That two bicycle salesmen from Dayton, Ohio, were the first people to fly is as astonishing today as it was over a century ago, when the Wright brothers soared above slack-jawed crowds at public exhibitions in the United States and France.
來自俄亥俄州代頓的兩名自行車推銷員是第一批乘坐飛機的人，這在今天和一個多世紀前一樣令人震驚，當時萊特兄弟在美國和法國的公共展覽上飛過了鬆弛的下巴人群。
For a brief period, the world was united in wonder.
在很短的一段時間裡，世界在驚歎中團結一致。
The Wrights’ accomplishment is worth revisiting because it challenges the 21st-century conviction that aspiring young engineers should focus narrowly on STEM disciplines in college, and that courses in the arts and humanities are not as important as those in math and science.
萊特的成就值得重新審視，因為它挑戰了21世紀的信念，即有抱負的年輕工程師應該在大學裡狹隘地專注於STEM學科，而且藝術和人文學科的課程不如數學和科學課程那麼重要。
If the Wright brothers were alive today, they might warn us that pedagogical dogmas like these prevent us from cultivating engineers of the extraordinary type that they were.
如果萊特兄弟今天還活著，他們可能會警告我們，像這樣的教育教條阻止我們培養他們這樣的非凡類型的工程師。
Neither Wilbur nor Orville Wright majored in a STEM discipline.
威爾伯和奧維爾·賴特都沒有主修STEM學科。
In fact, neither brother went to college and neither had any formal technical training.
事實上，兩個兄弟都沒有上過大學，也沒有接受過任何正式的技術培訓。
The Wright Flyer cost the brothers less than $1,000 (about $28,000 in today’s dollars) to construct, which they earned through profits from their bicycle business.
萊特傳單的建造成本不到1，000美元(約合今天的28，000美元)，這筆錢是他們從自行車業務中賺取的。
The first prototype of the Wright Flyer flew 852 feet, and with modifications it eventually flew in excess of 40 miles.
萊特傳單的第一個原型飛行了852英尺，經過改進，它最終飛行了超過40英里。
Not bad for two working class dreamers from Dayton with no engineering education, no internet access and no university laboratories or libraries.
對於兩個來自代頓的工人階級夢想家來說還不錯，他們沒有工程教育，沒有互聯網接入，也沒有大學實驗室或圖書館。
At the same time that the Wrights were designing and testing their successful flying machine, Samuel Langley, a university professor and secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, was also designing his.
在萊特夫婦設計和測試他們成功的飛行器的同時，大學教授兼史密森尼學會秘書塞繆爾·蘭利(Samuel Langley)也在設計他的飛行器。
Langley spent $70,000 (about $2 million today) on his “aerodrome,” which was mostly funded by a grant from the U.S. War Department.
蘭利在他的“機場”上花費了7萬美元(約合今天的200萬美元)，大部分資金來自美國軍火部的撥款。
On its maiden flight, Langley’s aerodrome plunged into the Potomac River while attempting take off.
在它的處女航上，蘭利的機場在試圖起飛時墜入波托馬克河。
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