First Flight Centennial

[He219]

The beginning of the first flight, December 17, 1903.
This is the complete print of the photo that John Daniels took.
The chip in the lower left corner is often cropped out.

The Flyer reaches close to 800 feet (244 meters) from its launching rail just before the end of the fourth flight.

Artist Stephan H. Smith's metal sculpture of the First Flight stands Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2003, at the bottom of Wright Brothers National Memorial Monument in Kill Devil Hills, N.C. (AP Photo/Karen Tam)

Lois Pearce Smith poses Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2003, with the statue of her grandfather, John T. Daniels, who took the world-famous photograph of Wilbur and Orville Wright as the made their first flight on Dec. 17, 1903. The statue of Daniels is part of a sculptor at the Wright Brothers' National Memorial recreating the famous moment 100 years ago. (AP Photo/Karen Tam)

A replica of the Wright Flyer glides on a track across the cavernous 10-story-high hangar of the new Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center, an annex to the popular Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, as it is dedicated in Chantilly, Va., Thursday, Dec. 11, 2003. Dozens of vintage flying machines, including the Enola Gay, a Concorde and the Space Shuttle Enterprise, are on permanent exhibition at the museum, on the grounds of Washington Dulles International Airport. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

Kanaka Murthy, right, paints a fiberglass statue of Orville Wright along with her assistants, as the statue of Wilbur Wright dries, background, in Bangalore, India, Thursday, Dec. 11, 2003. A life-size model of the Wright Flyer will be unveiled to the public at the Visvesvaraya Industrial and Technological Museum on Dec. 16, 2003, the eve of the 100th anniversary of the first powered flight by the Wright Brothers that took place in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, USA. (AP Photo/Gautam Singh)

Technicians try to fit the propeller on a life-size replica of the Wright Flyer at the Visvesvaraya Industrial and Technological Museum in Bangalore, India, Thursday, Dec. 11, 2003.

But wait, Who Invented the Airplane? a Brazilian, of Course!

Santos-Dumont and the 14-bis.

SANTOS DUMONT AND THE WRIGHT BROTHERS

Alberto Santos-Dumont - Wikipedia

ALBERTO SANTOS-DUMONT, Father of Aviation

First Flight

the worlds' first aviator

[Seiyuuki]

There are a lot of claims of who made the first flight and this and that and so forth...but the fundamental concept of aviation: yaw, roll and pitch control were pioneer by Wright's Flyer, every aircraft today can trace their ancestry all the way back to the Flyer. They also developed wind tunnel testing and I believe built what to be the first airplane engine.

Another famous Brazilian:
Father Laurenzo de Gusmao - Brazilian Jesuit Priest experimented with flight, earned a Portuguese patent in 1709 and launched a model balloon for the King of Portugal (70 years before the Montgolfier Brothers)

More famous contributors to aviation:
Sir George Cayley - Father of Aerodynamics
Otto Lilienthal - The Wright brothers utilized his data in their development, Lilienthal was never able to corretly apply his data, but the Wright brothers discovered his mistake and was able to incorporated it successfully in making their first flight.
Octave Chanute
Samuel Langley - Director of the Smithsonian, he was competing with the Wright brothers for the first flight. His model flew, but when he build the full-size aircraft, the Aerodrome, he never realize the need to add more support and strengthening the airframe so his aircraft crash on both try. After he passed away, in an effort to redeem their director's name, rebuilt his aircraft correctly with added supports and everything and it flew. For a few years, the actually put that aircraft on display in the Smithsonian with a plague proclaiming that it was the first aircraft to fly.

[Fox2]

I really want to do something cool and special for the anniversary, but I can't think of anything.

[Seiyuuki]

If you can make it to Kitty Hawk, I think, to see the centennial flight...that would be cool.

[Fox2]

Yeah, I thought that would be cool also...but I can't

Maybe go flying that day in a Cessna 152. That's about as low-tech as I'll get to the 1903 flyer.

[Apogee]

Even if you don't make it down for the flight. Go hang gliding off of Jockey's Ridge. I promise you'll enjoy it.