20th Century inventions

First flight.
The Wright brothers' first airplane flight on Dec. 17, 1903, lasted just 12 seconds and news of the feat made it into only four newspapers the next morning. Yet, the pioneering, 120-foot (37 meters) flight in a fragile airplane over Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, had an enormous impact on the entire world.
My mum-in-law worked at Rolls Royce during WW2 building the Merlin engine for the spitfire.
Thank you Laurie for this months intriguing prompts!