Description:

SAMUEL P. LANGLEY
(1834 - 1906) American aviation pioneer who explored the possibility of flight by heavier-than-air machines and actually succeeded in inventing such a machine which flew over the Potomac for 3,000 feet. T.L.S. 2pp. 8vo., Washington, May 9, 1899, on letterhead of the Smithsonian Institute to Francis Woodbridge, a young man in care of the wife of Otho Michaelis. Michaelis was a US Army Signal Corps officer attached to Langley's 1881 expedition to Mount Whitney, and a close personal friend. In part: "...I am going with another gentleman to Europe, expecting to sail on the seventeenth of this month from Boston, in the 'Canada', and to be gone an indefinite time...I had arranged to take with me a young man connected with the Smithsonian...but I have reflected that I would rather have someone on whom I could better [rely]...telegraph me 'I accept'...". With holograph closing: "Your affectionate Godfather S. P. Langley". Very good.

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September 10, 2014 11:00 AM EDT
Elkton, MD, US

Alexander Historical Auctions LLC

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