In June 1896, Octave Chanute, a leading civil engineer, crossed Lake Michigan from Chicago and conducted a series of glider experiments on Miller Beach between what is now Lake Street and Marquette Park. The most advanced gliders he tested featured rigidly braced biplane wings, and this work helped lay the foundation for powered flight. Chanute later became a friend and advisor to Orville and Wilbur Wright and assisted their efforts toward achieving powered flight, and the Chanute glider became the pattern for the Wright flier. Unlike previous flying-machine designs, its rigidly trussed biplane wings became the standard for airplanes up to World War II. William Avery, a Chanute associate, served as the pilot, and experimental flights on the beach took place in September 1896 and again in 1897. The Wright Brothers contacted Chanute in 1900 and invented the first airplane using this design. In 1911, after Chanute's death, Wilbur Wright said that if he had not lived, the history of human flight would have been quite different from what it had been.