By By Timothy R. Gaffney Dayton Daily News (view video)
WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE | From white fog rising off the grass to white wings soaring over it, Huffman Prairie took on a magical quality Wednesday morning for hundreds of people who gathered to celebrate a century of practical flight.
A replica 1905 Wright Flyer III, built and flown by Mark Dusenberry of Dover, Ohio, made two graceful flights across the prairie, its handmade engine chattering like a sewing machine.
Sponsored by Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, the National Park Service and the nonprofit Aviation Heritage Foundation Inc., the event marked the last and longest flight of the Wright brothers' third powered airplane 100 years ago Wednesday on the same patch of pasture.
The field is now a part of Wright-Patterson and a unit of the Dayton Aviation Heritage National Historical Park.
Dusenberry's flights were the highlight of a program that included several speakers and an aerial parade of vintage airplanes. Volunteers and early spectators found the field still swathed in fog, but the mist dissipated in time for the scheduled activities.
"On this very spot in 1905, the Wright brothers finally achieved their dream of practical flight," said Air Force Brig. Gen. Ted Bowlds, the Aeronautical Systems Center's deputy for acquisition.
Tom Crouch, senior curator of the National Air and Space Museum and Wright brothers biographer, said the Wright brothers began and ended their flying experiments in the Dayton area — beginning with a small kite that tested wing-warping in 1899 and ending with the Wright Flyer III's last flight.
On that flight, Wilbur Wright stayed aloft for more than 39 minutes, circling the prairie until he ran out of fuel — a dramatic contrast to the four short hops he and brother Orville had made less than two years earlier at Kitty Hawk, N.C.
Among the aviation enthusiasts at the event were two French delegations — one from Le Mans, where Wilbur's first public flights made the Wright brothers famous, and Pau, where Wilbur set up the world's first flying school.
The groups included descendents of several people who played key roles in the Wrights' success in Europe. One was Thierry Tissandier, son of French aviation pioneer Paul Tissandier, who was one of three students Wilbur taught to fly at the school he started in Pau.
"It was very important for me to see these demonstrations," he said through an interpreter. "I never saw a copy of a plane like my father flew in 1909."
The Wright Flyer III was the prototype for the airplane the Wright brothers began flying in 1908, later known as the Model A Flyer.
Static models of Wright airplanes are on display on the Huffman Prairie Flying Field, which will be open to the public from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. through Saturday. It will be closed Sunday while the exhibits are taken down, according to the park service.
Entrance to the field is through Gate 16A at the base off Ohio 444. The gate is marked by signs for the flying field.
Contact Timothy Gaffney at (937) 225-2390.