Along the Outer Banks, the surfmen of the U.S. Lifesaving Stations became the Wright brothers’ “world’s first flight crew” as the brothers tested their experimental aircraft from 1900 to 1903. The Life Saving Service’s primary job was to protect sailors along the treacherous Outer Banks, and it later evolved into the U.S. Coast Guard in 1915. In a diary entry of December 14, 1903, Orville Wright recorded making repairs, signaling for station men, going to the hill, testing the engine, and with the help of Bob Wescott, John T. Daniels, Tom Beacham, W.S. Dough, and Uncle Benny O’Neal, taking the machine uphill and laying track on an 8° 50’ slope. The modern U.S. Coast Guard carries forward both the spirit of the early Lifesaving Service and the aviation advancements of the Wright brothers, and its presence in the Albemarle region is presented as an unbroken tradition of heroism under the motto Semper Paratus, “Always Prepared.”