The Wright Brothers: Bicycle Geniuses
Part 2: Focus on the Air Into this 1890s bicycle craze stepped Orville and Wilbur Wright. They opened their own bicycle shop in Dayton, Ohio, in 1892. Wilbur had bought his first bicycle in the 1880s. It was a highwheeler. Both he and Orville were fascinated in how it worked and were determined to help make it better. They both bought safety bicycles, and Orville even began to enter bicycle races. The family business came first, however.
The success of the bicycle shop allowed Orville and Wilbur to buy lots of materials to use in their experiments with flight. They were still fascinated by things that flew, like kites and birds, and they now turned their attention to making a machine that people could fly. It was here that the bicycle came in handy again. One day, Wilbur squeezed an empty bicycle tube box flat. He noticed how it looked when he twisted in his hands. (The flattened box is the exact shape of the two-winged glider that the Wrights would produce just a couple years later.) You can also see the bicycle chain that the Wrights used as a propeller on their plane. (It should be pointed out here that the Wrights had to invent the propeller as a means of propulsion.) The double-triangle design of the plane also looks a lot like a bicycle.
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Social Studies for Kids
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