Wilbur and Orville Wright

Wilbur and Orville Wright, two of seven children of a church bishop and his wife, spent part of their childhood in Richmond, Indiana, and their interest in flight began after their father brought home a toy helicopter from a business trip. After building and repairing presses, bicycles, and other equipment, they read about early attempts to design flying machines and recognized that flight control mattered more than engine power in an era when aircraft crashed repeatedly and even killed their pilots. Studying earlier inventors' designs and flight in nature, they developed the first practical fixed-wing aircraft and became the first human beings to pilot a controlled, engine-powered, heavier-than-air plane. In 1886 Wilbur injured his head while playing hockey with friends, and after recovering he became withdrawn and chose not to attend Yale University. In 1889 the brothers designed and built a printing press, launched their own printing business and The Westside News, with Orville as publisher and Wilber as editor. In 1892, as Orville was a champion cyclist, they opened Wright Cycle Exchange, a bicycle shop that sold, repaired, and rented bicycles. In 1899, after reading about glider flights and unpiloted powered aircraft, Wilbur wrote to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., for information about aeronautics. In 1903, after numerous experiments, they made four flights of a powered, piloted aircraft on December 17 at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina; the longest lasted 59 seconds over 852 feet, and Wilbur Wright served as pilot after winning the deciding coin toss. In 1906 they designed the three-axis control system to steer aircraft safely and received U.S. Patent 821393 for a "Flying Machine." In 1909 they incorporated the Wright Company to manufacture and sell aircraft, with its factory in Dayton, Ohio, and its flight school northeast of Dayton.

Indianapolis city (balance), Indiana · United States