There are some moments in aviation history that are more familiar than others. Events like the first airplane flight, achieved by Orville and Wilbur Wright on Dec. 17, 1903, or the first nonstop transatlantic flight back in 1919 may be more common knowledge than, say, the first flight to the South Pole, Nov. 28-29, 1929.

The following are some other aviation firsts that may have flown under the radar of history courses:

First hydrogen-filled balloon flight — On Aug. 27, 1783, French physicist Jacques Alexandre Cesar Charles, launched a hydrogen-filled balloon that made a 27-mile flight in two hours, reaching upwards of 3,000 ft. The first piloted hydrogen balloon flight occurred in December of that year. (Source: Infoplease.com and MSN Encarta)

First flight from shipboard — Lt. Eugene Ely, USN, made the first takeoff from a ship (the cruiser Birmingham) in a Curtiss plane and flew from Hampton Roads, Va., to Norfolk on Nov. 14, 1910. He reversed the feat on Jan. 18, 1911, by flying from Camp Selfridge to the deck of the armored cruiser Pennsylvania in San Francisco Bay. (Source: Infoplease.com and Aviation History)

First aircraft to take off from water — The first seaplane, named Hydravion, was built by Frenchman Henri Fabre in 1910. It was powered by a 50-hp Gnome engine and had a cruising speed of 55 mph. Hydravion made its first takeoff from water on March 28, 1910, at La Mede harbor near Marseilles. It flew about 1.5 miles at just a few feet above water. (Data and photo, right, courtesy of Pandora Archive)

First aerial combat — In August 1914, Allied and German pilots and observers started shooting at each other with pistols and rifles. . .with negligible results. The first aerial victory came months later. On Oct. 5, Cpl. Louis Quénault and Sgt. Joseph Frantz of the French Air Force shoot down a German Aviatik. (Source: Infoplease.com and HowStuffWorks.com)

First helium balloon flight — On Dec. 21, 1921, the C-7, non-rigid U.S. Navy dirigible used non-inflammable helium as lifting gas to fly from Hampton Roads, Va., to Washington, D.C. (Source: Infoplease.com)

First autogyro flight — Juan de la Cierva, a Spanish aeronautical engineer, invented a rotary-wing aircraft called an autogyro and made the first successful flight in Madrid on June 9, 1923. He crossed the English Channel in 1928 with an improved autogyro model. (Source: Infoplease.com and The Columbia Encyclopedia) (Photo, left, courtesy of Hillel Aviation Museum)

First blind flight — U.S. Army Lieutenant James H. Doolittle (later famous for the so-called Doolittle Raid), working with the Guggenheim Foundation, proved that airplanes can be flown and landed without visual landmarks. Using only instruments on Sept. 24, 1929, he flew a 15-mile course and landed safely without ever seeing the ground. (Source: Infoplease.com and Wings Publishing)

First female-piloted helicopter flight — Hanna Reitsch, a German pilot (considered Nazi Germany's leading woman stunt pilot), flew Dr. Heinrich Focke's FW-61 in free, fully controlled flight at Bremen on July 4, 1937. Reitsch, who was also the first female civil and military aviation test pilot, went on to set more than 40 altitude and endurance records throughout her career. (Source: Infoplease.com)

First successful human-powered aircraft — Paul MacCready, an aeronautical engineer from Pasadena, Calif., was awarded the Kremer Prize for creating the world's first successful human-powered aircraft. The Gossamer Condor was flown by Bryan Allen over the required three-mile course on Aug. 23, 1977. (Source: Infoplease.com and Los Angeles Times)

Check out this video on the Condor's development and flight:

First nonstop flight around the world without refueling — In 1986, Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager flew in Voyager around the world nonstop and without refueling for 24,986.727 miles. They flew 216 hours, 3 min., 44 sec. from Dec. 14 to 23. The first solo, round-the-world flight without refueling was achieved by Steve Fossett in 2005, flying 22,878 miles in 67 hours from Feb. 28 to March 3. (Source: Infoplease.com and Los Angeles Times)

These are but a few achievements over aviation's 226-year history. For more aviation feats, visit Infoplease.com's Famous Firsts in Aviation.

Resources

Famous Firsts in Aviation
Infoplease.com, 2007

Ballooning
MSN Encarta

Aviation and Aeromodeling - Interdependent Evolutions and Histories: Henri Fabre
Monash University Centre for Telecommunications and Information Engineering

World War I Flight Timeline
by the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.
HowStuffWorks.com

Juan de la Cierva
The Columbia Encyclopedia (6th Edition), 2008

Blind Flight
Wings Publishing, 2003

Aviation and Aeromodeling - Interdependent Evolutions and Histories: Hanna Reitsch
Monash University Centre for Telecommunications and Information Engineering

Paul B. MacCready, 81; Inventor of Human-Powered Aircraft, Other Innovations
by Eric Malnic
The Los Angeles Times, Aug. 31, 2007

Round-the-World Stunt Lands Aviator a Record
by Peter Pae and Lianne Hart
The Los Angeles Times, March 4, 2005