Identified the principles of fixed-wing flight in the early 1800s
Otto Lilienthal
Made hundreds of controlled glider flights in the 1890s
Illustrative photograph, not the original artifact. Photograph: Kirandeep Singh Walia / Pexels
About this date
The first powered, controlled, sustained flights by a heavier-than-air craft took place at Kill Devil Hills near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, on 17 December 1903.
About credit
The Wrights are credited with the first controlled, powered flight. Alberto Santos-Dumont is celebrated, especially in Brazil, for public flights in Paris in 1906. Other claims, such as Gustave Whitehead’s, are not accepted by mainstream aviation historians.
Chapter II
The world before
The speed of a ship, the limits of a rail line
In 1900, crossing an ocean took about a week by steamship. Overland travel depended on railways and roads, and large regions of the world were connected only slowly.
The sky was the province of balloons, which drifted with the wind and could not be steered reliably.
II
The human achievement
Control, not just power
Wilbur and Orville Wright ran a bicycle shop in Dayton, Ohio. They studied the work of Cayley and Lilienthal and concluded that the central problem was control. They built kites and gliders, devised a system for twisting the wings to roll the aircraft, and in 1901 built a wind tunnel to test wing shapes.
With mechanic Charlie Taylor they built a lightweight engine. On 17 December 1903, at Kill Devil Hills, Orville flew the Wright Flyer for 12 seconds and about 37 metres (120 feet). Three further flights followed that day, the longest by Wilbur, 59 seconds and about 260 metres.
Others quickly advanced the idea. By 1909 Louis Blériot had crossed the English Channel, and the First World War accelerated development.
III
Understanding the invention
How it works
Four forces act on an aircraft: lift, weight, thrust and drag.
01
Step 01 of 04
Wings create lift
A wing is shaped and angled so that air moving over it is deflected downward; the reaction pushes the wing upward.
Wings create lift
The propeller creates thrust
Surfaces steer
The pilot balances all three
IV
The transformation
What changed for humanity
Travel
Commercial passenger jets, from the de Havilland Comet in 1952, made intercontinental travel an everyday option. The aviation industry carried about 4.5 billion passengers in 2019 (ICAO).
Trade
Air cargo carries high-value and perishable goods around the world within days.
Emergency and medicine
Air ambulances, disaster relief and organ transport depend on aircraft.
Conflict
Air power transformed warfare from the First World War onwards, with consequences of immense human cost.
It reduced journeys that took weeks to hours and made the planet’s far corners reachable for trade, family, emergency aid and travel.
V
Before and after
Life before and after The Airplane
Before
About a week by ocean liner.
After
Around seven to eight hours by jet.
On larger screens, drag the divider (or use the arrow keys) to give more room to the world before or after.
Navigation instruments and the lessons of sea navigation guided early aviators.
Beyond the collection
Spaceflight
Rocketry and spaceflight grew from aeronautical engineering.
Beyond the collection
Computing and avionics
Modern aircraft are flown by computers, and aviation drove advances in materials and simulation.
VII
Human stories
The people and the moments
A bicycle shop in Dayton
The Wrights had no university degrees. They worked methodically, built a wind tunnel, and kept careful records, an example of experiment beating guesswork.
Twelve seconds
The first flight lasted less than the time it takes to read this sentence aloud twice. The fourth flight lasted 59 seconds. Within a decade, aircraft were flying for hours.
Where accounts differ, this museum follows the documented record and says so.
