According to one biographer, Wells originally got the idea for land ironclads using "pedrails" from the inventor John William Dunne, who spoke of "big fat pedrail machines" in a letter to Wells.
John William Dunne (1875–1949), a pre-World War I pioneer of tailless aircraft, mostly in biplane form
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In addition some highly secret experiments with gliders were being carried out at Blair Atholl in Scotland by J.W. Dunne in collaboration with Capper.
Designed by Lieutenant J.W. Dunne, who was working with Samuel Franklin Cody on man-lifting kites at the Army Balloon Factory, the Dunne D.1 was a biplane glider whose design embodied Dunne's ideas about achieving inherent stability in an aircraft, which he had developed during two years of experimentation with models.