The Wright brothers invented and flew the first airplane in 1903, recognized as “the first sustained and controlled heavier-than-air powered flight”.
Following its limited use in World War I, aircraft technology continued to develop. Airplanes had a presence in all the major battles of World War II. The first jet aircraft was the German Heinkel He 178 in 1939. The first jet airliner, the de Havilland Comet, was introduced in 1952. The Boeing 707, the first widely successful commercial jet, was in commercial service for more than 50 years, from 1958 to at least 2013.
Airplanes come in a variety of sizes, shapes, and wing configurations. The broad spectrum of uses for airplanes includes recreation, transportation of goods and people, military, and research. Most airplanes are flown by a pilot on board the aircraft, but some are designed to be remotely or computer-controlled such as drones.
Here below is a set of amazing photos from Vintage Cars & People that shows people posing in front of airplanes from between the 1920s and 1960s.
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| Two fashionable ladies posing in front of a large, vee-engined biplane on an airfield in summertime, Kenosha, Wisconsin, circa 1925 |
| A lady in a fashionable summer dress and a fellow in a double-breasted suit posing with a Junkers F 13 aeroplane, circa 1928 |
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| Three fashionable ladies and a gent posing with a Junkers F 13 aeroplane, circa 1928 |
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| Two families posing in front of a Junkers F 13 airplane, circa 1928 |
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| A company of 13 well-to-do individuals posing with a Junkers F 24 aeroplane on an airfield in summertime, circa 1930s |
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| A company of 13 young ladies and an older woman posing with a Messerschmitt M20 on an airfield under bleak skies, 1935 |
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| A company of six stylish individuals posing on an airfield in front of a Fokker Tri-Motor aircraft, circa 1935 |
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| A young mother and her son posing on a landing stage next to a Dornier Delphin III flying boat on Lake Constance, circa 1935 |
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| A company of 19 posing in front of a Junkers Ju 52/3m on an airfield in summertime, circa 1936 |
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| A company of 18 posing in front of a Junkers Ju 52/3m on the tarmac of Stuttgart's old airport, Flughafen Stuttgart-Böblingen, circa 1938 |
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| A company of 18 stylish ladies posing with a Messerschmitt M20 on an airfield under bleak skies, circa 1938 |
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| Ten stylish ladies and gents posing with a Messerschmitt M20 on an airfield under bleak skies, June 27, 1939 |
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| A cheerful lady posing in front of a Morane-Saulnier MS 502 single-engined aircraft on an airfield in the countryside, circa late 1940s |
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| Passengers disembarking a Western Air Lines Douglas DC-4 on a sunny day in the Fifties |
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| Ten cheerful well-to-do passengers posing in front of an Air France airliner, probably a Douglas DC-4. Note the royal poodle, groomed in the fashion of the 1950s |
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| A group of passengers are waiting to board a Trans World Airlines Constellation, November 1954 |
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| An elderly lady posing in front of a Trans-Canada Air Lines Douglas DC-3 on the tarmac of an airport in summertime, circa 1955 |
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| A cheerful lady disembarking a Vickers Viking aircraft, operated by short-lived West German airline Luftreederei Karl Herfurtner (KHD), Son Bonet Aerodrome, 1957 |
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| A dapper fellow in a double-breasted suit disembarking a Vickers Viking aircraft, operated by short-lived West German airline Luftreederei Karl Herfurtner (KHD), Son Bonet Aerodrome, 1957 |
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| Four members of a middle-class family posing underneath the wing of a Scandinavian Airlines aircraft, Malmö Airport, September 9, 1957 |
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| A group of passengers posing on the rain-drenched tarmac of an airport in wintertime. Pan American World Airways "Clipper Roland" can be seen in the background, circa 1958 |
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| A middle-aged woman and an adolescent girl disembarking a four-engined propeller plane – most likely a Swissair Douglas DC-7, circa 1958 |
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| An elegant lady in a light-colored coat and a fellow with thick-rimmed spectacles and a magazine under his arm ascending the stairs to a Sabena Convair CV-440 Metropolitan airliner, circa 1958 |
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| Three ladies in woollen coats, a little child, and an adolescent boy wearing traditional Lederhosen (leather shorts) posing in front of a Pan American Douglas DC-4 aircraft, circa 1958 |
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| An elegant lady in a female suit disembarking a Pan American World Airways airliner on a sunny summer's day, August 1959 |
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| A young lady with a beehive hairdo posing in front of a British European Airways Vickers Viscount 802, circa 1962 |
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| A dapper fellow posing with a red and white Reims-Cessna R172H Skyhawk, circa 1968 |