An overview of the two-surfaced gliders that came out of the 'Chanute group.'

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Centered around Octave Chanute, Chicago was one of three centers of aeronautical research in the United States in 1896. From his group came the Chanute-Herring glider that was to be the most significant pre-Wright aircraft. Two strongly trussed wings with a cruciform tail, the wings would be the design chosen by the Wright brothers to build their planes. The glider foreshadowed the bi-planes of the early years of flight.

While Chanute was cautious about the future of this glider as an airplane, his assistant and chief contributor to the design, Augustus Herring, was inspired. Convinced that all was needed was an engine and propellers on the glider, he built and experimented with a three winged glider immediately following the initial experiments in the Indiana Dunes in 1896. The following year he found a new patron in Matthias Arnot, who financed the building of a bi-plane glider fashioned after the original Chanute-Herring glider. And the next year, 1898, he did put an engine and propellers on a bigger version of the glider and 'flew' it near his home in St. Joseph, Michigan. Chanute built one more of the 'original' glider, exhibiting and flying it at the St. Louis Exposition of 1904. Only the last one survives, having been bought by the Musee de l'Air, it is on public display at the new Musee de l'Air et de l'Space at the Bourget Airport in Paris, France.

The following tables provide an overview and comparison of these gliders.

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General Overview

1896 Chanute-Herring Glider	1896 Herring Triplane1	1897 Herring-Arnot Version	1898 Herring Powered Glider	1904 'Exposition' Glider
Photo		From a drawing
Type	Bi-Plane	Tri-Plane	Bi-Plane	Bi-Plane	Bi-Plane
Builder & Place	Chanute, Herring & Avery - Avery Workshop	Herring - probably Avery Workshop	Avery	Truscott Boat Yard St. Joseph, MI	Avery
Where Flown	Dune Park	Dune Park	Dune Park	St. Joseph, Michigan	St. Louis Exposition
When flown	Sept., 1896	late 1896 or early 1897	Sept., 1897	Oct. 10th& 22nd, 1898	Oct. 7 - 25, 1904
Best Distance	359' / 14 sec.	927'	600'	50' & 72'	175'

Details Overview

1896 Chanute-Herring Glider	1896 Herring Triplane	1897 Herring-Arnot Version	1898 Herring Powered Glider	1904 'Exposition' Glider
Support Bars2	vertical		Angled in		Angled in
Ribs or struts	12		11	14	11
Overhang3	Fabric overhangs		No overhang		No overhang
Wing size	16'2"x 4'4"	ca. 15'x 5'	15'7.5"x 5'	18'	15'9"x 4'11"
Total Square Feet	134	227	156		165.9
Wing Section	Circle		Circle		Parabolic 4
Total Weight	23 lbs.		19 lbs.	88 lbs. [with motor]	18 lbs.

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¹ The only evidence of this glider is from Herring himself. He wrote about this glider in the Aeronautical Annual, 1897. Some authors have discounted these flights considering Herring's later exaggerations about his role in the development of the airplane.

² In pictures the first Chanute-Herring glider was often confused with the Herring-Arnot glider. The most obvious difference is the position of the vertical support bars to the bars that the pilot supported himself on. In the original glider the bars were vertical, in the Herring-Arnot version the bars were angled in slightly to give the glider pilot easier control.

³Fabric overhang: In the original glider the fabric overhangs the interplane struts in each strut bay. Examination of photos and drawings is certain to bring confusion on this point and cannot be taken as a final determination.

⁴ The pictures indicate an almost flat wing with a short downturn in the wing section at the front.

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