The first man to achieve powered flight was a New Zealander.......not the Wright brothers as more commonly thought or believed.
Richard Pearse - Wikipedia
Richard William Pearse (3 December 1877 – 29 July 1953) was a New Zealand farmer and inventor who performed pioneering aviation experiments. Witnesses interviewed many years afterward describe
observing Pearse flying and landing a powered heavier-than-air machine on 31 March 1903, nine months before the Wright brothers flew. Ambiguous statements made by Pearse himself make it difficult to date the aviation experiments with certainty. In a newspaper interview in 1909, with respect to inventing a flying machine, he said "I did not attempt anything practical with the idea until 1904".
Biographer Gordon Ogilvie credits Pearse with "several far-sighted concepts: a monoplane configuration, wing flaps and rear elevator, tricycle undercarriage with steerable nosewheel, and a propeller with variable-pitch blades."
Pearse largely ended his early flying experiments about 1911 but pioneered on in novel aircraft and aero-engine invention from 1933 with the development of his "private plane for the million", a foldable single-engined
tiltrotor convertiplane.
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My grandfather told me all about him when I was a youngster, and I have never forgotten Richard Pearce. History books will never be changed as they are governed by "The Golden Rule" - he who has the gold, makes the rules - or in this case writes the history books.
I see now there are claims by Germans and Brazilians to try and claim they were first....all of them controversial.
