Wright Flying School

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Facility in Augusta, Georgia circa 1911

The Wright Flying School, also known as the Wright School of Aviation, was operated by the Wright Company from 1910 to 1916 and trained 119 individuals to fly Wright airplanes.

History

Orville Wright began training students on March 19, 1910 in Montgomery, Alabama at a site that later became Maxwell Air Force Base. With the onset of milder weather that May, the school relocated to Huffman Prairie Flying Field near Dayton, Ohio, where the Wrights developed practical aviation in 1904 and 1905 and where the Wright Company tested its airplanes. They also had a facility in Augusta, Georgia run by Frank Trenholm Coffyn. Some of the earliest graduates became members of the Wright Exhibition Team.

Sites

• Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery, Alabama
• Huffman Prairie Flying Field near Dayton, Ohio
• Augusta, Georgia

Students

• 1st Lt. Henry H. Arnold
• 1st Lt. Thomas DeWitt Milling
• Calbraith Perry Rodgers (1879-1912) started on June 5, 1911. Within a week, his instructor was letting him takeoff, fly, and land the airplane, but when he asked to be allowed a solo flight, the instructor said "no". Cal then bought the training airplane, a Wright Flyer Model B, the first to be privately owned.
• Walter Richard Brookins (1889-1953)
• Philip Orin Parmelee (1887-1912)
• Marjorie Stinson
• Edward Stinson
• Arthur L. Welsh (or Al Welsh) learned to fly and then in the summer of 1910 became an instructor at the Wright Company's flying school.
• George William Beatty was taught by Al Welsh, taking his first lesson on June 24, 1911 and soloing on July 23, 1911. That same day he flew as a passenger with Welsh to establish a new American two-man flight altitude record of 1,860 feet (570 m); and on August 5, 1911 Beatty broke his own record, flying to 3,080 feet (940 m) with Percy Reynolds as his passenger.