EAA Chapter 811 March Meeting

The March meeting is Tuesday 3/26 at ITH Admin Building Training Room 6:30 Snacks and Social, 7:00 meeting including chapter officer Elections!

Jack Thompson's message about the meeting is below:

I am preparing a talk on the Wright - Curtiss “Rivalry” and their respective places in history. Glenn Curtiss was a major contributor to the development of the airplane. I have detected a certain Hometown Hero advocacy in upstate NY for Curtiss. I have read some opinions to the effect that “Curtiss’s ideas were better than the Wrights” Much of this stems from the patent litigation that went on between 1908 and 1917. It also needs to be considered in the light of the miserly support for military aviation in the US, and the contrasting lavish expenditures in Europe during this period.

I will attempt to sort some of this out and credit all for their monumental and largely sequential contributions to the development of the airplane. It is a good story, and rich in characters, Law, Public Relations, Capitalism, Technology and human nature. As usual, all opinions are welcome, and it can be as interactive as we want to make it.