Aircraft timeline

• 400 B.C.  The first kites were invented by the Chinese.
• 1485  Leonardo da Vinci designed the ornithopter (a wing flapping aircraft).
• 1783  Joseph and Etienne Montgolfier launched the first passengers a duck, a sheep, and a rooster in a hot air balloon.
• 1849  Sir George Cayley, “The Father of Aerial Navigation,” designed the first three wing glider that lifted a person off the ground.
• 1891  Otto Lilienthal built the first practical glider for long flights.
• 1903  The Wright Brothers developed the first motor-powered airplane that a pilot could control.
• 1907  Paul Cornu built the first free flying helicopter.
• 1919  Lieutenant-Commander A.C. Reed and his crew were the first to fly across the Atlantic Ocean, making several stops, in the Curtiss Flying Boat.
• 1927  Charles Lindbergh was the first person to fly across the Atlantic Ocean nonstop.
• 1935  Amelia Earhart was the first person to fly solo across the Pacific Ocean from Hawaii to California.
• 1947  Chuck Yeager became the first pilot to break the sound barrier.
• 1979  The Gossamer Albatross was the first craft powered by a human (Bryan Allen) to fly across the English Channel.
• 1986  Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager flew Voyager around the world nonstop without refueling.
• 1997  The NASA/Aero Vironment Pathfinder became the first solar-powered aircraft to fly above the troposphere.