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The following is the text of a booklet copyrighted by the IBM Education Department in 1949 and republished by IBM in 1951.

The many advantages of the modern IBM Electric Typewriter can be appreciated by reviewing the history of typewriters, the years of research, and the millions of dollars spent on their development.

Invention of the typewriter

History tells us that the first known patent for a typewriting device to make characters "so neat and exact as not to be distinguished from print" was granted by Queen Anne of England on January 7, 1714. This patent was issued to a man named Henry Mill, an English engineer. No record or description of the invention has survived.

The first writing machine constructed in the United States was the invention of William Austin Burt of Detroit. This machine was developed in 1828, and his patent was signed by President Andrew Jackson in that same year. His crude device had something of the appearance of a butcher's meat block and was called a "Typographer." The only model of Burt's machine was destroyed in the Patent Office fire of 1836.

The first practical typewriter was completed in September, 1867, although the patent was not issued until June, 1868. The man who was responsible for this invention was Christopher Latham Sholes of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The first commercial model was manufactured in 1873 and was mounted on a sewing machine stand. The carriage was returned to the left margin by a foot pedal similar to a sewing machine treadle. This machine was a blind writer and wrote in only one case; that is, it not have both capitals and small letters, but wrote only in capitals.

It is interesting to note that Mr. Sholes invited Thomas A. Edison to Milwaukee to see his miracle machine and Mr. Edison told Mr. Sholes at the time that some day the typewriter would be operated by electricity. In fact, a short time later Mr. Edison built a typewriter which was operated electrically -- by a series of magnets. Since it was a large, cumbersome and expensive machine, it was never marketed. Mark Twain, the American humorist, was among the first purchasers of a typewriter, and he was the first author to submit a typewritten manuscript to a publisher.

Since Mr. Sholes's original machine, many makes of typewriters have been introduced and marketed. However, there have been only four major and important improvements since the original machine in 1873. These improvements in the order in which they appeared are as follows:

The International Business Machines Corporation was responsible for two of these four major changes in the typewriter industry, namely, Power Operation and Proportional Spacing.

Development of the IBM Electric typewriter

The first power operated machine of practical value was invented in 1914 by James Fields Smathers of Kansas City, Missouri. Mr. Smathers's operations as an inventor were halted by World War I. After he had served in the Army, he came back and went to work on his power-driven machine. In 1920 he produced a successful advanced model, and on April 2, 1923 turned that machine over to the Northeast Electric Company in Rochester for development. The machine originally had been designed to operate from a power-driven line shaft. The first conception of a power-driven typewriter worked on the same principle as the sewing machines in a large tailoring plant. This method of driving was immediately found to be a handicap to the machine because it eliminated the flexibility and portability of the typewriter. The Northeast Electric went ahead from this point with the development of a motor to be self-contained in the power base.

The original idea in developing the Electromatic drive was to make a power unit for all kinds of typewriters. The Northeast Electric Company actually built and sold 2500 of these power units to a typewriter company, where they were assembled on ordinary typewriters and marketed.

When an electrical drive was put on a machine it soon became apparent that the typewriter would require redesigning. The decision was made to design a typewriter primarily for power operation, and it was at this time that the Electromatic came into being. In 1928, when the General Motors Corporation purchased the Northeast Electric Company, the departments manufacturing the Electromatics did not go along in the transfer of ownership, but struck out with Rochester capital behind them to organize a new company under the same name of Electromatic Typewriters, Inc. The first model of Electromatic's new machine was completed on March 4, 1930. In 1933 Electromatic Typewriters became a division of IBM and immediately reaped many benefits from its association with this corporation. IBM's highly skilled engineering, educational and sales departments were instrumental in the continued steady growth of the Electric Typewriter Division.

Standard IBM Electric typewriter

Today's IBM Electric Typewriter, a completely new and modern product, brings to every user the advantages of speed, ease of operation, accuracy, reliability and beauty of work. The typist's versatility is increased because she is able to do all kinds of work, such as stencil writing and multiple copy work, with the minimum amount of effort. The appearance of the typewritten work is improved because, regardless of the operator's touch, each character strikes the paper evenly and uniformly.

The new IBM Electric Typewriter incorporates all the latest developments in electric typewriter engineering. Every movement is electrically powered and controlled from the keyboard. All working parts -- Carriage Return Key, Tab Key, Backspacer, Shift Keys and Space Bar -- operate electrically with instant and unfailing precision. Every key on the speed keyboard operates at a light, finger-flick touch.

The IBM Electric Typewriter takes the fatigue out of typing because it eliminates awkward, time-consuming operations -- tiring finger-travel over steep rows of keys, wasted effort in pounding the keys, uncertainties caused by impeded natural finger movements. And it puts within easy reach of all typists the essentials for developing typing technique and efficiency.

The IBM Electric Typewriter plays an integral role in the business world. The superior quality of work, and the increased speed with which this work is performed, have increased efficiency in business offices everywhere. Typists like the IBM Electric Typewriter because it is so easy to use and because the keyboard is ideally sloped for comfortable, relaxed operation.

IBM Executive electric typewriter

Embodying the revolutionary IBM spacing principle, the IBM Executive Electric Typewriter represents the most dramatic advance ever made in the typewriter industry.

This new and distinct type of letter spacing allows each letter or character the exact space it requires. On ordinary typewriters, a narrow letter such as "i" occupies the same space as a wide letter such as "m". The IBM spacing principle gives a new beauty to typing and makes it easy to read.

All the new and advantageous features of the Standard IBM Electric Typewriter are included in the IBM Electric Executive Typewriter. The Line Position Reset "locks out" the platen ratchet for variable line spacing and guarantees that the original spacing is resumed. The Four-Position Ribbon Control provides increased ribbon wear and economy while the Impression Indicator controls the force of the type blow. Carbon copy work is improved through the use of the Multiple Copy Control and margins are set and released from the keyboard. Every feature operates with electric ease and speed and is designed for the comfort and efficiency of the typist.

The IBM Executive Electric Typewriter is unsurpassed for executive correspondence. Letters prepared on this typewriter have a unique appearance and dignity that is truly representative of the most modern business office. The IBM spacing principle embodied in the Executive Typewriter makes possible preparation of copy with a straight right margin. By using the two- and three-unit space bars and typing the copy twice, a typist can prepare master copy for effective sales letters, bulletins, and booklets. Uniformity of impression on paper or metal plates, and on photographic masters, guarantees excellent reproductions. This booklet is a photo-offset reproduction of typing done on the IBM Executive Electric Typewriter.

The enthusiasm of IBM customers is evidence of the value of this machine -- for executive correspondence, statistical reports and statements, and masters for reproduction.

The typewriter today

The typewriter today is the most used piece of office equipment, and yet it is one of the last business machines to use electricity. IBM has pioneered the development of the Electric Typewriter to provide increased efficiency for the broadening requirements of modern business. IBM continued to set the trend in 1941 by revolutionizing the typewriter industry with the invention of the IBM Executive Electric Typewriter, embodying the IBM spacing principle. Ease, speed, and quality have always been the three dimensions of the IBM Electric Typewriter. With the advent of sound reducing features, the fourth dimension -- QUIET -- came into being.

The future will see additional IBM "firsts" because IBM engineers are seeking constantly to make typewriting easier, faster, quieter, and better than ever before.

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The many advantages of the modern IBM Electric Typewriter can be appreciated by reviewing the history of typewriters, the years of research, and the millions of dollars spent on their development...

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One thousand times more powerful than black powder, dynamite expedited the building of roads, tunnels, canals, and other construction projects worldwide in the second half of the 19th century. Today its inventor's name is well known, but more for prizes of peace and of achievement than for explosives.

In the 18th and early 19th centuries the growing understanding of gases and the reactions that produce them was of great importance to modern industrial society. Not least was the production of explosives-substances that undergo reactions involving the release of heat and rapidly expanding gaseous products.

In making black powder Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier and E. I. du Pont were improving a technology known to Western cultures since the 14th century and even earlier in China and the Far East. By the mid-19th century much more powerful explosives were being created by treating various organic substances with nitric acid. Among these new explosives was dynamite, a stabilized form of nitroglycerin, invented in 1867 by Alfred Nobel (1833-1896).

Early Years

Science History Institute

Nobel's father, Immanuel, was a Swedish inventor-entrepreneur. When Alfred was still a young child, Immanuel relocated his business and family to St. Petersburg, Russia, where he supplied the Russian military with war matériel, including early underwater mines. Alfred and his brothers were educated at home by Swedish and Russian tutors in chemistry and other subjects. Alfred became very proficient in chemistry but also entertained ambitions of becoming a writer.

Partly to dissuade him from the latter, his father financed his 16-year-old son's travel and study in Europe, including a stay of some months in the Paris laboratory of Théophile Pelouze, where Nobel shared workspace with an Italian chemist, Ascanio Sobrero, who had first prepared nitroglycerin in 1846.

Dynamite

When he was 17, Nobel apprenticed in New York with the Swedish-American inventor John Ericsson, who later built the Monitor, the Union's ironclad warship that became famous for defeating the Confederacy's Merrimac.

When Nobel returned to St. Petersburg, the family factory was booming thanks to the Crimean War. When the war ended and the firm went into bankruptcy, Nobel and his father turned to developing methods to produce nitroglycerin in quantity for use in construction.

In 1862 Nobel began its manufacture in a small plant outside Stockholm-a venture that cost the life of his youngest brother, Emil. Nobel persevered with his goal of developing a safe nitroglycerin explosive, first inventing the blasting cap and then discovering that a siliceous earth, kieselguhr, would stabilize nitroglycerin, thus making dynamite.

Fortune from Destruction

Nobel became wealthy by setting up companies and selling patent rights to dynamite and related products worldwide. The DuPont Company in the United States became one of the chief companies associated with Nobel.

In 1875 he created blasting gelatin, a colloidal suspension of nitrocellulose in glycerin, and in 1887 ballistite, a nearly smokeless powder especially suitable for propelling military projectiles. Nobel, the man who had tried to make handling explosives safe for workmen, was deeply troubled by the destructiveness of his inventions and became concerned with establishing worldwide peace.

Nobel died in 1896, leaving his considerable estate as an endowment for annual awards in chemistry, physics, medicine or physiology, literature, and peace-all of which represented his lifelong interests.
Featured image: Alfred Nobel. Edgar Fahs Smith Collection, Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts, University of Pennsylvania.

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Alfred Nobel | Science History Institute

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The founder of the prestigious Nobel Prizes made his fortune with a big bang by inventing dynamite, a stabilized form of nitroglycerin.

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How they work, types of motors and electric motor history

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Answer

Alexander Graham Bell is credited with being the inventor of the telephone since his patent and demonstrations for an apparatus designed for "transmitting vocal or other sounds telegraphically...causing electrical undulations" were successful.

First Bell Telephone, June 1875. Emile Berliner collection, Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division, Library of Congress.

Attributing the true inventor or inventors to a specific invention can be tricky business. Often credit goes to the inventor of the most practical or best working invention rather than to the original inventor(s).

Drawing by Alexander Graham Bell, 1876. In Alexander Graham Bell Family Papers, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress.

There is a lot of controversy and intrigue surrounding the invention of the telephone. There have been court cases, books, and articles generated about the subject. Of course, Alexander Graham Bell is the father of the telephone. After all it was his design that was first patented, however, he was not the first inventor to come up with the idea of a talking telegraph.

Louise Brooks ... holding telephones, with various other models on table before her. 1936. New York World-Telegram and the Sun Newspaper Photograph Collection, Prints & Photographs Division, Library of Congress.

Antonio Meucci, an Italian immigrant, began developing the design of a talking telegraph or telephone in 1849. In 1871, he filed a caveat (an announcement of an invention) for his design of a talking telegraph. Due to hardships, Meucci could not renew his caveat. His role in the invention of the telephone was overlooked until the United States House of Representatives passed a Resolution on June 11, 2002, honoring Meucci's contributions and work. You can read the resolution (107th Congress, H Res 269) on Congress.gov.

The Party Wire. Norman Rockwell, 1919. Prints & Photographs Division, Library of Congress.

To make matters even more interesting some historians suggest that Elisha Gray, a professor at Oberlin College, applied for a caveat of the telephone on the same day Bell applied for his patent of the telephone-these gentlemen didn't actually visit the Patent Office, their lawyers did on their behalf. In Historical First Patents: The First United States Patent for Many Everyday Things (Scarecrow Press, 1994), Travis Brown, reports that Bell's lawyer got to the patent office first. The date was February 14, 1876. He was the fifth entry of that day, while Gray's lawyer was 39th. Therefore, the U.S. Patent Office awarded Bell with the first patent for a telephone, US Patent Number 174,465 rather than honor Gray's caveat. However, some authors dispute this story and suggest that there was malfeasance by certain individuals at Patent Office, and possibly Bell himself.

If someone asks who is credited with inventing the telephone, you can explain the controversy that still surrounds this question.

Published: 02/22/2022. Author: Science Reference Section, Library of Congress

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Who is credited with inventing the telephone?

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Alexander Graham Bell is credited with being the inventor of the telephone since his patent and demonstrations for an apparatus designed for "transmitting vocal or other sounds telegraphically...causing electrical undulations" were successful. First Bell Telephone, June 1875. Emile Berliner collection, Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division, Library of Congress.

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On January 27, 1880, Thomas Edison received the historic patent embodying the principles of his incandescent lamp that paved the way for the universal domestic use of electric light.
The Patent Office granted Thomas Edison a patent for his "electric-lamp." Edison's patent was an improvement on electric lamps, not the invention of them; but because of Edison's design changes and the materials he used-such as a carbon filament-his patent allowed for an electric lamp that was reliable, safe, and practical.

Edison propelled the United States out of the gaslight era and into the electric age. From the time he was a boy, he was mesmerized by the mechanics of the universe and, with virtually no formal education, brought forth innovations that continue to dominate our lives. Out of his New Jersey laboratories, which were themselves inventions - thoroughly equipped and fully staffed - came 1,093 patented inventions and innovations that made Edison one of the most prolific inventors of all time.

Three of his most famous inventions, the phonograph, a practical incandescent light bulb, and the moving picture camera, dazzled the public and revolutionized the way people live throughout the world. His thundering dynamos transformed the United States into the world's greatest industrial superpower.

In 1878, the creation of a practical long-burning electric light had eluded scientists for decades. With dreams of lighting up entire cites, Edison lined up financial backing, assembled a group of brilliant scientists and technicians, and applied his genius to the challenge of creating an effective and affordable electric lamp. With unflagging determination, Edison and his team tried out thousands of theories, convinced that every failure brought them one step closer to success.

On January 27, 1880, Edison received the historic patent embodying the principles of his incandescent lamp that paved the way for the universal domestic use of electric light. The patent number for his electric lamp is 223,898.

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Thomas Edison's Patent Application for the Light Bulb (1880)

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EnlargeDownload Link Citation: Thomas Edison's patent drawing and application for an improvement in electric lamps, patented January 27, 1880; Records of the Patent and Trademark Office; Record Group 241; National Archives.

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Since motion pictures were invented, audiences have loved how they tell stories. Movies enabled people to travel the world vicariously, and experience tragedy, love and nearly every other emotion. Movies spread quickly, making them one of the most accessible and beloved forms of entertainment in the world.

Library of Congress

Setting Photography in Motion
Photography became a part of public life in the mid-19th century, especially during the Civil War, when photographers documented American battlefields for the first time. Experimenting with ways to exhibit photographs, several inventors came up with a simple toy that made it possible for a series of pictures to be viewed in rapid succession, creating the illusion of motion. It was called a zoetrope.

A Wager
In October 19, 1878, Scientific American published a series of pictures depicting a horse in full gallop, along with instructions to view them through the zoetrope. The photos were taken by an English photographer, Eadweard Muybridge, to settle a bet between California businessman Leland Stanford and his colleagues. Stanford contended that at some point in a horse's stride, all four hooves were off the ground. He enlisted Muybridge to take photographs of the positions of a horse's hooves in rapid succession. Muybridge's 12 pictures showed that Stanford had won the bet.

Rudimentary Projector
Muybridge's findings fascinated many, and with Stanford's support he created a sequential photo projector -- the zoogyroscope -- in 1879. With this device, Muybridge projected his photos to an enthralled San Francisco audience the following year.

12 Pictures Per Second
Meanwhile, in Paris, noted physiologist Etienne-Jules Marey was doing similar work. His studies of animals in motion drove him to experiment with photography, and he fashioned a camera that could take 12 pictures per second of a moving object. The technique, called chronophotography, along with Muybridge's work, were the founding concepts for motion picture cameras and projectors.

The Kinetograph
In 1888 in New York City, the great inventor Thomas Edison and his British assistant William Dickson worried that others were gaining ground in camera development. The pair set out to create a device that could record moving pictures. In 1890 Dickson unveiled the Kinetograph, a primitive motion picture camera. In 1892 he announced the invention of the Kinestoscope, a machine that could project the moving images onto a screen. In 1894, Edison initiated public film screenings in recently-opened "Kinetograph Parlors."

Everyday Images
Again, the French were working towards the same end. In 1895, Auguste and Louis Lumière introduced the Cinématographe, a projector that could show 16 frames per second. In their public cinema, audiences were spellbound by the films of simple movement and action: images of a baby eating, a hose squirting water, and the workers pouring out of the Lumière factory.

A New Art Form
While the first films were of commonplace occurrences - trains approaching, people dancing, and animals playing - filmmakers soon started to incorporate story lines and music into their works. Between the years of 1890 and 1927, thousands of silent films were produced, with an ever increasing sophistication of story line and technical craftsmanship.

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The Early History of Motion Pictures | American Experience | PBS

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Several inventors came up with a simple toy that made it possible for a series of pictures to be viewed in rapid succession, creating the illusion of motion.

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With his newly created Tesla coils, the inventor soon discovered that he could transmit and receive powerful radio signals when they were tuned to resonate at the same frequency. When a coil is tuned to a signal of a particular frequency, it literally magnifies the incoming electrical energy through resonant action. By early 1895, Tesla was ready to transmit a signal 50 miles to West Point, New York... But in that same year, disaster struck. A building fire consumed Tesla's lab, destroying his work.

The timing could not have been worse. In England, a young Italian experimenter named Guglielmo Marconi had been hard at work building a device for wireless telegraphy. The young Marconi had taken out the first wireless telegraphy patent in England in 1896. His device had only a two-circuit system, which some said could not transmit "across a pond." Later Marconi set up long-distance demonstrations, using a Tesla oscillator to transmit the signals across the English Channel.

Tesla filed his own basic radio patent applications in 1897. They were granted in 1900. Marconi's first patent application in America, filed on November 10, 1900, was turned down. Marconi's revised applications over the next three years were repeatedly rejected because of the priority of Tesla and other inventors.

The Patent Office made the following comment in 1903:

Many of the claims are not patentable over Tesla patent numbers 645,576 and 649,621, of record, the amendment to overcome said references as well as Marconi's pretended ignorance of the nature of a "Tesla oscillator" being little short of absurd... the term "Tesla oscillator" has become a household word on both continents [Europe and North America].

But no patent is truly safe, as Tesla's career demonstrates. In 1900, the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company, Ltd. began thriving in the stock markets—due primarily to Marconi's family connections with English aristocracy. British Marconi stock soared from $3 to $22 per share and the glamorous young Italian nobleman was internationally acclaimed. Both Edison and Andrew Carnegie invested in Marconi and Edison became a consulting engineer of American Marconi. Then, on December 12, 1901, Marconi for the first time transmitted and received signals across the Atlantic Ocean.

Otis Pond, an engineer then working for Tesla, said, "Looks as if Marconi got the jump on you." Tesla replied, "Marconi is a good fellow. Let him continue. He is using seventeen of my patents."

But Tesla's calm confidence was shattered in 1904, when the U.S. Patent Office suddenly and surprisingly reversed its previous decisions and gave Marconi a patent for the invention of radio. The reasons for this have never been fully explained, but the powerful financial backing for Marconi in the United States suggests one possible explanation.

Tesla was embroiled in other problems at the time, but when Marconi won the Nobel Prize in 1911, Tesla was furious. He sued the Marconi Company for infringement in 1915, but was in no financial condition to litigate a case against a major corporation. It wasn't until 1943—a few months after Tesla's death— that the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Tesla's radio patent number 645,576. The Court had a selfish reason for doing so. The Marconi Company was suing the United States Government for use of its patents in World War I. The Court simply avoided the action by restoring the priority of Tesla's patent over Marconi.

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PBS: Tesla - Master of Lightning: Who Invented Radio?

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November 8, 1895: Roentgen's Discovery of X-Rays

Few scientific breakthroughs have had as immediate an impact as Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen's discovery of X-rays, a momentous event that instantly revolutionized the fields of physics and medicine. The X-ray emerged from the laboratory and into widespread use in a startlingly brief leap: within a year of Roentgen's announcement of his discovery, the application of X-rays to diagnosis and therapy was an established part of the medical profession.

Roentgen's scientific career was one beset with difficulties. As a student in Holland, he was expelled from the Utrecht Technical School for a prank committed by another student. His lack of a diploma initially prevented him from obtaining a position at the University of Würzburg even after he received his doctorate, although he eventually was accepted. His experiments at Würzburg focused on light phenomena and other emissions generated by discharging electrical current in so-called "Crookes tubes," glass bulbs with positive and negative electrodes, evacuated of air, which display a fluorescent glow when a high voltage current is passed through it. He was particularly interested in cathode rays and in assessing their range outside of charged tubes.

On November 8, 1895, Roentgen noticed that when he shielded the tube with heavy black cardboard, the green fluorescent light caused a platinobarium screen nine feet at away to glow - too far away to be reacting to the cathode rays as he understood them. He determined the fluorescence was caused by invisible rays originating from the Crookes tube he was using to study cathode rays (later recognized as electrons), which penetrated the opaque black paper wrapped around the tube. Further experiments revealed that this new type of ray was capable of passing through most substances, including the soft tissues of the body, but left bones and metals visible. One of his earliest photographic plates from his experiments was a film of his wife Bertha's hand, with her wedding ring clearly visible.

To test his observations and enhance his scientific data, Roentgen plunged into seven weeks of meticulous planned and executed experiments. On December 28, he submitted his first "provisional" communication, "On a New Kind of Rays," in the Proceedings of the Würzburg Physico-Medical Society. In January 1896 he made his first public presentation before the same society, following his lecture with a demonstration: he made a plate of the hand of an attending anatomist, who proposed the new discovery be named "Roentgen's Rays."

The news spread rapidly throughout the world. Thomas Edison was among those eager to perfect Roentgen's discovery, developing a handheld fluoroscope, although he failed to make a commercial "X-ray lamp" for domestic use. The apparatus for producing X-rays was soon widely available, and studios opened to take "bone portraits," further fueling public interest and imagination. Poems about X-rays appeared in popular journals, and the metaphorical use of the rays popped up in political cartoons, short stories, and advertising. Detectives touted the use of Roentgen devices in following unfaithful spouses, and lead underwear was manufactured to foil attempts at peeking with "X-ray glasses."

As frivolous as such reactions may seem, the medical community quickly recognized the importance of Roentgen's discovery. By February 1896, X-rays were finding their first clinical use in the US in Dartmouth, MA, when Edwin Brant Frost produced a plate of a patient's Colles fracture for his brother, a local doctor. Soon attempts were made to insert metal rods or inject radio-opaque substances to give clear pictures of organs and vessels, with mixed results. The first angiography, moving-picture X-rays, and military radiology, were performed in early 1896.

In addition to the diagnostic powers of X-rays, some experimentalists began applying the rays to treating disease. Since the early 19th century, electrotherapy had proved popular for the temporary relief of real and imagined pains. The same apparatus could generate X-rays. In January 1896, only a few days after the announcement of Roentgen's work, a Chicago electrotherapist named Emil Grubbe irradiated a woman with a recurrent cancer of the breast, and by the end of the year, several researchers had noted the palliative effects of the rays on cancers. Others found remarkable results in the treatment of surface lesions and skin problems while others investigated the possible bacterial action of the rays. X-rays even found cosmetic uses in depilatory clinics set up in the US and France.

Roentgen was awarded the first Nobel Prize in physics in 1901 for his discovery. When asked what his thoughts were at the moment of discovery, he replied, true to form, "I didn't think, I investigated." Today, Roentgen is widely recognized as a brilliant experimentalist who never sought honors or financial profits for his research. He rejected a title that would have given him entry into the German nobility, and donated his Nobel Prize money to his university. While he accepted the honorary degree of doctor of medicine offered to him by his own university, he never took out any patents on X-rays, to ensure that the world could freely benefit from his work. His altruism came at considerable personal cost: at the time of his death in 1923, Roentgen was nearly bankrupt from the inflation following World War I.

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November 8, 1895: Roentgen's Discovery of X-Rays

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Few scientific breakthroughs have had as immediate an impact as Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen's discovery of X-rays, a momentous event that instantly revolutionized the fields of physics and medicine.

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The 2016 Rio Olympics sparked some historic controversy: During the Opening Ceremony, Brazil paid homage to Alberto Santos-Dumont, the man the country credits with inventing the airplane.

Who Actually Invented the Airplane?

Ask any American, and the general consensuses will be the Wright brothers.

This is a relatively undisputed fact. Orville and Wilbur Wright made the first controlled, sustainable flight of a powered, heavier-than-air aircraft December 17, 1903, a little south of Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. Historically, this gives them the reign of inventors of the airplane...but not to all.

If you ask the Brazilians who fathered modern aviation, they will tell you a completely different story.

Alberto Santos-Dumont was a Brazilian aviation pioneer born July 20, 1873. He spent most of his adult life living in Paris, France, where he dedicated himself to studying and experimenting with aeronautics. He designed, built, and flew hot air balloons and early dirigibles (airships) before he began his work pioneering heavier-than-air aircraft. His first fixed-wing aircraft was a canard biplane called the 14-bis.

On October 23, 1906, Santos-Dumont flew the 14-bis in what was the first powered heavier-than-air flight in Europe to be certified by the Aro Club de France and the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale (FAI). The aircraft flew for 197ft at a height of about 16ft. It won the Deutsch-Archdeacon Prize for the first officially observed flight of more than 25 meters. You can watch Santos-Dumont's first flight below (the narration is in German):

But obviously by 1906, the Wright bros had already flown. In fact, by this point, Orville and Wilbur had already flown their Wright Flyer III for over a half hour.

So where's the dispute?

Controversy

Well, one claim is that the the Wrights had no witnesses to their early accomplishments because it was not a public event. For that reason, they had trouble establishing legitimacy, particularly in Europe where some adopted an anti-Wright stance. By contrast, Santos-Dumont's flight was the first public flight in the world, so he was hailed as the the inventor of the airplane across Europe.

Ernest Archdeacon, the founder of Aéro-Club de France, publicly scorned the brothers' claims despite the published reports. Archdeacon wrote several articles, including a statement in 1906 in which he stated, "the French would make the first public demonstration of powered flight." In 1908, Archdeacon publicly admitted to doing the Wrights an injustice after they flew in France.

Defining an Airplane

Henrique Lins de Barros (a Brazilian physicist and Santos-Dumont expert) has argued that the Wrights did not fulfill the conditions set up during this period to distinguish a true flight from a prolonged hop; Santos-Dumont, on the other hand, took off unassisted, publicly flew a predetermined length in front of experts, and then safely landed.

Brazilians fail to recognize the legitimacy of the Wright Brothers' flight because they claim the Wright Flyer took off from a rail and, then later used a catapult (or, at the very least, used an incline to takeoff). However, CNN's 2003 report on these claims reveal that even Santos-Dumont experts don't believe this is accurate, though Lins de Barros believes that the "strong, steady winds at Kitty Hawk were crucial for the Flyer's take-off, disqualifying the flight because there was no proof it could lift off on its own."

Peter Jakab, chairman of the aeronautics division at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington and a Wright brothers expert, on the other hand, says that such claims, as put forth by Lins de Barros, are absurd: "Even in 1903 the airplane sustained itself in the air for nearly a minute. If it's not sustaining itself under its own power it's not going to stay up that long."

Competing Claims

By the early 20th century, it was a race to get the first powered aircraft up in the air.

Every aspiring aviator wanted the recognition of inventing the first powered, heavier-than-air airplane (don't forget-other experimental aircraft and early flying machines were already around), and Alberto Santos-Dumont is not the only aviator to claim the first successful powered flight (outside of the Wright Bros).

Some of the more significant claims include the following aviators:

Clement Ader in the Avion III (1897)

Gustave Whitehead in his No's 21 and 22 aeroplanes (1901-1903)

Richard Pearse in his monoplane (1903-1904)

Samuel Pierpont Langley's Aerodome A (1903)

Karl Jatho in Jatho biplane (1903)

Ader's claim was debunked by 1910. Pearse did not claim the feat of first powered flight himself Langley's Aerodome failed to fly either of the two attempts. In Germany, some credit Jatho with making the first airplane flight, although sources differ whether his aircraft was controlled.

Whitehead Developments

Of all the aviators who claimed to have flown in powered airplanes before the Wright Brothers, the most controversial is perhaps Gustave Whitehead.

Whitehead's claims were not taken seriously until 1935, when two journalists wrote an article for Popular Aviation. In 1963, reserve U.S. Air Force major William O'Dwyer researched Whitehead and because convinced that he did fly; his research contributed to Stella Randolph's 1966 book, The Story of Gustave Whitehead, Before the Wrights Flew. On March 8, 2013, Jane's all the world's aircraft, published an editorial by Paul Jackson endorsing Whitehead's claim. On June 11, 2013, Scientific American published a rebuttal of the Whitehead claims, and on October 24, 38 air historians and journalists rejected the claims and issued a Statement Regarding The Gustave Whitehead Claims of Flight.

Rear view of Whitehead's No. 21 (source: wright-brothers.org)

We may never actually know who really and truly invented the first airplane, but much of the evidence (and general consensus) support the Wright Brothers. But it's hard to say. Unfortunately, authentication doesn't always occur immediately upon invention (particularly when we're talking about history). It's hard to say that inventions and recognition should only go to those who seek out public view and have spotless documentation, yet how can authenticity be determined without those? Perhaps if the airplane wasn't such a technological feat, one that has only grown in global importance, the "who" wouldn't be such a big deal. I mean, we don't even know who invented the wheel...

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Sources:

http://www.cnet.com/news/were-the-wright-brothers-...

http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/ptech/12/10/brazil.sa...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alberto_Santos-Dumon...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wright_brothers

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claims_to_the_first_...

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Santos-Dumont vs The Wright Brothers: Who Really Invented the Airplane?

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Who invented the airplane? Depending on where you live, you might have a different answer. Was it the Wright Bros as most Americans believe, or Alberto Santos-Dumont who was honored by his home country Brazil during the 2016 Rio Olympics.