II.
At the same time the family was facing a highly unpleasant situation involving Bishop Wright that put severe strain on them all, and Wilbur in particular. It was a burden he accepted without complaint, even as it required giving up days, eventually weeks of his time.
The trouble had first taken root some fifteen years before, in the 1880s, when two contentious factions within the United Brethren Church struggled for control. The issue was mainly the church’s traditional anti-Masonic stance, one side holding firm to that position, the other arguing for acceptance of Freemasonry and its secret ways as one of the realities of the times and, not incidentally, as a clear means to increase church membership and revenues.
Those in favor of welcoming Masons to church membership were the so-called Liberals. Those opposed, the Radicals, were led by Milton Wright, never one afraid to speak out for what he believed, who, even then, had called on Wilbur to help write articles and editorials in response to attacks by the opposition.
But the Liberals prevailed. The Bishop lost his fight. His role in the church was reduced to virtually nothing. Undaunted, he continued with his travels as an itinerant preacher and in 1889, the year of Susan Wright’s death, he set about establishing a new church to be known as the Old Constitution Church.
Time passed. Then, in 1901, an investigation initiated by Bishop Wright found the official in charge of publications for the Old Constitution Brethren, the Reverend Millard Keiter, had been making use of church money for his personal expenses, to the amount of nearly $7,000.
In February 1902, the Bishop asked Wilbur to examine the church account books, and from his review Wilbur concluded the Reverend Keiter had indeed helped himself to church funds to pay for his own insurance premiums, personal clothing, and part of the construction cost of his home. But when the church’s board of trustees met to review the charges against Keiter, it was decided, despite the evidence, that any discrepancies had resulted from carelessness, not fraud.
“My chief regret,” Wilbur wrote to his father, “is that the strain and worry which you have borne for fifteen years past shows no sign of being removed. . . . It would seem however that the fight only increases in intensity.” Wilbur also had no doubt that the fight must go on.
The question of whether officials shall rob the church and trustees deceive the church for fear of injuring collections, must be settled now for all time. In the long run nothing can be gained financially by deceit. To cheat the people by lying reports is more dishonest than Keiter’s stealing, and so far as church interests are concerned, the penalty will be greater.
In mid-March, Wilbur took the train to Huntington, Indiana, for further examination of the publishing house records and returned home two days later to assure his father that Keiter’s books and papers were “very crooked.”
With strong encouragement from Wilbur, the Bishop decided to do something on his own. He and Wilbur spent a full day preparing “an exposé of Keiter’s defalcations,” as the Bishop wrote in his diary, and the day after, Orville finished typewriting the final tract.
Without waiting for approval from his church, the Bishop accused Keiter of criminal conduct. Keiter was brought to trial, but not convicted. Sentiment within the church began to turn against the Bishop for having overplayed his hand. Old friends, he told Katharine, spoke of him behind his back as an “egotist.” Then in May, Millard Keiter filed formal charges against the Bishop, accusing him of libel.
Wilbur described the situation as “absolutely inconceivable, incomprehensible, and incredible.” He had not stopped examining Keiter’s books and was, as he wrote, “finding new instances of his stealing every few days.” Worn down and filled with worry, his father had trouble sleeping.
The charges and countercharges continued on into summer. On August 15, Wilbur issued a tract in defense of his father.
When my father and myself came to examine the charges [against the Bishop] carefully, we at once saw that the whole thing was a mere sham. The charges were so trivial as to be laughable. . . .
Although Mr. Keiter and his followers are on general principles opposed to investigations and trials, nevertheless they saw some advantages in instituting a pretended prosecution against Bishop Wright. . . .
The institution of even a bogus case would afford opportunity for the wide circulation of reports that Bishop Wright’s own character was under a cloud.
That day in a letter to his father, who was back on the road again, Wilbur wrote to assure him “things are moving nicely” and not to worry. Katharine followed with another letter to tell him Wilbur and Orville were so convinced things would turn out right that they were talking of leaving for Kitty Hawk the following week and that she thought it past time they got away for a while. “Will is thin and nervous and so is Orv. They will be all right when they get down to the sand where the salt breezes blow. . . . They think that life at Kitty Hawk cures all ills.”
By late August, the brothers had reached the final stage in building their new glider—stitching yards of white Bride-of-the-West muslin for the wing covering—which they carried on in the backyard at 7 Hawthorn Street, and so inspiring much talk and speculation in the neighborhood. “Some say the boys just go camping and they make their own tents,” said one neighbor. “Others say they are trying to fly. I don’t believe they’re that foolish.”
“Will spins the sewing machine around by the hour,” wrote Katharine, “while Orv squats around marking the places to sew.”
On August 26 with everything needed for Machine No. 3 packed and crated for shipment, the brothers departed on their third expedition to Kitty Hawk, leaving it to Katharine and Charlie Taylor to carry on with the bicycle store.
She was particularly pleased to see Wilbur off—it was the best thing in the world for him to go away, Katharine told her father. “He was completely unnerved. When he gets a thing on his mind, he thinks of it continually.”
She also wanted her father to know she was in the fight with him every bit as much as the brothers. “We’ll never stop fighting now, Pop, until we’ve shown those rascals up.”
Soon she had more to contend with. Charlie Taylor, as she informed the brothers, was making her “too weary for words.” The man claimed to know everything about everything. “I despise to be at the mercy of the hired man.” Thankfully the school year had begun, her classes had resumed, and she was now making an unprecedented $25 a week.