1867-1912; 1871-1948
Pioneer Aviators

The Bicycle Shop.

Wilbur Wright was born on a farm in Indiana in 1867. His brother, Orville, was born in 1871, after the Wright family had moved to Dayton, Ohio. Their father was a bishop of the United Brethren in Christ and edited and published several church papers. The Wright brothers' first enterprise was a print shop, which they ran from 1889 until 1892, when they joined in the national obsession for bike riding and bought a bicycle shop. In 1895 they began to manufacture bicycles. The Wrights became interested in aeronautics in 1899 and immersed themselves in the available literature. From their analysis of a long line of failed attempts with heavier-than-air machines they concluded that the first step would be to master the principles of flight by observation and then by using gliders. Only then, they believed, could one think about combining an engine...