Design is evolutionary. Why do subsequent aircraft, such as the fighters of WW1 look like the Wrights’ plane and not Whitehead’s? Answer: Whitehead’s did not fly as advertised.
Because one of the first thing the Wright brothers did was go to the military (thus why the first airplane fatality was a member of the military involved in a crash of a Wright plane). And they started making and selling planes to other people. A lot of folks figured out flying all over the world at around the same time, who was first is hard to figure out. The Wrights were the first to turn it into a business.