George A. Spratt
George Alexander Spratt (1870–1934) was an American inventor who helped shape early aviation. Born in New Jersey, his family moved to Coatesville, Pennsylvania, where his father was a doctor. Spratt studied medicine but illness stopped him from becoming a physician, so he turned to farming and spent his spare time studying science, especially flight.
Spratt became an enthusiastic amateur aeronaut and began corresponding with aviation pioneer Octave Chanute. He spent three weeks at Kitty Hawk with the Wright brothers in 1901, helping with experiments. He suggested making the glider’s wings less curved, which made flight more stable. He returned to Kitty Hawk in October 1902 and October 1903, just before Orville Wright’s first controlled powered flight, and kept testing gliders to find designs that would fly steadily with little pilot help.
In 1920 Spratt finally patented a wing design with a circular cross-section and tested an airplane using that wing in Pine Valley, New Jersey, in 1924. He later claimed the Wright brothers did not give him proper credit for his ideas. His work continued to influence aviation, and on September 28, 1934, his son George G. Spratt flew a “plane without a tail” for the first time. George A. Spratt died of heart disease two months later, in November 1934, in Coatesville.
Spratt’s legacy lived on through his son, who continued building planes from his designs. In 2021, Pennsylvania placed a historical marker outside the Spratt Farm to recognize his contributions, noting his wind-tunnel work helped explain lift, drag, and the center of pressure on curved wings.
This page was last edited on 3 February 2026, at 19:00 (CET).