Flown on a commercial airline recently? I personally have done more flying in the past year than all the previous 43 years combined! While I still get a bit of anxiety when the plane is taking off - I really enjoy flying. I know there are many who have logged far more air miles than I have in the past year, but it’s been an exciting time for me. Last year around this time, I flew to Northern Ireland at a ridiculously low price - it was my first time “home” in over 20 years.

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What has any of this got to do with today, June 16th?

Well, it is the day that is commonly accepted as the first date in history when the first commercial sale of an airplane took place.

Naturally, the “Wright Brothers” get a lot of credit for their work in aviation - but someone that is not so well know should also get a lot of credit for the ability today to zip over to Belfast, Northern Ireland from Toronto, Canada in six hours, or be able to be out in the Rockies in 5 hours.

His name is Glenn Hammond Curtis. It was Curtis who really foresaw the possibilities of travel by air, and spent much of his life developing motors as well as working with designs of aircraft.

It was on this day, June 16th, that Curtis took an order for an airplane and sold it to the Aeronautical Society of New York which is the first known commercial sale of an aircraft.

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