The Wright brothers, Orville Wright (August 19, 1871 – January 30, 1948) and Wilbur Wright (April 16, 1867 – May 30, 1912), designed, built, and flew the first controlled, powered, heavier-than-air airplane on December 17, 1903. They had been experimenting for many years with gliders and other vehicles before their first powered flight. They are also known for making the first way to steer an airplane. They designed the aircraft in Dayton, Ohio, and their first test flight was in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.

Learning how to fly

By the 1890s, the Wrights were interested in flight, especially the gliders of Otto Lilienthal. They started working on making airplanes in their bicycle shop. They thought controlling a plane was one of the big problems of flight. Lilienthal and others had been killed when they could not control their aircraft. The Wright brothers fixed the problem by inventing control surfaces, such as a rudder that would work in the air. They built wings that could be twisted a little and moved up and down slightly, to control flight.

From 1900 to 1902, they built gliders in Dayton and tested them in Kitty Hawk, where there were strong and steady winds. They also made small versions of the wings and built a wind tunnel for model airplanes to test how well different wing shapes would lift an airplane.

Flying

In 1903, they built a powered airplane that had propellers and a small engine. The Wright Flyer airplane first flew successfully on December 17, 1903, near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. This was the first time people ever flew a powered airplane they could control. Before that, people flew in balloons or gliders, or for a very short time in planes they could not control. The two brothers continued to make changes to their design and had a very good plane by 1905.

Picture of the first flight with Orville Wright at the controls and Wilbur Wright running beside it.

The Wright Brothers kept their discovery largely secret for a couple of years, until they showed it to the world in 1908 (They had filed a patent on the airplane March 23, 1903.)

After that, they started a company to build airplanes and had a “patent war” with Glenn Curtiss over who could make money from the invention of the airplane. During the patent war, Wilbur died. Orville continued working to keep his reputation as the first man to fly. Later he sold the airplane company and became an “elder statesman” of aviation. He died in 1948.

Images for kids

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  Wright brothers” home at 7 Hawthorn Street, Dayton about 1900. Wilbur and Orville built the covered wrap-around porch in the 1890s.

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  Wright brothers” bicycle at the National Air and Space Museum

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  Wright 1899 kite: front and side views, with control sticks. Wing-warping is shown in lower view. (Wright brothers drawing in Library of Congress)

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  Chanute’s hang glider of 1896. The pilot may be Augustus Herring.

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  The 1900 glider. No photo was taken with a pilot aboard.

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  Orville with the 1901 glider, its nose pointed skyward; it had no tail.

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  Wilbur just after landing the 1901 glider. Glider skid marks are visible behind it, and marks from a previous landing are seen in front; Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina.

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  Replica of the Wright brothers” wind tunnel at the Virginia Air and Space Center

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  Wilbur Wright pilots the 1902 glider over the Kill Devil Hills, October 10, 1902. The single rear rudder is steerable; it replaced the original fixed double rudder.

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  Wilbur makes a turn using wing-warping and the movable rudder, October 24, 1902.

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  First flight of the Wright Flyer I, December 17, 1903, Orville piloting, Wilbur running at wingtip.

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  A Wright engine, serial number 17, circa 1910, on display at the New England Air Museum

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  Orville’s notebook entry of December 17, 1903

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  Wilbur’s logbook showing diagram and data for first circle flight on September 20, 1904

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  The modified 1905 Flyer at the Kill Devil Hills in 1908, ready for practice flights. Note there is no catapult derrick; all takeoffs were used with the monorail alone.

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  Soaring flight, Kitty Hawk, Oct., 1911 «Arrows indicate 50-Mile Wind, Showing How Machine Was Sustained in a Stationary Position»

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  Orville demonstrating the flyer to the U.S. Army, Fort Myer, Virginia September 1908. Photo: by C.H. Claudy.

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  Hart O. Berg (left), the Wrights” European business agent, and Wilbur at the flying field near Le Mans.

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  U.S. Patent and Trademark Office archive

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  Wright brothers at the Belmont Park Aviation Meet in 1910

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  Elwood Doherty, a Curtiss pilot, coaxes the structurally modified Langley Aerodrome into the air above the surface of Keuka Lake near Hammondsport, New York, September 17, 1914.

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  Original 1903 Wright Flyer in the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.