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Earliest newspaper from Orlando we have offered... A flying machine described...
Earliest newspaper from Orlando we have offered... A flying machine described...
Item # 697581
October 25, 1883
ORANGE COUNTY REPORTER, Orlando, Florida, Oct. 25, 1883
* Future home of Disney World
This is the earliest newspaper we have offered from Orlando. A typical newspaper of the day with a variety of news reports including a front page item: "A Flying Machine" which is very descriptive of it.
Gregory's "Union List of Newspapers" notes that only one institution has more than a single issue of this newspaper.
Four pages, large folio size, good condition. Folder size noted is for the issue folded in half.
AI notes: H. C. Linfield’s 1883 “flying machine” refers to a little-known but intriguing American aeronautical experiment from the early age of heavier-than-air flight. Linfield, an inventor from Massachusetts, proposed a man-carrying aircraft decades before the Wright brothers, designing a machine that combined features of an ornithopter and a glider. His 1883 model reportedly used oscillating, wing-like surfaces driven by mechanical power in an attempt to imitate bird flight—a common engineering assumption before true aerodynamic lift was fully understood. Contemporary accounts suggest that Linfield built at least a prototype and conducted small-scale tests, but like most pre-1890 ornithopter experiments, it never achieved sustained controlled flight. Nonetheless, Linfield’s design is part of the broader lineage of experimental American aviation in the late 19th century, illustrating the persistence and creativity of inventors working without the benefit of later aerodynamic science.
Category: Post-Civil War
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