The glider that the Wright brothers referred to as the 'Chanute double decker' was built in July and August of 1896 between the two visits that summer to the Indiana dunes. It's trussed bi-plane design would be the model for the Wright brothers in constructing their gliders and eventually their first airplane. This model is from the Fiddlers Green "Centennial of Flight "Series

The Most Successful Pre-Wright Glider
Octave Chanute and fellow flying enthusiasts went to wind-swept Miller Beach on Lake Michigan in 1896 to test three new glider designs. The type seen here was originally built as a triplane. Early flights revealed to Chanute and his co-designer, Augustus Herring, that the three-winged machine had too much lift-which made it unstable. With the bottom wing removed, it not only outperformed the other designs, but proved at the time to be the most successful glider ever built-with hundreds of controlled flights of up to 359 feet, for as long as 14 seconds. Its rigid, truss supported biplane design became the basis for the Wright brothers' gliders.

More Information