This is the fourth of five separate locations
for the Wright's bicycle business.
The brothers were operating from this shop
from the spring of 1895 until the fall of 1897.
In some ways I think this is the most important
of their bicycle businesses.
From here they would begin manufacturing
their own line of bicycles in late 1895.
Up to this point have been repairing bicycles,
they've been selling accessories,
they've been selling bicycles
built by other companies.
Now they wanted to take the next step
and to do that, they installed additional equipment
beyond what they would use for repair.
The equipment they install represented
state-of-the-art technology.
And, with the decision to begin manufacturing
the brothers were becoming familiar
with that equipment and its capabilities.
This building is also where they were working
when they first became actively interested
in the whole idea of powered flight.
That occurred in early August 1896.
In one of the local newspapers,
they saw a brief notice on the death of
Otto Lilienthal.
He was an experimenter working with
gliders in Germany.
At the time, probably the world's leading
authority in aviation.
He had been killed
in the crash of one of his machines.
The Wrights will point to that brief
announcement on his death years later
as the thing that really sparked their
latent interest in the whole question of flight.
They're not going to construct airplanes
in this building.
But, when Wilbur particularly is beginning
to think about all of the challenges ahead,
this is where he is working.
This building truly is the birthplace of aviation.
In just over 112 years we've gone
from their first flight of 12 seconds, 120 feet.
We have flown to the moon and back.
And today we have a machine that flies
28 and a half times faster than the speed of sound!
All of it begins right here.