Chicago, September 3, 1903
I have your letter of Aug. 31st and thank you for the information furnished. I send you a letter from Merrill, which please return. I have written him that I have no cross section of your surfaces, as I refrained from taking any measurements of your machine, but I have given him your address. I hope that he has really devised such an apparatus as he claims.
I have been kept quite busy with wood preserving matters; no less than four railroads [are] talking of having plants for treating ties built and operated by me. I am about to go over the line of some of them to look up suitable locations, but nothing may come of it after all.
I regret to hear that the total weight of your machine will approximate 675 lbs. I am so much interested in your continued success that I wish you had planned a lighter and more easily started machine, even at the risk of having to go a little faster through the air. Ferber's machine weighs 495 lbs. with 588 ft. of surface, 0.85 lbs. pr sq. ft., and I figure that he needs a speed of 24 miles an hour, at 2 1/2 incidence.
Wilbur Wright to Octave Chanute, September 9, 1903