Replica of the 1903 Wright Flyer
De Havilland Aeronautical Technical School, Hatfield · 1948
Hanging among the aircraft of the Flight gallery is a fragile biplane of pale fabric and spruce, with two pusher propellers behind the wings and a pilot's cradle in the middle of the lower wing. It is a faithful copy of the machine in which Orville Wright made the first controlled, powered flight of a heavier than air aircraft on 17 December 1903 at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. That flight lasted twelve seconds and covered about thirty seven metres. The replica was built in 1948 by students of the de Havilland technical school at Hatfield, working from the original, which had hung in this museum for twenty years.
Look at the construction. There is no tail at the back; the elevator, a pair of small horizontal surfaces, is out in front, and the rudder is behind. The pilot lay on his stomach and steered by shifting his hips in a cradle, which warped the wing tips to bank the aircraft, the Wrights' key invention. A single twelve horsepower engine drives the two propellers through bicycle chains, one of them crossed so the propellers turn in opposite directions. The propellers themselves were carved by the brothers and were the most efficient in the world at the time.
The story of the original is the reason this copy exists. After a long quarrel with the Smithsonian over who flew first, Orville Wright sent the 1903 Flyer to London in 1928, and it hung in the Science Museum until 1948, surviving the war in storage. When the Smithsonian finally acknowledged the Wrights' priority, the aircraft went home to Washington, and this replica was made as part of the agreement. A memorable detail is the chain drive, borrowed straight from the bicycle shop the brothers ran in Dayton.
Did You Know? The original Flyer hung in this gallery for twenty years while the Wrights quarrelled with the Smithsonian; this copy was the price of its return.
Unlock the Full Guide
Read every room and listen to every work in all museums with premium.