Dec 15, 2018 3 min read

While the Founding Fathers gave the national government several important responsibilities, picking winners and losers in the free market was not one of them, although the government has often ventured into that area, usually with disastrous results.

History is replete with examples, but one that stands out occurred at the turn of the 20th century when the government got into the fledgling aviation business. The nation’s leaders worried that European nations, especially France and Germany, might achieve manned flight first, which, among other advantages, would give them superiority should future wars include air battles and air transport. Thus, the War Department commissioned Samuel Langley, the head of the Smithsonian Institution and a pioneer in the aviation field, to invent the airplane and subsidized him with a $50,000 grant.

Flush with government (taxpayer) cash, but forced to abide by various, mostly counterproductive, government specifications, Langley developed a piloted aircraft that he planned to launch from a catapult on the Potomac River that borders Washington. The aircraft had no landing gear, but it was supposed to land softly on the water and glide to a stop.

The first attempt occurred on Oct. 8, 1903. As thousands watched, including members of the press, Langley’s plane was catapulted off a houseboat on the Potomac, whereupon it crashed into the river and sank. However, thanks to his government subsidy, Langley could afford to make another flight, and after some fine-tuning, the second attempt occurred a month later. It, too, sank into the Potomac.

Meanwhile, down in Kitty Hawk, N.C., on a deserted beach called Kill Devil Hills, two brothers, Orville and Wilbur Wright, using just $2,000 they had earned as bicycle mechanics, were experimenting with their own aircraft. Their design, the trial-and-error result of four years of experiments with kites and gliders and paid for by themselves, had a curved propeller and wings, was controllable in the air, and included landing gear, since the Wright brothers intended to land their craft on the ground.

This week (Dec. 17), just nine days after Langley’s second failed flight, Orville Wright piloted the world’s first successful manned flight, covering 127 feet in 12 seconds. Two subsequent flights, one by Wilbur and another by Orville, covered 175 feet and 200 feet, respectively. Then Wilbur took off on a fourth flight, in which, as Orville recorded, “the machine was under much better control,” and the flight covered 852 feet and lasted one minute.

So, the government picked the wrong guy, and aided and abetted him, but also guided him, in creating the wrong design, proving – not for the first or last time – that usually the less the government gets involved in free enterprise, the greater the chance of success.

Bruce G. Kauffmann’s email address is bruce@historylessons.net.