Wright Brothers and the Pail Laurence Dunbar Dayton Aviation Heritage National Historical Park’s Wright and Dunbar Center
“We now hold all the records!” Orville Wright
This museum was full of exhibits about both Paul Laurence Dunbar as well as the Wright Brothers. Upon walking in the museum, there is a virtual exhibit to prepare you for the rest of the tour. Once you walk past this giant screen, there is an exhibit introducing you to Paul Laurence Dunbar. Raised in Ohio, Dunbar was a well accomplished poet, but he wasn’t always so popular. In the late 1800’s it was very difficult for African American Writers to get published. He started out as an Elevator Repair Operator who published a small book of poems and sold them only from his elevator. It was this small book that lead him to be a very important writer by 1900.
The next exhibit introduced you to the Wright brothers. Wilbur Wright was four years older than his brother Orville. They put their minds together to solve problems, understand inventions of their time, and created many inventions themselves. In their early teens, the Wright brothers started their own newspaper called West Side News. Their print shop served many purposes such as business cards, news letters, advertisements, and their newspaper. It was the Wright Brother’s print shop that printed Paul Laurence Dunbar’s tickets and handbills for his public readings. The Wright brothers were not just interested in printing, they rode their bicycles when ever they could. Friends of the family would often come by to get their bicycles fixed and as time went by the numbers of repairs increased. Eventually, Orville and Wilbur opened up a bicycle shop selling their own line of bicycles to their community. After taking interest in travel on the ground, Orville and Wilbur decided to focus on travel by air. They studied aviation closely and determined that the machine they needed to build should contain three things; wings for lift, a power plant, and it would need to be fully controllable. An exhibit demonstrating these three key things provided pictures of what the planes looked like.
After building several kites and gliders, Wilbur and Orville faced failure over and over. Traveling back and forth from Dayton to Kitty Hawk the brothers never gave up on flying. Dayton is where they developed their ideas and built the pieces to the gliders, but due to the overwhelming amount of trees, and soft winds of Dayton, the brothers traveled to Kitty Hawk North Carolina to find better winds and a more isolated place. In 1900 the brothers built a glider that was big enough to carry a pilot which proved to be successful at Kitty Hawk. In 1901, the brothers built a wind tunnel in their bicycle shop and conducted many experiments. The results of the many experiments allowed them to fix the equation they were using to determine wing design. It was this equation that aided them in building the first aircraft that roll, pitch, and yaw were controllable. From this, they determined that a flyable aircraft would need to weigh less than 200 pounds, provide 8-9 horsepower and run smoothly. Using the principles of lift, control, and power they seeked the help of a local mechanic in building their aircraft which worked, but was unreliable and broke down often.. They flew their first circle in 1904, but in 1905 their aircraft was able to pitch up and down. Flyer III was the brother’s pound practical airplane and was the start of something amazing. The Wright Company was established in 1909.
After touring the museum, I picked up a flyer at the front desk that showed how you can use your cell phone as a tour guide. All you have to do is call a number and it will talk you through the museum. There are also rewinding, pausing, and fast forward options just by using your key pad.
