WRIGHT, ORVILLE. Autograph document, a promissory note for Miss Crabbe, Dayton, Ohio, 7 February 1896. 1 page, 8vo, 242 x 147mm. (9 1/2 x 5 3/4 in.), slight fold separations, ON ILLUSTRATED LETTERHEAD OF THE WRIGHT CYCLE CO., showing a large bicycle at top, ENDORSED BY WILBUR WRIGHT: "Paid Wright Cycle Co. O.W." (written across the sheet). A promissory note which no doubt records the Wrights' sale of a bicycle of their own manufacture -- WRIGHT, WILBUR. Three printed receipts accomplished and signed ("Wright Cycle Co. W.W."), 19 February, 20 May, 29 July 1896, each oblong, 56 x 112mm. (2 3/16 x 4 1/2 in.), possibly printed on the Wrights' own press in red and black, recording payments received from Miss Crabbe -- WRIGHT, ORVILLE. Printed receipt accomplished and signed ("Wright Cycle Co. O.W."), 13 April 1896, as the preceding -- Another similar, filled out by a clerk. (6) A very unusual series of documents recording a very early Wright transaction, the sale of a bicycle, on credit, to a Miss Martha Crabbe, of Dayton, who signs the promissory note agreeing that: "For value received I promise to pay to the order of Wright Cycle Co., the sum of sixty dollars ($60.00) payable in sums as follows...Eight dollars on the 20th day of March, 1896, and the sum of twelve dollars on the 20th day of April 1896 and twelve dollars on the 20th day of each suceeding month till the full amount shall have been paid...." Documents of such early vintage relating to the pioneers of manned flight are decidedly rare. For three years the Wrights had been servicing, selling and, more recently, manufacturing bicycles. Their first-line bicycle, launched in 1896, sold for $60 and may be the model purchased by Miss Crabbe. "The production of their own line of machines marked a turning point in their financial fortunes....During their years of peak production, 1896-1900, Wilbur and Orville constructed perhaps three hundred bicycles..." (T. Crouch, The Bishop's Boys; A Life of Wilbur and Orville Wright, 1989, p.114). The year 1896 was a fateful one for the bicycle-builders of Dayton. In August, the German glider pioneer Otto Lilienthal was killed in one of his aircraft, and, as Orville later wrote: "The brief notice of his death which appeared in the telegraphic news at that time aroused a passive interest [in aeronautics] which had existed since my childhood..." (quoted in Crouch, p.159. (6)
WRIGHT, ORVILLE. Autograph document, a promissory note for Miss Crabbe, Dayton, Ohio, 7 February 1896. 1 page, 8vo, 242 x 147mm. (9 1/2 x 5 3/4 in.), slight fold separations, ON ILLUSTRATED LETTERHEAD OF THE WRIGHT CYCLE CO., showing a large bicycle at top, ENDORSED BY WILBUR WRIGHT: "Paid Wright Cycle Co. O.W." (written across the sheet). A promissory note which no doubt records the Wrights' sale of a bicycle of their own manufacture -- WRIGHT, WILBUR. Three printed receipts accomplished and signed ("Wright Cycle Co. W.W."), 19 February, 20 May, 29 July 1896, each oblong, 56 x 112mm. (2 3/16 x 4 1/2 in.), possibly printed on the Wrights' own press in red and black, recording payments received from Miss Crabbe -- WRIGHT, ORVILLE. Printed receipt accomplished and signed ("Wright Cycle Co. O.W."), 13 April 1896, as the preceding -- Another similar, filled out by a clerk. (6) A very unusual series of documents recording a very early Wright transaction, the sale of a bicycle, on credit, to a Miss Martha Crabbe, of Dayton, who signs the promissory note agreeing that: "For value received I promise to pay to the order of Wright Cycle Co., the sum of sixty dollars ($60.00) payable in sums as follows...Eight dollars on the 20th day of March, 1896, and the sum of twelve dollars on the 20th day of April 1896 and twelve dollars on the 20th day of each suceeding month till the full amount shall have been paid...." Documents of such early vintage relating to the pioneers of manned flight are decidedly rare. For three years the Wrights had been servicing, selling and, more recently, manufacturing bicycles. Their first-line bicycle, launched in 1896, sold for $60 and may be the model purchased by Miss Crabbe. "The production of their own line of machines marked a turning point in their financial fortunes....During their years of peak production, 1896-1900, Wilbur and Orville constructed perhaps three hundred bicycles..." (T. Crouch, The Bishop's Boys; A Life of Wilbur and Orville Wright, 1989, p.114). The year 1896 was a fateful one for the bicycle-builders of Dayton. In August, the German glider pioneer Otto Lilienthal was killed in one of his aircraft, and, as Orville later wrote: "The brief notice of his death which appeared in the telegraphic news at that time aroused a passive interest [in aeronautics] which had existed since my childhood..." (quoted in Crouch, p.159. (6)
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.jpg "Source: Christie's")
.jpg "Source: Christie's")
