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I am sure that lots of people are seeing that title in lots of places lately. I
know it is a little late for me to be writing about this, but... just recently,
human being reached their
100th year of flight!
So the story goes, it all started when the Wright brother's father, a minister, brought home a toy for
his two sons. When you twisted a rubber band, the toy flew up into the air.
Delighted, Orville and Wilbur named it the 'bat." After a while, the "bat"
broke, and the Wrights built a bigger one, and then a bigger one, and so on and
so forth, until it could not fly anymore.
The Wrights created many things of their own, including a kite shop, a local
newspaper and a bicycle shop.
They also enjoyed hearing about inventor Otto Lilienthal's gliders, and flight itself.
After Lilienthal's death, the Wright brothers started studying aviation.
They came up with the 1902 glider, which was not very... well, it wasn't very well built. They improved over the
years: The 1903 glider, and then there was the Wright Flyer.
The first
powered flight happened Dec. 17 at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. And now,100 years
later, we are flying all over the place, even up in space! If we did that in less than 100 years, think of
what could happen in the next 100 years. Oh, the possibilities...! ;-)
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