On This Day In Alabama History: Wrights’ Biplane Arrived In Montgomery

By Graydon Rust Alabama 200

March 15, 1910

A biplane built by the Wright brothers arrived in Montgomery by train in seven large crates. Wilbur and Orville Wright traveled to Montgomery in 1910, only seven years after their first successful flight in North Carolina, to open the nation’s first civilian flying school in a city with mild winter climate and flat farmland. The brothers chose a cotton plantation owned by Frank Kohn as the site of the school and three students enrolled in the program for training. Mechanical and weather-related problems, however, forced the closure of the school a few months later. The site later reopened for aircraft repair during World War I and evolved into what is now Maxwell Air Force Base.

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