Orville Wright

Orville Wright made the first powered, sustained and controlled flight by a heavier-than-air machine. Born in Dayton, Ohio in 1871, the youngest son of a bishop of the United Brethren Church, he and his brother Wilbur were given a toy helicopter as children which they rebuilt repeatedly. Neither finished high school or married. They printed a newspaper and then opened a bicycle shop in 1892, building their own machines from 1896. The trade taught them lightweight structures, chain drives, machining, and above all balance — the insight that an inherently unstable vehicle can be controlled by its rider. That is what separated them from their rivals. Others sought automatic stability; the Wrights concluded that an aircraft must be flown, and worked out three-axis control, with wing-warping for roll — the idea taken from twisting a cardboard inner-tube box — a rudder for yaw and an elevator for pitch. They tested gliders at Kitty Hawk from 1900 for its steady wind and soft sand. Finding published lift tables wrong, they built a wind tunnel in 1901 and tested some two hundred aerofoil shapes themselves, generating their own data. They also designed their own propellers, treating them as rotating wings, and had a mechanic build a light aluminium-block engine. On 17 December 1903 Orville flew 120 feet in twelve seconds, the brothers having tossed a coin. Three more flights followed that day, the longest 852 feet. Wilbur died of typhoid in 1912. Orville sold the company in 1915, served on aeronautical bodies, and lived to see the bombing of cities. He died in 1948.

• Lived: 1871 CE – 1948 CE
• Nationality: American
• Roles: inventor