You may have heard that the Wright brothers were just lucky bicycle mechanics. In fact, they succeeded because of study and scientific experimentation, not luck. Wilbur and Orville owned a bicycle shop in Dayton, Ohio. They sold and fixed bicycles. They built their own bicycles too. Later they built a wind tunnel. They also built an engine, because they could not buy one light enough.

You may also have heard that they were the first people ever to fly. They were not. People had flown in balloons and tried gliders long before. What was new was a powered airplane that could be controlled. The Wrights made the world's first powered, controlled flight on December 17, 1903. It was at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. It had strong winds and soft sand to land on.

Their big idea came from birds. The Wrights got the idea of wing warping from watching how birds steady themselves in flight. Wing warping meant twisting the tips of the wings in opposite directions, with lines the pilot pulled. In the summer of 1899 they built a biplane kite to test their way of steering. In 1902 their best glide went more than 600 feet and lasted 26 seconds.

They also saw the propeller in a new way. A propeller is a wing that turns on a spiral course. The Wrights thought of their propellers as rotary wings. Their airplane was the Wright Flyer. On the first flight in 1903, Orville was the pilot. It lasted 12 seconds. The brothers made four flights that day. They took turns as pilot. The longest went 852 feet.

Their third airplane, built in 1905, is called the first practical airplane. On October 5, 1905, Wilbur flew it in circles for 39 minutes. In 1908 Wilbur Wright flew in public near Le Mans, France, and amazed the crowds. In 1948 the Wright Flyer went from the London Science Museum to the Smithsonian Institution. As of November 2026, it is on display in the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.

Words to know

• warping: twisting
• propeller: spinning blade
• practical: useful
• experimentation: testing ideas