Wright Timeline

o invention, no scientific discovery, no work of art, no human endeavor happens in an historical vacuum. There are always other factors -- cultural, political, personal -- that influence the outcome of a single event. So it was with the invention of the airplane. The Wright brothers were born just as the Scientific Method became a tremendous force for cultural change, and the world became an increasingly wonderful and terrible place because of it. When Wilbur and Orville were children, the abacus was the most advanced mathematical aid, influenza was an often-fatal disease, and the cannon was the most feared weapon of war. By the time Orville died, the first computers were just being built, antibiotics had begun to wipe out disease, and the atomic bomb made war unthinkable. Many of these advances influenced the development of the airplane -- and the airplane, in turn, influenced further advances.

Here is chronology that shows not just the story of the Wright brothers, but also the world they lived in and the important political, cultural, and scientific events that loomed large in their lives.

*Time*	*The Wright Story*	*The Bigger Picture*
1860 to 1869		1861 to 1865 -- The United States of America is engulfed in a Civil War.
		1864 -- Louis Pasteur develops the pasteurization process to kill bacteria.
	1867 � Wilbur Wright is born near Millville, Indiana.	1867 -- The Transcontinental Railroad spans America and Johann Straus writes the Blue Danube Waltz.
1870 to 1879	1871 � Orville Wright is born in Dayton, Ohio.
		1872 -- Susan B. Anthony is arrested for voting and Yellowstone becomes the first U.S. national park.
		1876 -- Alexander Graham Bell invents the telephone and Lt. Colonel George Custer makes his last stand against the Sioux at Little Bighorn.
		1877 -- Nikolaus Otto invents the four-cycle internal combustion engine.
	1878 � Wright brothers build their first aircraft, a rubber-band powered helicopter they call a "bat."	1878 -- A. A. Pope manufactures the first bicycles in America.
1880 to 1889		1880 -- Thomas Edison invents the electric light and Rodin sculpts The Thinker.
		1883 -- The first skyscraper is built in Chicago.
		1884 -- Mark Twain publishes Huckleberry Finn.
	1885 � A sports injury leads to health problems that prevent Wilbur from attending college.
	1886 � Orville starts a printing business while he is still in high school.
	1889 � Orville publishes a newspaper, the "West Side News," and Wilbur joins him as editor. The newspaper business does not profit and the Wrights return to printing to make a living.	1889 -- The Eiffel Tower is built in Paris.
1890 to 1899		1892 -- Tchaikovsky performs The Nutcracker ballet.
	1893 � The Wright brothers begin to sell and repair bicycles.	1893 -- Karl Benz and Henry Ford build their first automobiles.
	1895 � The Wrights gear up to manufacture their own bicycles, the "St. Clair" and the "Van Cleve." The bike business is profitable.	1895 -- Marconi transmits the first radio signals.
	1896 � The Wrights take an interest in the "flying problem" after hearing of the flight of Samuel Langley's unmanned "Aerodrome" and the death of glider pilot Otto Lilienthal.	1896 -- The first modern Olympics are held in Athens, Greece.
		1898 -- The United States goes to war with Spain, and Marie and Pierre Curie discover the first radioactive element, radium.
	1899 � Wilbur devises a revolutionary control system for aircraft and builds a kite to test it.
1900 to 1909	1900 to 1902 � The Wright brothers fly gliders at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, refining their control system. At home in Dayton, Ohio, they build a wind tunnel and conduct research on wing shapes.	1900 -- Pablo Picasso begins to show his paintings and Sigmund Freud writes The Interpretation of Dreams. 1901 -- The first successful submarine is launched in Britain.
	1903 � The Wright brothers make the first controlled, sustained powered flight at Kitty Hawk. Samuel Langley of the Smithsonian Institution also tries to fly a manned version of his Aerodrome and fails.	1903 -- The first true film, The Great Train Robbery, premiers. It is 12 minutes long.
	1904 to 1905 � The Wrights develop a practical airplane at Huffman Prairie near Dayton, Ohio.	1905 -- Albert Einstein publishes the Special Theory of Relativity and the Niagra Movement -- later to become the NAACP -- is founded.
	1906 -- The U.S. Patent Office grants a patent to the Wright Brothers on their airplane control system.
	1908 � The Wright brothers demonstrate a two-passenger airplane in Europe and America.	1908 -- The Ford Motor Company produces the first "Model T" automobile.
	1909 � The Wrights begin to manufacture and sell airplanes. They launch patent suits against Glenn Curtiss and other airplane builders who are using their control system without permission.	1909 -- Leo Baekeland develops "Bakelight," the first widely-used plastic, and Ernest Rutheford discovers the structure of the atom.
1910 to 1919	1912 � Wilbur Wright dies of typhoid in Dayton, Ohio.	1912 -- The passenger ship Titanic sinks.
	1914 -- U.S. courts decide in favors of the Wrights in their suits against Curtiss and others, and the' 1906 patent becomes the "grandfather" patent of the airplane. The Smithsonian Institution claims that Langley's Aerodrome was the first manned aircraft "capable of flight" and begins a bitter disagreement with Orville Wright.	1914 to 1918 -- World War I rages in Europe. 1914 -- The Panama Canal opens and Robert Goddard begins his first rocketry experiments.
	1915 � Orville Wright sells his airplane- company for $1.5 million.
		1916 -- Jazz emerges a distinct form of American music.
		1917 -- The October Revolution makes Russia the first socialist state.
		1919 -- Women get the right to vote in the United States.
1920 to 1929	1920 -- Orville is appointed to the National Advisory Council on Aeronautics (NACA, the forerunner of NASA). He remains an active participant for the rest of his life.
	1922 -- Orville develops the split flap, which is used to slow airplanes in a steep dive. It is his last aeronautical invention.
		1925 -- John L. Baird transmits the first television images.
	1926 -- Orville Wright sends the 1903 Flyer 1 to an English museum to call public attention to the wrong he feels is being done to his name by the Smithsonian.
		1927 -- Charles Lindbergh flies non-stop from New York to Paris in The Spirit of St. Louis.
		1929 -- The stock market plunges, starting the "Great Depression," a worldwide economic crisis.
1930 to 1939		1930 -- Astronomer C. W. Tombaugh discovers the planet Pluto.
	1932 � The Wright Brothers Monument at Kitty Hawk is dedicated.
		1933 -- Adolph Hitler becomes Chancellor of Germany.
		1937 -- Amelia Earhart is lost while attempting to become the first woman to fly around the world.
	1938 � The Wright Bicycle Shop and Wright home are opened to the public at Henry Ford Museum/Greenfield Village.
		1939 -- John Steinbeck writes The Grapes of Wrath and the first antibiotic medicines are developed.
1940 to 1949		1940 to 1945 -- World War 2 rages in Europe, North Africa, and the Pacific Ocean.
		1942 -- The first electronic computer is built in the U.S.
	1943 -- The Smithsonian Institution finally apologizes to Orville and recognizes the Wright Brothers as the first to make a controlled, sustained powered flight. Orville recalls the Flyer 1 from England, but it can't be shipped home until World War 2 ends.
		1945 -- First atomic bomb is detonated at Alamogordo, NM.
		1947 -- Chuck Yeager breaks the sound barrier in the Bell X-1.
	1948 � Orville Wright dies of a heart attack in Dayton, Ohio and the Wright brothers' first powered airplane, the 1903 Flyer 1, is enshrined at the Smithsonian Institution.

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