10 Francs Langley-Centenary of Aviation

Samuel Langley's claim to aviation priority was officially demolished within months of the Wright Brothers' Kitty Hawk flight, yet his Smithsonian Institution backing kept the argument alive for decades. The Institution famously doctored the record of Langley's 1903 Aerodrome tests to assert it had achieved "capable of flight" status — a falsification Glenn Curtiss participated in and the Smithsonian didn't formally retract until 1942.

Congo's inclusion of Langley in an aviation centenary series is an odd editorial choice, given that 2008 marks 105 years after Kitty Hawk, not 100.