Wilbur Orville Wright

A biography of the brothers who, in 1903, made the first powered, controlled flight in an airplane.

The reissue of this definitive biography heralds the one-hundredth anniversary of the Wright brothers' first flight. Brilliant, self-trained engineers, the Wright brothers had a unique blend of native talent, character, and family experience that perfectly suited them to the task of invention but left them ill-prepared to face a world of skeptics, rivals, and officials. Using a treasure trove of Wright family correspondence and diaries, Tom Crouch skillfully weaves the story of the airplane's invention into the drama of a unique and unforgettable family. He shows us exactly how and why these two obscure bachelors from Dayton, Ohio, were able to succeed where so many better-trained, better-financed rivals had failed.

On December 17, 1903, the Wright brothers took their historic first flight, and by 1909 the brothers were full-fledged celebrities. In September of that year, Wilbur and Orville finally showed the world, firsthand, just what they had achieved. In the United States, Wilbur delighted the crowd with spectacular flying demonstrations in New York City during the city's Hudson-Fulton Celebration. He flew over the harbor, glided past tall buildings, looped the Statue of Liberty, and even traveled up the Hudson River to Grant's Tomb. The people of New York were astonished and thrilled to witness these unbelievable flights. At the same time, Orville held daring public exhibitions in Germany and set amazing new records. He flew the highest ever, and took the longest flight with a passenger. The Wright brothers opened doors that no one knew could be opened! Louise Borden and Trish Marx document the extraordinary lives and achievements of two of our most celebrated American heroes, Wilbur and Orville Wright, from their humble beginnings to their later success and riches.

Definitive, crisply written study tells the full story of the brothers' lives and work — from their early childhood and initial fascination with flight, the historic first flight at Kitty Hawk, more.

In 1903, at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, two brothers, Wilbur and Orville Wright, made the first manned, controlled, sustained, successful powered flight in a heavier-than-air craft. This title represents the record left by the Wright brothers on their triumph, and its consequences to themselves and to the world.

During the year 2003, hundreds of events will mark the one-hundredth anniversary of the Wright brothers' historic first flights at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. The centennial year will witness exhibitions, lectures, television documentaries, films, air shows, flight recreations of Wright aircraft, the issuing of postage stamps and medals, the publication of dozens of new books and articles, and numerous other commemorative activities. One of these events, although not likely to make the evening news, is among the most important of all in terms of a lasting contribution to the observance of this ultimate aviation milestone: the reprinting of Arthur G. Renstrom's Wilbur & Orville Wright: A Chronology Commemorating the Hundredth Anniversary of the Birth of Orville Wright, August 19, 1871. Since its appearance in 1975, Wilbur & Orville Wright: A Chronology has become indispensable to students and authors concerned with the life and work of the famous brothers. No doubt every book on the subject published in the last quarter century, including three of my own, was written with this treasure close at hand. This volume is far more than a simple compilation of dates and facts. Renstrom was a master reference librarian and bibliographer with a passion for aviation and the Wright brothers. He brought his considerable research skills to bear on the topic, and the result is a richly detailed, ever-informative, often entertaining walk through the lives and achievements of these two extraordinary individuals. Renstrom was not content to offer a date with a one-line tidbit. His entries are brimming with information. This is a highly readable reference work that, believe or not, can be enjoyably read from cover to cover. The project was clearly a labor of love by a talented professional. During most of the last twenty years, I have been privileged to be the curator of the 1903 Wright Flyer at the Smithsonian Institution's National Air and Space Museum. The position brings a steady stream of inquiries about the Wright airplane and the endlessly fascinating brothers who created it. I do not know how I would have done this job without Renstrom's superb volume on my bookshelf. It is the first place I go to check anything on the Wright brothers, and I typically find what I am looking for in its pages. Arthur Renstrom also published two other classic reference works on the Wright brothers: Wilbur & Orville Wright: A Bibliography Commemorating the Hundredth Anniversary of the Birth of Wilbur Wright, April 16, 1867, in 1968 (an updated revision was published by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration in 2002) and Wilbur & Orville Wright, Pictorial Materials: A Documentary Guide in 1982, completing a series of research tools for which there are few peers on any subject. He was also part of the team that produced the landmark two-volume compilation of the Wrights' letters, notebooks, and diaries in 1953, The Papers of Wilbur and Orville Wright, edited by Marvin W. McFarland. Renstrom's contribution to the documentation and preservation of the Wright story is a lasting legacy that will serve researchers, students, and general enthusiasts for generations to come. In this busy, high-profile anniversary year, the reprinting of a nearly thirty-year-old reference book may seem a mundane and quiet contribution to the celebration surrounding the Wright brothers' world-changing achievement, but it is perhaps one of the most important. The U.S. Centennial of Flight Commission and NASA are to be commended for their foresight.

This fascinating firsthand account covers the Wright Brothers' early experiments, construction of planes and motors, first flights, and much more. Introduction and commentary by Fred C. Kelly. 76 photographs.

This book is the first deconstruction of the Wright brothers myth. They were not -- as we have all come to believe--two halves of the same apple. Each had a distinctive role in creating the first "flying machine." How could two misanthropic brothers who never left home, were high-school dropouts, and made a living as bicycle mechanics have figured out the secret of manned flight? This new history of the Wright brothers' monumental accomplishment focuses on their early years of trial and error at Kitty Hawk (1900-1903) and Orville Wright's epic fight with the Smithsonian Institute and Glenn Curtis. William Hazelgrove makes a convincing case that it was Wilbur Wright who designed the first successful airplane, not Orville. He shows that, while Orville's role was important, he generally followed his brother's lead and assisted with the mechanical details to make Wilbur's vision a reality. Combing through original archives and family letters, Hazelgrove reveals the differences in the brothers' personalities and abilities. He examines how the Wright brothers myth was born when Wilbur Wright died early and left his brother to write their history with personal friend John Kelly. The author notes the peculiar inwardness of their family life, business and family problems, bouts of depression, serious illnesses, and yet, rising above it all, was Wilbur's obsessive zeal to test out his flying ideas. When he found Kitty Hawk, this desolate location on North Carolina's Outer Banks became his laboratory. By carefully studying bird flight and the Rubik's Cube of control, Wilbur cracked the secret of aerodynamics and achieved liftoff on December 17, 1903. Hazelgrove's richly researched and well-told tale of the Wright brothers' landmark achievement, illustrated with rare historical photos, captures the excitement of the times at the start of the "American century."