Editing Aileron (section)

=== Other early aileron designers ===

Others who were previously thought to have been the first to introduce ailerons included:

* American [[John J. Montgomery]] included spring-loaded trailing edge flaps on his second glider (1885): these were operable by the pilot as ailerons. In 1886 his third glider design used rotation of the entire wing rather than just a trailing edge portion for roll control. By his own accounts all of these changes in addition to his use of an elevator for pitch control provided "entire control of the machine in the wind, preventing it from upsetting."<ref>Harwood, CS and Fogel, GB "Quest for Flight: John J. Montgomery and the Dawn of Aviation in the West," University of Oklahoma Press, 2012. pp. 36–45.</ref>
* New Zealander [[Richard Pearse]] reputedly made a powered flight in a monoplane that included small ailerons as early as 1902, but his claims are controversial—and sometimes inconsistent—and, even by his own reports, his aircraft were not well controlled.

[[File:Bulgarien Farman M.F.7.jpg|thumb|right|A 1912 [[Farman HF.20]] biplane with [[Aileron#Single acting ailerons|single acting ailerons]] hinged from the rear spar. The ailerons hang down when at rest and are pushed up into position when flying by the force of the air, being pulled down by cable to provide control.]]

* In 1906 [[Alberto Santos-Dumont]]'s [[Santos-Dumont 14-bis|14-bis]] was one of the earliest (if not ''the'' earliest) engine-powered, aileron-equipped aircraft to fly, as it was modified to have added octagonal-planform interplane ailerons in its outermost wing bays [[Santos-Dumont 14-bis#Concluding flights, and the inclusion of ailerons|on November 12]] of that year for its concluding flight sessions at the [[Chateau de Bagatelle]]'s grounds; but those roll control surfaces were not true "trailing-edge" ailerons hinged directly to the wing panels' framework—for the 14-bis, these were instead pivoted around a horizontal axis centred on the ''forward'' outboard interplane struts, and protruded forward past the wings' leading edges - said to be very much like those on [[Robert Esnault-Pelterie]]'s 1904 biplane glider design.<ref>Harrison, James P. [https://books.google.com/books?id=sIk_T6F63NYC ''Mastering the Sky: A History of Aviation from Ancient Times to the Present''], Da Capo Press, 2000, p. 48, {{ISBN|1885119682}}, {{ISBN|978-1885119681}}.</ref> 
* On May 18, 1908, engineer and aircraft designer [[Frederick Walker Baldwin|Frederick Baldwin]], a member of the [[Aerial Experiment Association]] headed by [[Alexander Graham Bell]], flew their first aileron-controlled aircraft, the [[AEA White Wing]],<ref name="Aerospaceweb-Yoon.1" /> which was later copied by the U.S. aeronautical pioneer [[Glenn Curtiss]]<ref>Parkin 1964, pp. 54–69.</ref> the same year, with the [[AEA June Bug|AEA ''June Bug'']].
* [[Henry Farman]]'s ailerons on his 1909 [[Farman III]] were the first to resemble ailerons on modern aircraft as they were hinged directly to the wing planform structure, and thus were viewed as having a reasonable claim as the ancestor of the modern-day aileron.<ref name="Aerospaceweb-Yoon.1" />
* Wingtip ailerons were also used on the contemporary [[Bleriot VIII]]—the first known flightworthy aircraft to use the joystick and rudder bar pioneering form of [[Flight control system|modern flight controls]]<ref name="Crouch 1982" /> in a single airframe, and the 1911-vintage [[Curtiss Model D]] [[Pusher configuration|pusher]] biplane had spanwise rectangular interplane ailerons of a similar nature to those on the final form of the [[Santos-Dumont 14-bis]],<ref name="Parkin.b" /> but mounted on, and pivoted from the outer ''rear'' interplane struts instead.
* Another very late contestant included the American, [[William Whitney Christmas]], who claimed to have invented the aileron in the 1914 patent for what would become the [[Christmas Bullet]] which was built in 1918.<ref name="Aerospaceweb-Yoon.3" /> Both "Bullet" prototypes crashed during their first "flights" when their wings broke off in flight due to [[Aeroelasticity|flutter]] as a result of being deliberately unbraced.