Also interesting is that they settled on what would now be called a canard design with the pitch control surface on the front rather than the tail. This is actually a superior arrangement in most cases as both the wing and the stabliator are both generating positive lift. Most conventional aircraft have the center of gravity in front of the main wing, such that the system is dynamically stable (try throwing a dart backward and you'll see what I mean). To control pitch, they then have control surface in the rear pushing down to keep the nose up. In a canard, the CG is still forward of the wing (and the center of lift) but the control surface helps lift the nose up instead of pushing the tail down improving efficiency. This also has an important safety feature in that you can add a couple degrees to the canard's angle such that it will stall before the main wing. In effect, this means the pilot cannot fully stall the aircraft and put it into a spin, it'll simply mush about, descending in and out of canard stall until the control input is relaxed.
Edit: an excellent example of a modern canard would be the Rutan LongEZ and it's accompanying, rather ridiculous, performance numbers: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rutan_Long-EZ
Edit: an excellent example of a modern canard would be the Rutan LongEZ and it's accompanying, rather ridiculous, performance numbers: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rutan_Long-EZ