English in school, but I never learned US-American English or the way US-American's think, so I do not understand your last four words. By the way, I do not even know what nationality you are. The word American means you are from Chile, Cuba, Canada, USA, Brazil, etc... The word US-American is too long to write. The word Yankee is known worldwide, in fact millions of walls around the world have the sentence: "Go home, Yankee!" written on them. But I am not sure if it is okay with you if we call you Yankees? Could you please decide what you want to be called, what is your nationality? Roger491127 (talk) 05:08, 11 June 2011 (UTC)


 * It's usually written: "Yankee Go Home!" DonFB (talk) 06:50, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I realized that a few hours later. But I have to work so much with every line I write in English, a spelling mistake on every line to check up on google so I make a less important mistake here and there. I actually came here to fix that mistake now, thinking you would have answered the question instead of pointing out that mistake. But it seems that your new modus operandi is, don't answer the question, change the subject instead.

And your point is? Roger491127 (talk) 15:56, 11 June 2011 (UTC)


 * We are done with personal reflections. There is no need for conjecture about what if this guy did that thing. Binksternet (talk) 16:15, 11 June 2011 (UTC)