In honor of #NationalAviationDay, August 19, we are taking a closer look at the revolutionary impact of aviation and some interesting facts below:

Important Historical Events:

• 1903 - The Wright Brothers: With Orville at the helm and Wilbur making a final wing adjustment, they completed the first sustained flight of a heavier-than-air aircraft on a spit of land four miles south of Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.
• 1871 - Orville Wright was born in Dayton, Ohio. His older brother, Wilbur, had been born in Millville, Indiana, in 1867.
• 1799 - Sir George Cayley, an English engineer, described the model for a modern airplane; a fixed-wing machine with lift, propulsion and control mechanisms.
• 9th Century AD - Abbas ibn Firnas is said to have covered himself with feathers, attached wings to his body and (according to Algerian historian Ahmed Mohammed al-Maqqari) "flew a considerable distance."
• 1st Century AD - Legend has it that Chinese Emperor Wang Mang ordered a soldier to strap two wings to his back. The soldier, covered in bird feathers, flew 100 meters.

Cool High-Flying Facts: 

• Although it may seem like a lot of people are afraid to fly, Aviophobia afflicts only about 6.5 percent of the population.
• Worldwide, only about 5 percent of the population has been on an airplane.
• The first U.S. president to fly in an airplane was the adventurous Theodore Roosevelt, who flew in a Wright Flyer on October 11, 1910.
• The Wright Brothers got their mechanical training as owners of a bicycle shop.
• A Boeing 747 without engine power can glide about two miles for every 1,000 feet or so that the plane is above the ground.