In 1910, Wilbur and Orville Wright sued Glenn Curtiss and his airplane company for infringing on their intellectual property by using aileron-like flaps to achieve lateral stability. After a fierce patent battle the court ruled in favor of the Wrights, but it was Curtiss who had the last laugh.

The Wrights are renowned for their breakthroughs in aviation, notably the first powered heavier-than-air flight. Their success faded afterwards as they became consumed in litigation, while other eager airplane manufacturers continued to innovate and improve upon their airplanes. The Curtiss company was one of those companies whose work far surpassed that of the Wrights.

By 1918, Curtiss had secured an agreement with the US Navy to build a flying boat, the NC-4 with the intention of crossing the Atlantic. Early skeptics criticized Curtiss, saying that there was no way planes could cross the Atlantic at their current state. But the next year, a group of four Curtiss aircraft, one a NC-4, began a journey from Rockaway, New York to the Azores. Although the planes took several stops along the way, the NC-4 successfully made the journey, representing the first transatlantic flight.

A Curtiss NC-4 Under Construction in New York, 1919. Image via Library of Congress.

Charles Lindbergh next to The Spirit of St. Louis in 1927. Image via Yale University Library, © P. & A. Photos.

Just one month later, Jack Alcock and Arthur Whitten Brown flew in a Vickers Vimy flew from St. Johns, Newfoundland to Clifden, Ireland, making the first nonstop transatlantic flight. In 1927, Charles Lindbergh rose to fame for making the first solo nonstop transatlantic flight, from New York to Paris in The Spirit of St. Louis.

Distance records went in the other direction as well. In 1923, pilots from the US Army Air Service flew the Fokker F.IV (T-2) from New York to San Diego in the first nonstop transcontinental flight. The next year, Army Air Service pilots circumnavigated the globe by air for the first time over the course of 175 days.

It’s fascinating to think that just 16 years after the Wright brothers’ first powered flight, airplanes were already advanced enough to cross the Atlantic Ocean. As airplanes flew farther and longer, the age of flight became less of a dream and more of a reality that would go on to change the world.