As I got in my car and found a place to eat, I began to “come down” from the elevated emotional, patriotic high of the National Marine War Memorial. As I became present with the reality of my actual place and time, the end of my trip loomed before me.

I was running out of money and I was running out of time. I had an appointment with the United States Marine Corps December 31, 1964 at MCRD San Diego – Marine boot camp. That was only a couple of weeks away.

At my motel for the night, on a piece of motel stationery, I plotted out my remaining time, the thousands of miles I had to drive and the hand full of must-see things I thought I might be able to squeeze in on my drive home.

Given that I wanted to see Kitty Hawk (the site of the First Flights), Miami, Florida (to touch the lower right-hand corner of the USA), then see the south including New Orleans (Tennessee Williams and “The Streetcar Named Desire”), Taliesin West (Frank Lloyd Wright’s winter studio near Phoenix, Arizona), and the Grand Canyon (the largest canyon in the world), I estimated I had roughly 4,400 miles to drive to get home.

Given that December 31 was non-negotiable, I planned to drive home in 10 days. So I had to average 60 miles an hour for about 8 hours a day to get me home in 10 days with a little buffer built in. I had driven 400 miles in a day a couple of times already on this trip, so I knew it was doable. I got to bed to get an early start.

With 270 miles to go that day, I was up and on the road by 6 am. The driving was relatively flat so I was able to average about 60 miles an hour with no problem. Even including a leisurely stop for brunch midway, I still reached the Wright Brothers National Monument by noon.

I parked by the Visitor’s Center. When I got out of my car, it was cold and windy.  I bundled up with my parka and checked out the Visitor Center. They gave a nice historical perspective on Orville and Wilbur Wright’s years of development from bicycle shop to gliders and extensive research with their wind tunnel. They explained the trips from Dayton, Ohio to the Kitty Hawk area of North Carolina to do manned glider flights in 1900, 1901 and 1902 with kites and gliders only. Then 1903 with gliders and the powered model.

I had no idea the thousands of hours they devoted to figuring out an effective wing as well as how to control it. They built their own wind tunnel and did hundreds of tests to perfect their wing design. They built kites and flew them in Ohio.  Then they built full size gliders and did over 1,000 fights at Kill Deer, North Carolina in 1900, 1901 and 1902. They wanted to make sure they had full control over their airplane before they added power. Each time they returned from Kitty Hawk, they built bigger and better gliders with more effective controls.

Finally, in 1903 after yet more glider flights, they did 4 successful powered flights.

After checking out the full-sized model of their first successful plane, I went outside to explore the memorial further.

You can see the first 3 flights are like warm-ups or test flights before the 4th and far more dramatic flight.

It is never easy being the first, the real pioneers. These 2 brothers spent over 4 years and hundreds of hours thinking through and perfecting their system of flight control. And then proved it with 4 historic flights on a very cold day in December, 1903.  And they literally changed the world forever. Their efforts led to Neill Armstrong making his “one small step for a man and one giant leap for mankind.”

I appreciated getting back into the relative warmth of my car but I was glad I had made the effort to experience this spot and this historic moment in time.

As I continued my drive south toward the heat of Florida, I reflected once again on all I had seen and experienced. From Bangor, Maine in the upper right corner of the country, all part of a magnificent trip. I wanted to get in another 100 miles or so before I stopped to eat and called it a day.

Again, I encourage you to take full advantage of our limited time special offer: buy 2 cases of JDD protein and receive 1 case of JDD protein for free.

Thank you for your business.

As always, I wish you and your family the very best of health.
Joe