Nothing has changed us so much as flight. It has shrunk the world while opening it to commerce, industry, science, diplomacy. It is hard think of any human effort untouched by the miracle revealed by the Wright Brothers in 1903. Unleashed, it ran rampant, easily making the Twentieth Century one of the most amazing periods in human development. We went from Kitty Hawk to the moon in just 66 years, and the Wright Brother's systems are still the basics for everything up to and including the space shuttle today.

The following is a collection of pictures I snapped at Kitty Hawk that morning along with a few gathered at odd places in the past:

These are replicas of the hangar (left) and living quarters built by the brothers at Kitty Hawk. Spartan, but adequate.

They had all the amenities, but it was really hot in the summertime and reealllly cold in the winter.

They adjusted their fabric with this little Singer, lent to them by a neighbor lady from down the beach.

This was the second flight, piloted by Wilbur. He went further, but like the first, the flight lasted only about 12 seconds. Apparently, the brothers were starting to get the knack of "straight and level" by that time. Modern engineers, experimenting with the design on simulators, say it's like "flying a Kleenex."

Third flight.

After the ceremonies on December 17th, 99 aircraft did a spectacular flyby, trailing one after the other above the original runway. That's normally hard to capture on film..but here's one you can't miss. It soared across the Wright's takeoff point at exactly 10:35 AM:

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