KITTY HAWK

Orville Wright begins the first successful controlled flight in history, at Kill Devil Hills, North town, Dare county, northeastern North Carolina, U.S., on a narrow sand barrier facing the Atlantic Ocean, opposite Albemarle Sound. Immediately south at Kill Devil Hills is the Wright Brothers National Memorial (1927), commemorating the flight there of Wilbur and Orville Wright on Dec. 17, 1903, the first powered airplane flight in the United States (see photograph). Kitty Hawk is probably derived from an Indian (Algonkian) name recorded in 1729 as Chickahauk; its meaning is uncertain. Pop. (l990) 1,937.