Just 58 years separate the Wright brothers' first flight from Gagarin's, and 66 from the Moon landing — some who saw the first airplanes lived to see the Moon.

1903 · 1961 · 1969 · apart: 66 years

◍ Show on the globe

The events

• Wright brothers' first flight1903 · Kitty Hawk. On 17 December 1903 Orville and Wilbur Wright made the first controlled, sustained flight in a powered aeroplane. The first attempt lasted just 12 seconds but opened the age of aviation, which within half a century transformed war, travel and the world.
• Moon landing1969 · Cape Canaveral. Apollo 11 launched from Cape Canaveral on 16 July 1969, and on 20 July Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first people to walk on the Moon while Michael Collins stayed in orbit. The landing was the climax of the space race.

20th century

More amazing facts

• 1889 The Eiffel Tower opened in spring 1889, and in June van Gogh painted The Starry Night at the Saint-Rémy asylum.
• 1893 · 1918 Women in New Zealand have voted in parliamentary elections since 1893, a quarter of a century before those in Britain, Germany or Russia.
• 1895 In 1895 Popov demonstrated a radio receiver in St Petersburg, and the Lumière brothers held the first paid film screening in Paris.
• 1908 1908: the Tunguska blast flattened 2,000 km² of Siberian forest, and the Messina earthquake killed some 80,000 people.
• 1914 Passenger pigeons once numbered in the billions, but the last one, Martha, died on 1 September 1914 — a month after World War I began.
• 1922 In November 1922 Howard Carter peered into Tutankhamun's tomb; just over a month later the USSR was founded.

All amazing facts (126) →