"Mike Rhodes" wrote in message
...

All the Wright brothers had to do was observe the arrow, as it flies a
precise flight; and consider what might happen if they changed that
very simple design. And all they had to do was observe the bird in
its astonishing air-dance. Apparently they did not do that, and put
part of their tail feathers up front. That was really kind of dumb,
wouldn't you say?


No, I wouldn't. They had sound reasons for putting the horizontal surfaces
in front. One of them was crashworthiness; they understood that everything
may not go as hoped and wanted structure in front of them. Another was
their belief that the pilot needed to see the position of the control
surface in order to effectively control the machine.