On December 17th, 1903 the course of the world was forever changed as two brothers, Orville and Wilbur Wright, completed the first heavier-than-air, manned flight. While governments in Europe were pumping millions of dollars into aviation exploration these two boys from Dayton, Ohio unlocked the secret to human flight in five short years with less than $5,000. How did they out-engineer the top scientists in the world? What did they have that the European governments lacked? According to Darrell Collins, Park Historian at the Wright Brothers National Memorial, it came down to two simple things: a child’s toy and a bit of Southern Hospitality. The impact of these two dissimilar paths changed the path of modern travel.
The Wright Brothers Memorial is a homage to their innovative spirits just on the edge of the interestingly named Kill Devil Hills, directly adjacent to the famous Kitty Hawk site.
Collins elaborates, “The Wright brothers’ father, Milton, was a circuit preacher who spent a great deal of time traveling away from his family. Often Milton would bring gifts home from his trips. On one such occasion 7-year old Orville and 11-year old Wilbur were playing on the floor when Milton returned. He announced that he had a gift in his fist, which he proceeded to open. Rather than sit in his palm, the tiny, wooden toy floated up into the air and moved about the room before falling to the ground. The gift was a tiny helicopter designed by French aeronautical pioneer Alphonse Pénaud. The Wright boys would never be the same.”
Orville and Wilbur played with the paper and bamboo flying machine until it broke. They quickly assessed the problem and set about fixing it. Over time the fragile toy continued to break and the boys continued to repair it. Eventually they decided to build their own and thus began their lifelong fascination with flight and aeronautical engineering.
Flash forward 20 years and the Wright’s hobby of fixing toys has turned into an obsession with solving the problem of human flight. The main issue, as the brothers saw it, was control. According to Collins, “Nobody in the history of the world had solved the problem of how to control an aircraft in flight.” Gliders were already being experimented with, particularly in France, but nobody had yet been able to make a successful turn in the air. It was this problem that Orville and Wilbur set about solving.
“During the renovation project, the reproduction 1903 Wright Flyer that was home to the Visitor Center, spent most of its time at the North Carolina Museum of History in Raleigh.” [Photo Credit: NPS]
By 1900 the boys’ experiments had grown to the point where manned tests were feasible and Wilbur began extensive research, through the US Weather Bureau, in an attempt to locate the perfect site.
This is where Southern Hospitality comes into play. According to Collins, “Wilbur received a letter from Captain William Tate, who offered Kitty Hawk on the Outer Banks of North Carolina as the ideal place for their tests. Wilbur never replied. Instead he simply showed up at Tate’s door one morning, cold and hungry. Tate took him in and they became friends for life.” Bill Harris, former Mayor of Kitty Hawk and former President of the First Flight Society agrees, “The locals were very supportive of the Brothers. They didn’t interfere. They let them use the land. They even helped out and ran errands for the boys. Overall the people in the area were very supportive. Of course, I doubt they had any idea what was actually going on out there.”
It wasn’t long before the boys accomplished their goal of designing a control system that allowed the gliders to control for pitch (side to side), roll (lateral motion), and yaw (up and down). This three-axis control system would be the revolution that allowed the boys to surpass all other aviation experimenters up to that point. They needed to add power and thrust to compensate for the added weight of a human body so the boys set about adding a motor and propeller to their gliders.
By 1903 the Wright Flyer I was ready for testing and Orville stayed aloft for 12 seconds, covering a distance of almost 120 feet. Three other attempts were completed that day, the final lasting for 59 seconds and covering 852 feet before crashing to the ground and damaging the aircraft. Human flight was a reality.
The site of the first flights were designated a National Memorial in 1927. By then it was already clear that aviation was changing the world and the Wright Brothers were the men responsible. A 6-ton granite boulder with a commemorative plaque was placed on the exact take-off spot and markers designate the distances traveled on those first four tests. The establishment of the monument, and the park surrounding it, fueled the development of Kitty Hawk and Kill Devil Hills into a major tourist destination for aviation novices and experts from around the world. With over 500,000 visitors a year, the Memorial stands as a testament to innovation, ingenuity, and perseverance.
However, news of the historic feat didn’t spread as quickly as one might expect. As Harris states, “There wasn’t any publicity around Kill Devil Hills back then. No papers or nothing. So word was slow to spread.” In fact, people didn’t believe the Wrights even when they began demonstrating their aircraft in different places. Harris elaborates, “When the Wrights went back to Dayton they began conducting flights in cow pastures outside of town. People riding by on the train could see what was happening and STILL didn’t believe it.” A 1908 trip to Europe and a contract to build planes for the US Army changed all that and soon the world was aware that man could fly.
There is a direct link between what the boys did at the turn of the century and what we see in the air today. Their three-axis control concept is the basis for all modern flight and their wing and propeller designs are still being used by aircraft manufacturers today. As Collins states, “Even if the Wright Flyer had never left the ground the Wright Brothers would still be famous. They were the first men to understand and demonstrate how propellers work. In 1903 they measured their propellers as 66% efficient. By 1910 they had raised that to 82% efficiency. Today, in 2016, modern propellers operate at 87%. We’ve only gained 5% efficiency since the Wright Brothers designed them over 100 years ago.”
But, ultimately there is a more human impact in the story of the Wright Brothers. For Collins, a native of the area, it’s the children that testify to their continuing power: “For every little kid that comes here, no matter where in the world they come from, Orville and Wilbur are heroes. They all know the story. They all know what was achieved right here in North Carolina. That means something.”