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The Wright Flyer (also known as the Kitty Hawk, Flyer I or the 1903 Flyer) made the first sustained flight by a manned heavier-than-air powered and controlled aircraft—an airplane—on December 17, 1903. Invented and flown by brothers Orville and Wilbur Wright, it marked the beginning of the pioneer era of aviation.
The aircraft is a single-place biplane design with anhedral (drooping) wings, front elevator (a canard) and rear rudder. It used a 12 horsepower gasoline engine powering two pusher propellers. Employing 'wing warping' it was relatively unstable and very difficult to fly.
The Wright brothers flew it four times in a location now part of the town of Kill Devil Hills, about 4 miles (6 kilometers) south of Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. The airplane flew 852 ft (260 m) on its fourth and final flight, but was damaged on landing, and minutes later powerful gusts blew it over, wrecking it.
The aircraft never flew again but was shipped home and subsequently restored by Orville. The aircraft was initially displayed in a place of honor at the London Science Museum until 1948 when the resolution of an acrimonious priority dispute finally allowed it to be displayed in the Smithsonian. It is now exhibited in the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.After Kitty Hawk
The Wright Brothers returned home to Dayton for Christmas after the flights of the Kitty Hawk Flyer. While they had abandoned their other gliders, they realized the historical significance of the Flyer. They shipped the heavily damaged craft back to Dayton, where it remained stored in crates behind a Wright Company shed for nine years. The Great Dayton Flood of March 1913 covered the flyer in mud and water for 11 days.Charlie Taylor relates in a 1948 article that the Flyer nearly got disposed of by the Wrights. In early 1912 Roy Knabenshue, the Wrights Exhibition team manager, had a conversation with Wilbur and asked Wilbur what they planned to do with the Flyer. Wilbur said they most likely will burn it, as they had the 1904 machine. According to Taylor, Knabenshue talked Wilbur out of disposing of the machine for historical purposes.In 1910 the Wrights offered the Flyer as an exhibit at the Smithsonian Institution, but the Smithsonian declined, saying it would be willing to display other aeronautical artifacts from the brothers. Wilbur died in 1912, and in 1916 Orville brought the Flyer out of storage and prepared it for display at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He replaced parts of the wing covering, the props, and the engine's crankcase, crankshaft, and flywheel. The crankcase, crankshaft, and flywheel of the original engine had been sent to the Aero Club of America in New York for an exhibit in 1906 and were never returned to the Wrights. The replacement crankcase, crankshaft and flywheel came from the experimental engine Charlie Taylor had built in 1904 and used for testing in the bicycle shop. A replica crankcase of the flyer is on display at the visitor center at the Wright Brothers National Memorial.
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