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U. S. manufacturers were inclined to minimize Esnault-Pelterie's standing as an airman, to scoff at his claim of inventor. The joystick, they said, first appeared in a monoplane model designed (but never flown) by Alphonse Penaud in 1876 and was first made to work, in principle, by the Wrights in 1905.† Moreover, while Esnault-Pelterie's patent did include a clause which might cover all singlestick controls, the one which he had designed could never work, they insisted. To prove it, the defense had built a model exactly according to his plane, was testing it last week in the wind-tunnel of the N. A. C. A. at Langley Field, Va.
* By Act of Congress, 1918, infringement suits cannot be directed against manufacturers of goods supplied to the Government. The Government assumes liability rather than risk having its source of supply cut off by action against the builder. †So states History of Aircraft, Magoun & Hodgins, Whittlesey House, N. Y., 1931.