To grow them in water, take a stem cutting with several nodes and leaves and place the cut end of the stem in a tall and narrow vessel filled with non-chlorinated water. Without notifying his wife (who most likely would’ve scolded and slapped him into his senses), the worker cut a winnowing basket, used to separate corn kernels from husks, in half, fashioning them to his back. The 2004 film The Assassination of Richard Nixon, based on a true incident, depicts a disillusioned tire salesman who attempts to hijack a plane in 1974 and crash it into the White House. ­Because of several accounts detailing the uncertainty of attaching a pair of wings to one’s ar­ms and falling several stories, there were many stories and moral tales describing the dangers of flight attempts before the beginning of modern aviation. The small European country of Portugal has a long history of aviation: Attempts at flight go back as early as Medieval times, and the Portuguese Air Museum dates back as far as 1909, only six years after the Wright brothers flew at Kitty Hawk, N.C.

Al-Djawhari fell straight to the ground and was killed, stamping into history the first recorded attempt at human flight. Most of the precipitation that enters a lake, river, stream or marsh must first pass over and seep through soil. Alighting over water rather than land made braking rockets unnecessary, but its disadvantages included difficult retrieval and the danger of drowning. Unfortunately, when he landed, his helmet slipped over his face and obscured his ­view. Unfortunately, trial flights by Lake Trasimeno only ended up in violent crashes on the roof of Saint Mary’s Church. Constructing wings made of whalebone (once again, covered with feathers) and curved into shape using springs, Guidotti attempted a flight that lasted about 400 yards (366 meters) before falling through a roof and breaking his thigh. Using two pairs of calico cloth-covered wings attached to his arms and an eagle-shaped helmet, Torto jumped from the cathedral tower in St. Mateus square on June 20, 1540 at 5 p.m. Like many other before and after him, Giovanni simply glued feathers to his arms and moved them rapidly up and down, hoping the feathers had some physical property that aided the mechanics of flight. One ­of Leonardo’s contemporaries, the Italian mathematician Giovanni Battista Danti, was one of the many men throughout the Middle Ages and Early Renaissance to mistakenly interpret the anatomy of birds and take the motion of flapping wings a little too far.

Sciences such as mathematics and astronomy were very important to Islamic scholars during the Middle Ages, and flight became a sacred ideal to Turks well before it was seriously discussed in Europe. In 1910, the first airplane was seen flying in the country when the club invited French pilot Julien Marmet to give flight trials, and by 1912 Alberto Sanches de Castro became the first Portuguese pilot to fly an airplane in Portugal. We often have fanta­stic dreams of floating or flying around effortlessly when we’re young, and it’s no surprise adolescents are drawn to superheroes like Superman, who can run, jump and fly faster than a speeding bullet. One 16th-century writer named Phillippe le Picard, who went by the penname of Philippe d-Alcripe, wrote one such story, infusing his fable with a bit of humor. Another Renaissance man, Paolo Guidotti, who lived about 100 years later than Leonardo and Giovanni, just couldn’t let go of the bird’s-wing theory.

If we’re lucky enough, however, our parents let us know that actually attempting to fly without an airplane or helicopter and a licensed professional behind the wheel is not a good idea. One famous attempt, however, made the wrong kind of history, ending up in failure. According to the John Bridge tile company, one of the most effective ways to keep your shower looking clean and fresh is to wipe it down after each use. After outdoor irrigation, toilets use more water than any appliance or fixture in a residential home. Millions of people every year flock to the Louvre Museum in Paris, France, to get a glimpse of hi­s painting the “Mona Lisa.” His sketch of “The Vitruvian Man” changed the way people use proportion in art. In the early 1900s, how did people cross the Atlantic Ocean? Why do trains have steel wheel? Trains have steel wheels to decrease the rolling friction. So, metal or steel wheels give low rolling resistance, consume less energy and save operating costs. On the other hand, a modern hybrid diesel locomotive combines both electrical and mechanical energies to give better power output.