100 years of flight : a chronicle of aerospace history 1903-2003

In just 100 years, air and space exploration has progressed from a 12-second, 120-foot flight by two brothers to a 30-year sustained flight, now 7 billion miles from Earth, traveling at 300,000 mph. Drawing on the extensive collection of the National Air and Space Museum and personal collections, this full-colour book chronicles the most significant accomplishments in aerospace history over the past 100 years. In timeline fashion, you'll read brief excerpts from hundreds of news articles reporting on significant accomplishments in flight. Through brief introductory essays, you will learn what made each decade of flight most significant. Concluding essays look at what lies ahead. The book was commissioned in celebration of the 100th Anniversary of Powered Flight.