All Stories

At the Museum we’re fortunate to host many of the nation’s aerospace icons. This was certainly the case earlier this year when Gemini 10 and Apollo 11 astronaut Michael Collins was on hand for our 2016 John H. Glenn Lecture, Spaceflight: Then, Now, Next.

Long before your laptop computer and the computers that took us to the Moon, there was another type of computer. In the early 20^th century, women who made calculations and reduced astronomical data were known as “computers.” The hours were long and the pay was minimal. Their calculations, however, laid important groundwork for future astronomers and led to some of the most important astronomical discoveries.

On September 5, 1882, the Central Labor Union in New York City held a “monster labor festival” in Wendel’s Elm Park, an event that would become known as Labor Day.  On October 2, 1924, the Central Labor Union of Dayton sponsored their own trophy race at the International Air Races in Dayton, Ohio.

Although her flight is not considered “official,” this day in history we remember Blanche Stuart Scott, the first American woman to take a solo hop into the air.

It’s the little things we take for granted here on Earth; things like being able to lie down on a bed and not have it float away, or wake up without suffocating on our own exhaled carbon dioxide. While interning at the Museum, I’ve spent time researching several of those things we take for granted but astronauts in space cannot.

Guion Bluford made history on August 30, 1983 when he became the first African American in space, launching into low Earth orbit aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger. He subsequently flew aboard three additional shuttle missions, logging a total of 688 hours in space.

Olive Ann Beech is proof that some milestones in aviation occur with two feet firmly planted on the ground. Olive Ann co-founded Beech Aircraft Corporation with husband Walter Beech and became the first female executive of an aircraft company when she took the reins in 1940. In Famous Personalities of Flight Cookbook, Olive Ann shared a recipe for supper nachos and a little insight into her early years in the aircraft industry.

Art Scholl was a three-time member of the U.S. Aerobatic Team, a racer at the Reno Air Races, an airshow pilot, and a fixed base operator with an aerobatic school. His dog Aileron often flew with him in his deHavilland Chipmunk, riding on the wing as Scholl taxied on the runway or perched on his shoulder in the aircraft.

In 1932, Amelia Earhart made history yet again as the first non-stop transcontinental flight by a woman pilot. 

Today in 1871, aviator and inventor Orville Wright was born to Milton and Susan Catherine Koerner Wright. Orville was the sixth of seven children born to the Wrights.