Wilbur Wright (1867 - 1912) was an American aviation pioneer and inventor who, together with his younger brother Orville, invented, built, and flew the first successful powered aircraft. On 17 December 1903 the brothers achieved the first controlled, sustained flight of a powered, heavier-than-air machine near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. [1] Wilbur was the elder of the two and often took the lead in the pair's technical research and public demonstrations. [2]
Early life
Wilbur Wright was born on 16 April 1867 near Millville, Indiana, one of the children of Milton Wright, a bishop of the Church of the United Brethren in Christ, and Susan Catharine Koerner. The family later settled in Dayton, Ohio. [1] Wilbur was a capable student, but a serious injury during his youth left him withdrawn and interrupted his plans for further schooling. [1]
Bicycle business and interest in flight
Toward the end of the 1880s Wilbur and Orville went into the printing trade, and in 1892 they opened a bicycle sales and repair shop that grew into the Wright Cycle Company. [1] Earnings from the business helped fund their aeronautical work. Inspired by reports of glider experimenters such as Otto Lilienthal, the brothers began a systematic study of flight in 1899 and concluded that the unsolved problem was not lift or power but stable control of a machine in the air. [3]
Development of the airplane
The Wrights devised a system of wing-warping to control roll, and from 1900 they tested a succession of gliders at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, a site chosen for its steady winds and soft sand. [1] To improve their designs they built a small wind tunnel and compiled their own tables of aerodynamic data. On 17 December 1903 the powered Wright Flyer made four flights; the first, with Orville at the controls, lasted about twelve seconds, while the longest, flown by Wilbur, covered roughly 260 metres in under a minute. [3]
Later career
In the years that followed, Wilbur continued to refine practical aircraft and to demonstrate the brothers' machines in the United States and Europe. His flights in France in 1908 drew wide attention and helped establish the brothers' priority in the field. [2] The Wrights also entered into prolonged patent disputes as they sought to defend their invention and its commercial value. [1]
Death and legacy
Wilbur Wright contracted typhoid fever and died in Dayton on 30 May 1912 at the age of 45. [1] He is remembered, alongside Orville, as one of the inventors of the airplane, and he was later honoured through induction into the National Inventors Hall of Fame and the National Aviation Hall of Fame. [2]
