Labels:text | font | screenshot | black and white | document | paper | number OCR: 1903 Orville Wright* makes the first flight in a heavier-than-air machine. 1 906 Brazilian Alberto Santos-Dumont* makes the first recorded European 1 909 flight, in Paris. Louis Bleriot, * French airplane designer, crosses the English Channel in his 25-hp monoplane. 1 909 First regular commercial air service begun in Germany, using Zeppelin 1913 The world's first transport airplane, the Sikorsky Il'ya Muromets, makes air ships. * its first flight at St. Petersburg, Russia. 1914 The world's first scheduled airline, the St. Petersburg-Tampa Airboat Line, operates a daily service for three months across Tampa Bay , Florida. 1918 First U.S. airmail* service opens. The U.S. Army operates the single route New York-Philadelphia-Washington. 1919 A flying boat built by Glenn Curtiss* makes the first transatlantic crossing. 1919 First nonstop transatlantic flight (New foundland- Ireland) is made by British pilots John Alcock* and Arthur W. Brown. 1919 First scheduled air-passenger service (London-Paris) uses converted World War I planes. 1921 Gen. Billy Mitchell* air-bombs and sinks a German battleship to demonstrate the war time uses of air power 1923 First U.S. nonstop transcontinental flight (New York-San Diego) takes 27 hours 1926 Richard E. Byrd* and Floyd Bennett* fly over the North Pole. 1927 Charles A. Lindbergh* solos nonstop across the Atlantic. 1 929 James H. Doolittle* pilots the first "blind, " instrument-only, flight. 1930 French pilots Dieudonne Costes and Maurice Bellonte fly Paris-New York nonstop in 37 hours. 1932 Amelia Earhart* solos across the Atlantic-the first such flight by a woman. 1933 Wiley Post completes the first round-the-world solo flight. 1933 The flying boat The China Clipper opens the first transpacific passenger route (San Francisco-Hawaii). 1934 New Zealander Jean Batten flies solo from England to Australia. 1935 The future workhorse of civil aviation, the Douglas DC-3, makes its first flight. 1 938 Italian Mario Pezzi sets a world altitude record of 17,083 m (56,046 ft) in a Caproni 161. 1 939 The Yankee Clipper flying boat inaugurates the first Atlantic passenger service (New York-Southampton). 1942 The Bell P-59 Airacomet makes the first U.S. jet flight. 1947 Capt. Charles E. Yeager* flies the Bell X-1 through the sound barrier. 1952 Britain introduces the Comet, the first jet transport, and begins the first jetliner passenger flight (London-Johannesburg). 1953 Jacqueline Cochrane* is the first woman to cross the sound barrier, piloting an F-86 Sabre jet. 1954 The prototype of the Boeing 707, the first U.S. jet transport, is test-flown. 1958 Transatlantic jet passenger service begins (New York to London, New York to Paris). First U.S. jet passenger service (New York to Miami). 1968 Prototype of the first supersonic airliner, the Soviet Tupolev Tu-144, makes its first flight. (The Concorde prototype flies for the first time in 1969.) 1970 First wide-body jet, the Boeing 747, enters service. 1976 Concorde, * the French-British supersonic transport, begins passenger service. 1979 Bryan Allen pedals the Gossamer Albatross across the English Channel, breaking the distance record for human-powered flight. 1986 Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager pilot the ultralight Voyager-which carries 8, 175 kg (7,000 lbs) of fuel- on a 9-day, nonstop, round-the-world flight. * See separate article.
