    
Need to get your bearings?
Try our Museum Guide.
Want to ask a question? Tell us something?
Arrange a showing of one of our airplanes? Ping:
mailto:[email protected]
Meanwhile:
How about a
little music?
We have a selection of tunes that were
popular during the first days of aviation, performed by Sue Keller, courtesy the
Ragtime Press:
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| Have
you ever played the game "Telegraph?" A dozen or more people sit in a circle and
one whispers a short message to their neighbor. The neighbor whispers the message as
they heard it to the next person, and so on until the message makes it's way around
the circle. When it arrives back at it's originator, the message is always corrupted. So
it is with history. The story of the invention of the airplane is such a popular part of
our culture, and it is so often repeated, that dozens of "myth-conceptions"
about the Wright Brothers and early aviation have grown up in the wake of all the
re-tellings. This section is for those of you who wish to separate fact from fiction --
brief doses of the unvarnished truth about early aircraft and the folks who flew them.
These facts are divided into several categories, including the Wright
family, kites and gliders, airplanes,
and engines and propellers:
Our thanks to Dr. Joe McDaniels and
the Wright Research Group for their help in preparing "Just the Facts."
Back to the top |
In the telegram that Orville sent to his father on
December 17, 1903, there were two mistakes. The longest flight was
misreported at 57 seconds instead of 59, and Orville's named was misspelled
"Orvelle." |
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