The floor beneath you starts to rumble as you slowly begin to accelerate. You automatically lean your head back and close your eyes. Your mouth chomps down intensely on gum as if it is experiencing an adrenalin rush. You feel your stomach drop when hear the seatbelt light ding. You gather up enough nerve to open your eyes and look out the window. You are surrounded by a field of clouds. As you settle into your seat the flight attendant welcomes you onboard and you begin to relax for your flight. We take the ability to fly across states in a few hours for granted as we realize it couldn’t be possible without the brilliant minds of Wilber and Oliver Wright.
I bet if I told you the reason behind airplane transportation today is because of a toy helicopter given to two small boys, you wouldn’t believe me. Even though the Wright brothers weren’t the first to create the design, they put their ideas up into air, and opened the door for a whole new world of transportation that would someday carry millions of people around the world. Wilbur was born April 16, 1867 in Indiana, and Orville was born August 19, 1871 in Dayton Ohio. These two brothers were inseparable and had completely opposite personalities. Wilbur was planning on going to Yale, but because of his injury in a hockey game he stayed home for a few years. While he was there he took care of his dying mother and read most of the books in his father’s library. Both brothers gained most of their experience from working in a printing press shop, handling bicycles, motors, and much other machinery.
There is much controversy over this, but the brothers are credited with engineering the world’s first flying airplane in Kitty Hawk North Carolina after four years of experiments. They had many achievements in life like on December 17, 1903 they accomplished a heavier than air-machine that carried people. They also created the first fixed wing airplane. They were not the first to experiment with airplanes, but they did invent aircraft controls that made the first flight possible. Probably one of their biggest breakthroughs was the three axis control which allowed the pilot to steer where he wanted to.
Many people at this time were trying to make the engines of airplanes more powerful, but the Wright brothers focused on different things of “The Flying Problem”. What led them to this discovery was their brilliant aeronautical data from wind test that provided more answers to building wings and propellers better. They eventually had this patented. Due to working with bikes, the brothers believed that you could balance things that are unstable and control them. The brothers had many glider tests which helped them become better pilots. After all this time, the Wright planes became the first military planes due to a demonstration of a one hour long plane ride at Fort Myer, Virginia.
By doing research on the Wright brothers I have come to learn of the history and hard work that put forth into the transportation that that I take for granted every year on my vacation to Florida. Without planes many people wouldn’t have the chance to go and visit their families across seas. Many people think that they are just fuel guzzling ways of transportation, but who knows what we would do without them.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wright_brothers
8Madison
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