To fly is everything ...

January 3, 2005 9:30 AM

"To Fly is Everything" - A museum of early aeroplane history. Includes galleries of movies of aviation pioneers (watch an early flight from Wilbur Wright's point of view), and links to early aviation patents.
posted by carter (6 comments total)

Also: Footage of a 1911 Wright Model B Flyer taken on its last flight, in 1934.
posted by carter at 9:42 AM on January 3, 2005

Watching the flight from Wilbur's point of view, the heart beats faster, even though by today's standards, it's not much of a flight. Another good part on this site is the story of how the Wright brothers and their contemporaries went about inventing powered flight -- a story subtitled "A Puritan Fairy Tale." The history is given with a strong point of view, and is well worth reading (good pictures there, too.)
posted by Faze at 1:37 PM on January 3, 2005

It's always startled me to realize that the 12-second first flight of the Wright Brothers covered a distance of 120 feet ... while the length of the Airbus A380 (first flight coming up in a couple of months) is almost exactly twice as far at 239 feet, 6 inches.

Awesome.
posted by AirBeagle at 2:41 PM on January 3, 2005

Very nice find, carter ... you always post interesting things. I vote for more carter posts ;-)
posted by madamjujujive at 2:55 PM on January 3, 2005

Back at ya, mjjj!
posted by carter at 3:16 PM on January 3, 2005

Very neat and I'm not even particularly into to aviation stuff. This is what's so cool about Mefi. And woohoo for the mefi contacts thingy or I would have missed this. Thanks, carter!
posted by lobakgo at 2:50 PM on January 6, 2005