Subsequently, a memo by Lippincott dated February 1, noted, ‘Lopez phoned today that he and Garber will be unable to attend the February 2 interview.’

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Later, on February 15, Lippincott recorded: ‘On February 2, 1974, at Trumbull, Conn., Mrs. Elizabeth Koteles described a flight of a monoplane by Gustave Whitehead near the baseball diamond at Gypsy Springs, Fairfield. She said the airplane took off from, and landed undamaged, on level ground. The plane was about four feet in the air and flew maybe 100-150 feet….From photos displayed, she picked out Airplane No. 21 of 1901 as the plane she saw. I was much impressed by her effort to recollect, and her sincerity and truthfulness. If she did not know something she said so.’

Whitehead’s claimed flight of August 14, 1901, was described by writer Richard Howell in the August 18 issue of the Bridgeport Sunday Herald as covering a half mile at heights of up to 50 feet. Howell, an artist before he became a reporter, illustrated his article with an accurate drawing of airplane No. 21 in flight above an open field at Fairfield. Howell was erroneously referred to as editor of the Herald in later publicity. Whitehead’s detractors, already debunking Howell’s story as ‘only imagination,’ used that error as further ammunition. Why, they asked, would an editor hold such an important story for four days instead of giving it front page headlines on August 14? Not only did they overlook the fact that the Herald, a weekly, was published only on Sunday, but they also failed to recognize that in 1901 Howell was not the Herald’s editor, but its sports editor. As such, he had placed his article on page one of his sports section.

O’Dwyer, curious about Howell, spent hours in the Bridgeport Library studying virtually everything Howell wrote. ‘Howell was always a very serious writer,’ O’Dwyer said. ‘He always used sketches rather than photographs with his features on inventions. He was highly regarded by his peers on other local newspapers. He used the florid style of the day, but was not one to exaggerate. Howell later became the Herald’s editor.’

Howell’s story in the Sunday Herald said that Whitehead and two helpers (James Dickie and Andrew Cellie), along with the reporter, had traveled through the pre-dawn darkness from Bridgeport to Fairfield on August 14, 1901. Whitehead and Cellie rode in the aircraft, which rolled over the road on four wooden wheels. Dickie and Howell followed on bicycles. At Fairfield, Howell said, the airplane, with 220 pounds of sand ballast aboard, made a brief tethered hop; he then described the manned flight.

‘By the time the light was good,’ Howell wrote, ‘the bags of sand were taken out of the machine….An early morning milkman stopped in the road to see what was going on. His horse nearly ran away when the big white wings flapped [as the engines were started]….The nervous tension was growing and no one showed it more than Whitehead who still whispered at times, but as the light grew stronger he began to speak in his normal tone of voice. He stationed his two assistants behind the machine with instructions to hold onto the ropes and not let the machine get away. Then he took his position in the great bird. He opened the throttle of the ground propeller and [the craft] shot along the green sod at a rapid rate. ‘The two assistants held on as best they could, but the ship shot up into the air like a kite. It was an exciting moment. ‘We can’t hold her,’ shrieked one of the rope men. ‘Let her go then,’ shouted Whitehead back. They let go, and…the machine darted up through the air like a bird released from a cage. Whitehead was greatly excited and his hands flew from one part of the machine to another.

‘The newspaperman and the two assistants stood still for a moment watching the air ship in amazement. Then they rushed down the slightly sloping grade after the air ship. She was flying now about fifty feet above the ground and made a noise like the ‘chung, chung, chung’ of an elevator going down a shaft.

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