Airplanes 1900-1909

The Kitty Hawk Flyer by The Wright Brothers (1903)

Origin: The Wright Brothers built their gliders and tested them at Kill Devil Hill in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina in 1903. Wilbur and Orville did not attempt to invent their flying machine without research and studying. They studied earlier experiments and flying attempts by men such as Otto Lilienthal, Octave Chanute, and Samuel Langley. Much of their influence came from their “glider kite” which was the beginning for the Wright Brothers. They also obtained information from the Smithsonian Institute on flight.

The Kitty Hawk Flyer Blueprint

Purpose: The Wright brothers invented the air plane as they wanted to come up with a controlled, powered and sustained flyer as opposed to other flying machines which mainly glided in the air. They wanted to create a man man machine that could “fly” in the sky. Wilbur Wright and Orville Wright launched their machine on December 17, 1903 and it actually flew for 37 metres within a period of 12 seconds. Over the next few years they worked on other sophisticated planes and founded the Wright Company

Value: On December 17, 1903 Orville Wright flew the Kitty Hawk Flyer for twelve seconds in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, making aviation history. Orville wrote:

"This flight lasted only 12 seconds, but it was nevertheless the first in the history of the world in which a machine carrying a man had raised itself by its own power into the air in full flight, had sailed forward without reduction of speed and had finally landed at a point as high as that from which it started."

The Wrights had not only created a airplane; but they had also created a system to maintain flight that would shrink the size of Earth due to the fast transportation over-seas. This was the beginning of something very big and even though people didn't know it at the time, it would not end there.

Limitations:  The brothers made their first four flights in 1903 on the Wright Flyer; but all of them were their last. Since the airplane was weak and light, strong gusts of air flipped it over several times, and made considerable damage to it. Another limiting factor was that the plane could not keep flight for long periods of times. People around that time were impressed; however they did not see it as hope for being able to travel faster.

Sources:
1. http://www.wright-brothers.org/Information_Desk/Just_the_Facts/Airplanes/Flyer_I.htm
2. http://history1900s.about.com/od/firstflight/a/Wright-Brothers.htm