Huffman Field - Wright-Patterson Air Force Base
Posted by: 
DougK
N 39° 48.419 W 084° 03.773
16S E 751435 N 4410462
Huffman Prairie Flying Field is the site where the Wright brothers perfected their flying machine. They learned to launch, land, turn, bank, and fly in circles and figure eights. It was also home to the Wright School of Aviation.
Waymark Code: WMFGMN
Location: Ohio, United States
Date Posted: 10/18/2012
Views: 5
From the
Dayton Aviation Heritage NHP site:
Huffman Prairie Flying Field was designated a National Historic Landmark, for its role in the development and testing of the world's first practical airplane, the Wright Flyer III. Huffman Field, touted by some as the cradle of aviation and the world's first aerodrome, is the flying field where Wilbur and Orville Wright obtained the necessary practice and experience to master the principles of flight.
Huffman Field was a farm meadow used for livestock in 1904 when the Wright brothers began their flying experiments here and constructed a hangar for that purpose. The low, wooden gable-roofed shed was converted into a livestock shelter in the winter of 1904 and torn down thereafter. A larger hangar was constructed in 1905 and replaced in 1910 when the Wrights built a new one near the intersection of the Yellow Springs and Springfield Pike for the Wright Company. The Wrights developed a derrick and weight launching system and positioned it on Huffman Field in 1904; this system rolled planes down a short launching rail. In 1910 the Wright brothers replaced this system with the use of airplane skids.
Although previously operating a winter flying school in Montgomery, Alabama, Orville Wright, the principal instructor of the school, moved the permanent operations to Huffman Field in 1910. Among the most notable students trained at Huffman were Lt. Henry H. "Hap" Arnold, Commander of the U.S. Army Air Corps in World War II; Griffith Brewer, the first Englishmen to fly an airplane; Cal P. Rodgers, the first person to fly across the United States; A. Roy Brown, the pilot who shot down the Red Baron during World War I; and three daring women: Rose Dugan, Mrs. Richard Hornsby and Marjorie Stinson. While the terrain has changed little since the Wright brothers used Huffman prairie, no buildings dating from the Wright brothers' experiments remain on the site.
This NRHP site is also known as Simms-Wright Station. This comes from the nearby Simms Road Station that was a stop on the Interurban electric trolley, which the Wrights rode daily to the Huffman Prairie Flying Field.
The story of the World's First Flying Field is told at Wright Stories.
Enter Wright-Patterson Air Force Base at Gate 16 (N39 47.510 W84 03.616) off of Ohio Route 444. Follow Communications Boulevard and signs to Hebbie Creek Road. Main parking and entrance are off Marl Road, but additional parking can be found on Pylon Road.
NOTE: Huffman Field is not on Wright Brothers Hill. If you only visited Wright Brothers Hill, you did not visit this place.