ORVILLE WRIGHT - COLLECTION CO-SIGNED BY:CAPTAIN EDWARD V. "EDDIE" RICKENBACKER - HFSID 91386

ORVILLE WRIGHT and EDDIE RICKENBACKER
Signed checks from the Aviation Pioneer and the Flying Ace!
Comprises: (1) ORVILLE WRIGHT. Check signed: "Orville Wright", 8¼x3. Dayton, Ohio, February 11, 1930. Check filled out by Mabel Beck, made payable to "The American Federation of Arts" for "$10.00", and signed by Orville Wright. Check No. 3329. Drawn on Wright's account at The City National Bank & Trust Co., Dayton, Ohio. Show through of bank stamp at signature. Cancellation holes, not at signature. Blue check mark to right of amount, stray ink mark at lower margin beneath signature. Overall, fine condition. (2) EDDIE RICKENBACKER. Check signed: "E.V. Rickenbacker", 6¼x2¾. New York, N.Y., February 11, 1969. Check No. 2573, drawn on the Chemical Bank New York Trust Company, payable to “Flower Fashions Inc.” for “$18.90”. Lightly creased. Show through of bank stamp on verso at the "E", "V" and "R" of signature. Ink slightly smudged at flourish of Rickenbacker. Overall, fine condition. Two items. Framed to an overall size of 30¾x22.

Orville Wright (1871-1948) and his brother, Wilbur Wright (1867-1912), made aviation history on December 17, 1903, with their Wright Flyer at Kitty Hawk, a town located on North Carolina's Outer Banks. While the Wrights had been testing their gliders on Kill Devil Hill for a number of years, that day was different. At 10:35 a.m., Orville was at the controls of the 21-foot biplane that sported a 40.3-foot wingspan. The 605-pound craft, powered by a 12-horsepower, four-cylinder engine which revved to 1,090 rpm, left the ground and stayed aloft for 12 seconds. The flight covered a length of 120 feet and at an altitude of ten feet. Later that day during one of their four test flights, Wilbur manned the controls, traveling 852 feet in 59 seconds. The Wright brothers were granted the first U.S. patent for the Flying Machine in May 1906. After Wilbur's death from typhoid fever in 1912, Orville continued to be an innovator in the aviation field.

America's greatest Ace during WWI, Captain Edward Vernon Rickenbacker (1890-1973) commanded the famed 94th "Hat-in-the-Ring" Squadron. He downed 26 enemy aircraft, becoming America's "Ace of Aces", and received the Congressional Medal of Honor. After the War, the former auto racer developed his own auto manufacturing company, the Rickenbacker Motor Company (1922-1927), and he would later manage and then own the Indianapolis Speedway and Eastern Airlines. Rickenbacker, who battled Germany's Red Baron Flying Circus and survived a 1941 commercial airline crash, cheated death once again during WWII. Acting as Special Consultant to Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson, "Rick" was aboard a B-17-D "Flying Fortress" when it crashed into the Pacific Ocean. From October 21 until November 13, 1942, the survivors of the eight-man crew floated in three small lifeboats in the shark-infested waters until their rescue. Rickenbacker detailed the ordeal in his book, Seven Came Through(1943).