There’s a lot to unpack in the phrase “The Wright Brothers invented and flew the first airplane,” such as, what even is an airplane? And what does it mean to fly one?
In the years leading up to the Wright brothers’ historic (maybe) flight in 1903, so many inventors were working on heavier-than-air vehicles that the Aéro-Club de France established a set of conditions which defined whether a non-balloon, non-glider craft “flew.” Among them: The flight had to be controlled and manned, the craft had to take off under its own power, and—most importantly—the flight had to be demonstrated publicly before it “counted” so that everyone would know it followed all the rules.
Under these conditions, The Wright Brothers’ initial flights were not legitimate because there were no official witnesses to confirm that the plane took off under its own power, flew in a controlled manner, and otherwise behaved like a plane. Going by the Aéro-Club’s definition, the first heavier-than-air craft was flown by Alberto Santos-Dumont in 1906.
But even if you discount the “rules” of aviation created by the Aéro-Club de France—who are they to determine what’s an airplane, right?—you can make a strong case for Clément Ader as the inventor of the airplane. His Avion III flew over 90 meters (300 feet) in 1897 before crashing.
(For a deeper dive on the “first flight,” listen to this episode of the Our Fake History podcast.)
The lesson: A question like “who flew the first airplane” is more complicated than you might think.