Whitehead 21 (oz13672)

About this Plan

Whitehead No.21. Free flight scale model for rubber power.

Quote: "Whitehead No.21 Monoplane, by Ken Johnson. An interesting scale model, as the original may have flown before the Wright Brother's aircraft. Lesson: If you're ever the first to do something historical, make sure someone takes pictures!

Did Gustave Whitehead and his #21 monoplane truly fly on August 14, 1901? This date was over 2 years before the Wright brothers flew at Kittyhawk.

This question prompted me to read the article on Whitehead in the November 1968 issue of American Aircraft Modeler magazine. According to this AAM write-up, there were numerous eyewitnesses who related seeing Whitehead in #21 fly for up to 1/2 mile in distance. The Wright's flight was 122 feet in length.

While working in Dayton, Ohio in 1975, I was a contestant in a paper airplane contest held in the convention center. This building has two marble pillars in the lobby, marking the distance of the Kittyhawk flight. The contestants in the contest stood on a low platform at the one pillar and flew their paper gliders toward the other pillar. The winning flight went past the 122 ft marker and struck the wall a good 30 ft behind it.

The reason the Kittyhawk flight was recognized as the first powered flight was that a local photographer snapped that famous picture we all know, with the airplane about 4 ft off the ground. A helper in black suit and cap is standing near one wingtip. Unfortunately there were NO photos of the Whitehead aircraft. Just accounts from eight eyewitnesses who saw #21 fly.

A friend of the Whitehead family, Miss Stella Randolph, wrote a book about Mr Whitehead and his experiments with airplanes and engines. This work is titled 'Before the Wrights Flew,' and was published by G Putnam & Sons, in 1966. I found the book in my public library. Many photos and accounts of the planes can be found there. A second book by Miss Randolph is titled 'The Lost Flights of Gustave Whitehead.'

The AAM article contains an excellent three-view drawing of #21 by Bjorn Karlstrom.

Note: There is no intent herein to discredit the achievements of the Wright brothers, but to simply show a comparison with Mr. Whitehead. This airplane intrigued me personally for several reasons:

1. It had folding wings and tail.
2. The craft stood on four wheels.
3. The pilot was partially enclosed within the fuselage.
4. The two counter-rotating propellers were driven by one steam engine located in the front of the fuselage.
5. #21 could come down on the water, since the body of the plane was boat shaped.
6. To turn the craft, Mr Whitehead stood up and pulled on the wires which supported the wings. This amounted to wing warping and the resulting drag made the plane turn.

As I studied the three-view, I wondered if it would fly with no vertical fin. #21 had none. And how would I make a rubber powered model of it with one rubber band driving two propellers?

The plan was drawn up to a span of 22 inches and construction began. The rubber motor was enclosed in the fuselage, with a two-pulley arrangement forward of the front hook. The propellers each had a pulley just behind which connected to the motor hook pulley by a tied length of thin thread. The model was covered with condenser paper.

The wing structure was made of what appears to be tapered bamboo poles connected at the root and fanning out toward the tip of each wing. To simulate this in the model, 1/16 sq balsa strips were sanded round and tapered smaller toward the tips. This is accomplished by holding a small square of sandpaper (folded over) in one hand and spinning the strip of wood around through the sandpaper and drawing it back and forth simultaneously. The wood poles are coated with yellow marker and the joints marked with a thin brown ring.

Test flights on the completed model revealed that the pulley arrangement was inefficient and much power was lost with this type of drive train. The model flew in a straight line but wandered slightly from side to side. I concluded the reason being the absence of a vertical fin. This first model was set aside and eventually given to a friend when my family moved to California.

The second Whitehead model was built to the 13 inch Peanut size for the Model Builder Peanut Proxy Contest held in Long Beach, Ca. in 1978. The new craft was different in that is used a separate rubber motor for each propeller. Rear hooks were located on the top of the stab on each side. The model was covered with white Japanese tissue, and this time a scale-looking vertical fin was added. The performance was much improved..."

Whitehead 21, Model Builder, July 1982.

Direct submission to Outerzone.

Update 8/6/2022: Replaced this plan with a clearer copy, thanks to MB2020.

Supplementary file notes

Article pages, thanks to RFJ.
Previous scan version.

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