What I learned from rereading The Wright Brothers by David McCullough.
At exactly 1035, Oroville slipped the rope restraining the flyer, and it headed forward.
At the end of the track, the flyer lifted into the air, and Daniels, who had never operated a camera until then, snapped the shutter to take what would become one of the most historic photographs of the century.
The course of the flight, in Orville's words, was extremely erratic.
The flyer rose, dipped down, rose again, bounced and dipped again like a bucking bronco.
The distance flown had been 120ft.
The total time airborne was approximately 12 seconds.
Were you scared?
Orville would be asked.
Scared, he said with a smile.
There wasn't time.
It was only a flight of 12 seconds, he said, and it was an uncertain, wavy, creeping sort of flight at best.
But it was a real flight at last.
Wilbur took a turn and went off like a bird for 175ft.
Orville went again, flying 200ft.
Then, on the fourth test, Wilbur flew through the air at a distance of 852ft over the ground in 59 seconds.
It had taken four years.
They had endured violent storms, accidents, one disappointment after another, public indifference and ridicule, and clouds of demon mosquitoes to get to and from their remote sand dune testing ground.
They had made five round trips from Ohio, a total of 7000 miles by train, all to fly little more than half a mile.
No matter.
They had done it.