<div class="section abstract"><div class="htmlview paragraph">BY working from notebook memoranda, personal correspondence files, old photographs, and the original laboratory instruments, the author has been able to gather together the story of how the Wright brothers, starting in 1899 with an idea for controlling the flight of a glider, were able, by 1903, to develop a machine that was capable of powered flight.</div><div class="htmlview paragraph">The author describes this airplane and its engine as well as the 1904-1905 and 1908 ones. The latter was the first airplane to pass U. S. Army acceptance tests.</div></div>