“It will place Dayton’s history squarely in the heart of China’s most populous regions,” Lightle said. “It’s big.”
What’s driving the sale is the great appreciation the Chinese people have for the Wrights and the history of powered flight, said those involved in the deal.
The first set — from the brothers’ early kite to the 1905 Flyer — is being readied now and will be transported to China next month. Many Dayton residents have seen this set, which was part of the Vectren Dayton Airshow in 2003, the centennial year of the Wrights’ first powered, piloted flight at Kitty Hawk, N.C.
That set has been exhibited around the U.S. and Canada since then.
“It was the single biggest static display we (the air show) ever had out there,” said Frank Winslow, who serves on the show’s board and is chair of the National Aviation Heritage Alliance.
Winslow appeared at a press conference Tuesday celebrating the deal, saying he expects the replicas will bring Chinese tourism to Dayton in a couple of years.
“It is quite Dayton-centric,” Lightle said of what will be displayed in China.
The second set of replicas will be “built from scratch” and delivered in 2017.
The permanent home for the planes and historical curios will be museums and historical complexes in Xi’an and Chengdu.
The Chinese client is re-creating a “birthplace of aviation” exhibit mirroring the one that appeared in Dayton in 2003, said Lightle, whose company is responsible for licensing the Wright Brothers’ name and images on behalf of the Wright family.
The replicas are to be prepared and built by Nick Engler and his team at Wright Aeroplane Co. in Dayton. The company is a group of artisans who have built flying replicas of early Wright craft. Engler stressed that the replicas are true airplanes.
“We went to Kitty Hawk and flew them,” he said.
The first set will go on tour to major Chinese cities before landing at its permanent home in early 2017.
Lightle said his Chinese customers are pleased the second set will be built in Dayton, where the Wrights designed and built their first planes and perfected powered flight at nearby Huffman Prairie, about 10 miles northeast of the city, today part of Wright-Patterson Air Force Base.
“They believe in the added value of having these originate in Dayton,” Lightle said. “They get that.”
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