In my opinion, it is wrong to believe in the two extremes: That there were no revolutionary innovators or to ignore previous work in some areas.
When Wright brothers did their test, planes were already flying thanks to the innovation of lots of other people.
But planes could fly without control and crashed. A solution was needed and the Wright brothers provided it expending very little money: flexing the wings.
The fact that they could come with the first valid solution provides a lot of value for society, in the same way of solving the nuclear problem by slowing the neutrons with heavy water(a crazy idea from a single guy) gave America an advance over the Germans.
The same could be said about the problems yet to solve: who will make the first viable fusion nuclear reactor?
It has to be noted that while the Wright brothers invented flexing the wings, they did not invented ailerons, but a twisting mechanism that was not practical, but they were awarded a patent anyway on them for several reasons ( American protectionism being one of them).
Those patents make America aviation industry lag behind other nations and forced the Government to act.
When Wright brothers did their test, planes were already flying thanks to the innovation of lots of other people.
But planes could fly without control and crashed. A solution was needed and the Wright brothers provided it expending very little money: flexing the wings.
The fact that they could come with the first valid solution provides a lot of value for society, in the same way of solving the nuclear problem by slowing the neutrons with heavy water(a crazy idea from a single guy) gave America an advance over the Germans.
The same could be said about the problems yet to solve: who will make the first viable fusion nuclear reactor?
It has to be noted that while the Wright brothers invented flexing the wings, they did not invented ailerons, but a twisting mechanism that was not practical, but they were awarded a patent anyway on them for several reasons ( American protectionism being one of them).
Those patents make America aviation industry lag behind other nations and forced the Government to act.