lawrence sperry (the son of famous inventor elmer sperry) demonstrated it in 1914 at an aviation safety contest held in paris. sperry demonstrated the credibility of the invention by flying the aircraft with his hands away from the controls and visible to onlookers. elmer sperry jr., the son of lawrence sperry, and capt shiras continued work on the same autopilot after the war, and in 1930 they tested a more compact and reliable autopilot which kept a us army air corps aircraft on a true heading and altitude for three hours.