Jack Linthicum wrote:

As always the Chinese seem to have been there first. Temple in his
reduction of Needham down to 240 pages, The Genius of China, tells of
one Ko Hung.."Someone asked the Master (Ko Hung) about the principles
of mounting to dangerous heights and traveling into the vast inane.
The Master said..some have made flying cars with wood from the inner
part of the jujube tree, using ox leather straps fastened to returning
blades so as to set the machine in motion. Others have the idea of

Well, now that you've disclosed it, ox leather is the secret to the
high performance of the Lockheed Blackbird, hence the name of the
CIA project, OXCART.