Introduction: The Origins of the Practical Airplane

1. Daedalus and Icarus / Ovid and Horace Gregory

2. The Short, Happy Flight of King Bladud / Geoffrey of Monmouth and Lewis Thorpe

3. Oliver of Malmesbury, the Flying Monk / Bescherelle / Octave Chanute

4. The Saracen of Constantinople / Octave Chanute

5. The Aerial Ship / Francisco de Lana Terzi

6. The Flight of Birds / Giovanni Alphonso Borelli

7. "Some Fire, My Dear Friend, Some Fire!" / Marquis d'Arlandes

8. The Flight of the Sycamore Seed / George Cayley

9. On Aerial Navigation / George Cayley

10. "Certain Improvements in Locomotive Apparatus and Machinery for Conveying Letters, Goods, and Passengers from Place to Place Through the Air, Part of Which Improvements Are Applicable to Locomotive and Other Machinery to Be Used on Water and on Land." / William Henson

11. Proposal / William Henson

12. "We Feel Very Sanguine as to the Results of Our Endeavour ..." / William Henson and George Cayley

13. "Memoir of the Late John Stringfellow" / Frederick W. Brearey

14. The Artificial Bird of Captain Le Bris / Octave Chanute

15. "My Apparatus, No. 3, the Light, Imperfect One" / Pierre Mouillard and Octave Chanute

16. "My Late Brother Otto" / Gustav Lilienthal

17. The Trials of the Eole / Clement Ader

18. Progress in Flying Machines: Introduction / Octave Chanute

19. Progress in Flying Machines: Conclusion / Octave Chanute

20. "I Have Been Afflicted With the Belief That Flight Is Possible to Man" / Wilbur Wright

21. The First Journey to Kitty Hawk / Wilbur Wright

22. Life at Kitty Hawk, 1900 / Orville Wright

23. Life at Kitty Hawk, 1901 / Orville Wright

24. Life at Kitty Hawk, 1902 / Orville Wright

25. Mr. Chanute in Paris / Ernest Archdeacon

26. Experiments With the Langley Aerodrome / S.P. Langley

27. Life at Kitty Hawk, 1903 / Orville Wright

28. "We Tossed a Coin to Decide ..." / Orville Wright

29. "Success Assured Keep Quiet" / Orville Wright

30. "Mr. Daniels Took a Picture Just as It Left the Tracks" / Orville Wright

31. "Success Four Flights Thursday Morning" / Orville Wright

32. "Two Ohio Brothers Crowned With Success" / Norfolk Virginian-Pilot

33. The Wright Boys Are Coming Home / Dayton Daily News

34. Statement to the Associated Press / Wright Brothers

35. Fall Wrecks Airship / The New York Times

36. What Hath God Wrought? / Amos Root

37. "We Are Prepared to Furnish a Machine on Contract ..." / Wright Brothers and War Department

38. "Like Everybody Else, I Cried: 'Bravo! Bravo!'" / Antoinette Gastambide

39. Competition / Gabriel Voison and Oliver Stewart

40. Beginning to Fly / Glenn Curtiss and Augustus M. Post

41. The June Bug / Glenn Curtiss and Augustus M. Post

42. "We Would Be Glad to Take Up the Matter of a License ..." / Orville Wright

43. The Pioneers of Flight / Claude Grahame-White

44. Bleriot Tells of His Flight

Dropped Crutches to Do It / Louis Bleriot

45. The First Air Meet / Glenn Curtiss

46. An Exchange Between Two Old Friends / Wilbur Wright and Octave Chanute

47. "The Cheering Subsided to a Silent Prayer ..." / New York American

48. Down the Hudson River / Glenn Curtiss and Augustus M. Post

49. Finding His Wings / Adelaide Ovington

50. How a Woman Learns to Fly / Harriet Quimby

51. "Canvas, Steel, and Wire" / Cal Rodgers

52. The Sensation of Flying / Claude Grahame-White

53. Why I Looped the Loop / A. Pegoud

54. Johannisthal Days / Anthony Fokker and Bruce Gould

55. "A Short Life, Full of Consequences" / Milton Wright

56. The Credulous Farmer / Grover Loening.