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Marsha Mills in her painting entitled “Beginning to Beyond” paints her visual impression of the events along this skyward path to the beyond.


From the cockpit of the Bell XS-1 the Wright Brothers are seen achieving the first successful powered flight, and thus guiding humanity towards future horizons, past the moon, to the beyond.

In the short span of 100 years humankind has made many great advances in aviation. From Kitty Hawk, North Carolina on December 17, 1903, the Wright brothers with the help of five North Carolinians flew the world’s first power-driven heavier-than-air machine in which they made free, controlled, and sustained flights.

On October 14, 1947 USAF Captain Charles “Chuck” Yeager, flew the Bell XS-1 to a speed of 1.06 mach, becoming the first pilot to break the speed of sound.

On July 20, 1969 Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin were the first men to step on the moon, stepping into another world from their lunar module, the Eagle.

In 1981, with the debut of the space shuttle Columbia, humankind proved their ability to do “routine” trips to space and return to earth safely and more economically.

Now, with the space station, serviced and maintained by an international crew and orbiting the Earth, can humankind, from this position at the near edge of beyond, reach the far edge of beyond in the future.

Marsha Mills in her painting entitled “Beginning to Beyond” paints her visual impression of the events along this skyward path to the beyond.