Thursday, September 27, 2012

Wright and Lieutenant Humphreys in Flight, Oct. 19, 1909



We all know about Wilbur Wright, but what of Lieutenant Humphreys?...Born Frederick Erastus Humphreys, October 1883 in Summit, New Jersey. He attended Pennsylvania Military College and then West Point from which he graduated in1906.

Humphreys volunteered for assignment to the Aeronautical Division, U.S. Signal Corps and was chosen by the Wright brothers to participate. On October 26, 1909, after three hours of instruction by Wilbur Wright, he became the first Army aviator to solo in a heavier-than-air craft, and thus the first pilot of what was to eventually become the United States Air Force.

Lieutenant Humphreys was inducted into the First Flight Society's shrine in 2009.


https://www.firstflight.org/frederick-e-humphreys/