On 120th anniversary of Wright Bros. flight, Rowan County museum celebrates historic feat year-round

SPENCER, N.C. (QUEEN CITY NEWS) — This weekend marks the 120th anniversary of the Wright Brothers’ historic first flight.

Festivities take place Sunday on the Outer Banks. For aviation aficionados that can’t make the trip to Kitty Hawk, a museum in Spencer has the next best thing.

The North Carolina Transportation Museum has a remarkable replica of the iconic Wright Flyer, the first successful powered airplane.

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The first powered flight took place Dec. 17, 1903, by Orville Wright. While he and brother Wilbur shared test flights at Kitty Hawk, landing them both in the history books, parts of the original Wright Flyer have since landed in outer space.

“Yeah, a lot of people don’t know that,” explains Xavier Klonowski, collections manager at the state-run museum. “We have an exact replica on display that we acquired from the museum at Kitty Hawk.”

The famed flyer represents the world’s first successful powered flight with a pilot onboard. It flew 120 feet for 12 seconds on a cold blustery December day with Orville at the controls. It’s speed was 6.8 miles per hour across the ground. But one day, parts of that aircraft would blast off at record rates.

The flying machine that launched the space age by a quarter-mile has since rocketed into history on the red planet. A piece of its fiber made the 300-million-mile journey, hitching a ride aboard NASA’s Perseverance rover.

“A small portion of the original Wright Flyer was attached to the ‘Ingenuity’ helicopter on Mars,” says Klonowski.

Additionally, the Wright Flyer was present for two of Humankind’s greatest flight achievements — not only the Wright Brothers flight in 1903, but the first human Lunar landing in 1969.

“Neil Armstrong took a small piece aboard Apollo 11 and onto the moon,” Klonowski recalls. “It returned to Earth and is on display in the Smithsonian’s Air and Space Museum.”

A piece of the Wright Flyer took another space trip a few decades later.

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“Another swatch from the fabric wing of the actual Wright Flyer flew into orbit with former astronaut John Glenn onboard space shuttle ‘Discovery’ in 1998.”

It’s now preserved on a plaque in the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C.

“Here we are 120 years later, the Flyer is still as impressive as day one,” Klonowski said. “And the replica at our Transportation Museum is certainly one of our most popular exhibits. But we have so much more. Planes, trains and automobiles on our historic site in Spencer. Something for everyone.”

For av-geeks craving more aviation history, the Transportation Museum will host a “Wind and Wings” event in the Spring. And in Charlotte, get ready for the 2024 grand opening of the Sullenberger Aviation Museum — a Smithsonian affiliate.

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