It made me think of this guy:
The one on the left - my grandad. Horrible capture (with the phone camera) but…him and his bud built[1] this for traveling airshows better part of a century ago. IIRC they would give rides for like a nickel or something like that.
I know for sure he’d get a kick out of VR = everyone told me we were a lot alike, even physically. He used to scare the krap outta me on crazy amusement park rides when I was a little boy.
[1] Not sure this is the one they actually built - it may be their second one, and I don’t know his friends name (would help), posing next to the ‘shiny’ new one. Granny said they had this one around 1929-ish…whoa…the internet to the rescue.
This page:
http://www.airhistory.org.uk/gy/reg_N12.html
WACO GXE…
Led me to this