INTRODUCTION

Inside the chain-link fence that surrounded the site of General Motors Corp.’s Inland Manufacturing Division in Dayton, Ohio, a pair of long, low, brick buildings stood in near anonymity for decades. Massive manufacturing buildings surrounded the smaller structures on the fifty-four-acre site, blocking them from view. The two buildings were active facilities at what later became known as the Inland, Delco and finally Delphi Home Avenue plant, where for decades auto workers turned out parts and components for GM and the global auto industry. Few Daytonians remembered or ever knew how all that industry and all those jobs grew from these two modest buildings. Still, subtle architectural touches—white-painted brick instead of concrete; rows of large, arched windows along the sides; gracefully arched parapets at each end—set these buildings apart and hinted at an earlier history.

And what a history it is: not simply the nucleus of a major auto parts plant, these buildings were the birthplace of America’s aerospace industry. They were the Wright Company’s factory, built in 1910 and 1911 to mass-produce the flying machine invented by Wilbur and Orville Wright—the first purpose-built airplane factory in America, according to the National Park Service. The men and women who earned their livings inside these buildings were the spiritual ancestors of today’s American aerospace workers.

At this writing, nearly all other structures on the old Delphi site are gone, exposing the Wright Company buildings to public view. NAHA is working with the National Park Service and municipal, state and private partners to preserve the buildings as a unit of the Dayton Aviation Heritage National Historical Park. The Wright Company factory buildings complete the story of the Wright brothers’ invention, development and commercialization of the airplane.

The first Wright Company factory building in 2013. Courtesy of the National Aviation Heritage Area.