The Wright Sister: A Novel

By Patty Dann

An epistolary novel of historical fiction that imagines the life of Katharine Wright and her relationship with her famous brothers, Wilbur and Orville Wright.

On December 17, 1903, Orville and Wilbur Wright flew the world’s first airplane at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, establishing the Wright Brothers as world-renowned pioneers of flight. Known to far fewer people was their whip-smart and well-educated sister Katharine, a suffragette and early feminist.

After Wilbur passed away, Katharine lived with and took care of her increasingly reclusive brother Orville, who often turned to his more confident and supportive sister to help him through fame and fortune. But when Katharine became engaged to their mutual friend, Harry Haskell, Orville felt abandoned and betrayed. He smashed a pitcher of flowers against a wall and refused to attend the wedding or speak to Katharine or Harry. As the years went on, the siblings grew further and further apart.

In The Wright Sister, Patty Dann wonderfully imagines the blossoming of Katharine, revealed in her “Marriage Diary”—in which she emerges as a frank, vibrant, intellectually and socially engaged, sexually active woman coming into her own—and her one-sided correspondence with her estranged brother as she hopes to repair their fractured relationship. Even though she pictures “Orv” throwing her letters away, Katharine cannot contain her joie de vivre, her love of married life, her strong advocacy of the suffragette cause, or her abiding affection for her stubborn sibling as she fondly recalls their shared life.

An inspiring and poignant chronicle of feminism, family, and forgiveness, The Wright Sister is an unforgettable portrait of a woman, a sister of inventors, who found a way to reinvent herself.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media
• Release date: Aug 18, 2020
• ISBN: 9780062993120

Patty Dann

<p>Patty Dann's novels have been translated into French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Dutch, Chinese, Korean, and Japanese. Her novel <em>Mermaids</em> was made into a movie starring Cher, Winona Ryder, and Christina Ricci. Dann is also the author of <em>The Butterfly Hours: Transforming Memories into Memoir</em>, <em>The Goldfish Went on Vacation: A Memoir of Loss</em>, and <em>The Baby Boat: A Memoir of Adoption</em>. Dann's articles have appeared in the <em>New York Times</em>, <em>Boston Globe</em>, <em>O</em>, <em>The Oprah Magazine</em>, and numerous other publications. She teaches writing workshops at the West Side YMCA in New York. Dann is married to journalist Michael Hill and has one son and two stepsons.</p>

Book preview

Dedication

For my mother,

1925–2020

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Dedication

Preface

November 21, 1926

November 22, 1926

November 23, 1926

Later on November 23, 1926

November 24, 1926

Thursday, November 25, 1926

November 30, 1926

December 8, 1926

December 9, 1926

December 22, 1926—Winter Solstice

February 1, 1927

Later on February 1, 1927

February 2, 1927

February 3, 1927

February 4, 1927

February 15, 1927

Later on February 15, 1927

March 6, 1927

March 7, 1927

March 9, 1927

June 1, 1927

June 1, 1927

June 12, 1927

August 19, 1927

August 20, 1927

August 22, 1927

August 23, 1927

August 24, 1927

August 24, 1927

August 25, 1927

August 26, 1927

August 27, 1927

August 28, 1927

Later on August 28, 1927

August 29, 1927

August 30, 1927

August 31, 1927

September 1, 1927

September 23, 1927

September 24, 1927

September 25, 1927

September 26, 1927

September 26, 1927

September 27, 1927

September 28, 1927

September 29, 1927

September 30, 1927

Later on September 30, 1927

October 1, 1927

October 3, 1927

October 4, 1927

October 5, 1927

October 6, 1927

October 7, 1927

October 8, 1927

October 10, 1927

October 13, 1927

October 17, 1927

October 18, 1927

October 19, 1927

October 22, 1927

October 24, 1927

October 25, 1927

October 27, 1927

October 28, 1927

October 29, 1927

October 30, 1927

November 20, 1927—My One-Year Anniversary

November 30, 1927

December 1, 1927

December 2, 1927

December 15, 1927

Sunday, January 1, 1928

January 2, 1928

January 15, 1928

January 16, 1928

January 17, 1928

January 25, 1928

January 26, 1928

January 26, 1928

February 1, 1928

March 1, 1928

March 17, 1928

May 18, 1928

May 19, 1928

May 20, 1928

June 27, 1928

June 28, 1928

June 29, 1928

July 30, 1928

July 30, 1928

July 31, 1928

August 10, 1928

August 15, 1928

August 16, 1928

August 21, 1928

August 30, 1928

August 30, 1928

August 31, 1928

Labor Day 1928

September 9, 1928

September 12, 1928

October 15, 1928

November 10, 1928

November 21, 1928

December 4, 1928

December 21, 1928—Winter Solstice

January 1, 1929

January 7, 1929

January 28, 1929

January 29, 1929

February 18, 1929

February 18, 1929

February 21, 1929

February 23, 1929

February 23, 1929

February 23, 1929

February 24, 1929

February 25, 1929

February 26, 1929

February?

February ?, 1929 (my calendar is downstairs), written upstairs by hand . . .

February 28, 1929

February ?, 1929

Orv, Orv dear, February 28 or is it the 18th?

March 1, 1929

March? I Do Not Know When

Another Day in March?

Dear Orv

Author’s Note

Acknowledgments

P.S. Insights, Interviews & More . . .*

About the Author

About the Book

Read On

Copyright

About the Publisher

Preface

WINTER WINGS! WRIGHT SISTER WEDS AT 50!

NOVEMBER 21, 1926

November 21, 1926

The paper was incorrect. I was not fifty. On November 20, 1926, I was fifty-two when I got married for the first and only time to Harry Haskell. But my brother Orv, with whom I share a birthday, refused to attend the festivities. This was just yesterday, at 4:00 p.m. When Orv heard of my upcoming nuptials last year, he smashed the blue-and-white Limoges china pitcher full of daisies against the wall of our summerhouse on Lake Huron. Everyone in the world knows Orv as the Wright brother who has a mustache and wears zigzag socks, ones that I knit every year with the soft yarn from the sheep outside of Dayton he insists upon, because of his sensitive feet. The flowers scattered like an exploded bridal bouquet as the water and bits of china littered the floor.

It has occurred to me more than once that although Orv is brilliant, ingenious, extraordinary, and able to study the subtle arc of a seagull’s wings and to create an invention that has changed the entire planet, unfortunately, he might also be insane. I do not say such a thing lightly or with any disrespect. I love Orv in what some say is an uncommon love. But I think all love is uncommon if it is worth its salt.

I am calling this diary my marriage diary, as conjugal life is such a new adventure for me. I do not know how I will fare with this curious tie that binds. This diary is nothing fancy, just a worn, toffee-colored notebook I have saved from my Oberlin days. There’s a nifty envelope inside the back cover where I keep some precious drawings of my scribbles and designs. I did have some French verbs in the first pages, but I have torn those out. My penmanship remains steady from my years as a schoolteacher. I still dot my i’s precisely, and I can still do line after line of perfect o’s, except when my fingers are cold. I am writing in the most beautiful heron-blue ink that Orv gave me as a Christmas gift just two years ago, when my life seemed to be quite humdrum after years of living with the Most Famous Brothers to Ever Leave the Earth. I keep the diary in a locked box with copies of letters I have begun to write to Orv, not that I imagine Harry or the housemaid would be interested.

I vow to take these new seasons of my life, fall and winter, and begin anew, to be bold where I have been timid and strong where I have hesitated. I have always been a woman of science and scholarly pursuits along with my work for the rights of women. But in my new life, I hope to be able to write some truths about another kind of Wrights: secrets both professional and personal, aspects that have been previously hidden. We discussed much in the Wright household, but there was much we did not say. It will not come easily to me to reveal what was for so long concealed, as I am the Reverend’s daughter.

Have to go meet Harry’s friends for drinks—more tomorrow.

November 22, 1926

KANSAS CITY, HERE I AM

I married Harry, a journalist for the Kansas City Star, a smart and talky widower. We’re head over heels for each other, even though his collar is often still wet from tears he sheds for his first wife, Isabel. I wore a cream-colored gown and new silk undergarments for our wedding at Oberlin College, from which we both graduated in the last decade of the nineteenth century. Harry was and still is fifty-two as well, but nobody has batted an eye at that.

I’d bought the Limoges pitcher Orv smashed on our trip to Paris in 1908. Will, Orv, and I were there showing an admiring and amazed world our new invention. And Orv had picked those daisies for me when he took his morning bird-counting walk only hours before his violent display. He has not spoken a word to me since that horrible smashing last year, not by telegram, post, or telephone.

It was not I but Harry who ended up giving Orville news of our engagement, that day of his furious outburst, and since then he has remained living in the big house with every modern convenience in Dayton, Ohio, the house we had moved to with Father, a bishop in the United Brethren Church, after all the success and hoopla about the aeroplane. Now only Orv remains there with our housekeeper, capable Carrie Kayler, six hundred miles away from my Kansas City residence, as the crow flies. Not a crow! I hear Orv’s voice shouting in my ear, even though he is stone silent. I detest crows, sister. A red-winged blackbird is a much more interesting bird.

November 23, 1926

WRIGHT SISTER OVER THE MOON

I am over the moon about Harry, but I still imagine I hear Orv shouting at me in moments that should be serene, while I am in the bath or baking a batch of walnut brownies, his favorite, although he has become like a ghost in the tales that he and Will used to scare the dickens out of me with. When he was in a good mood, Orv called me Swes or Sterchens, from schwesterchen, German for little sister. I say called because our life together feels hidden in the past tense. Orv’s voice could be as gentle as a cooing dove or as cruel as a squawking blue jay. The unpredictability of his moods made me walk around holding my breath. Not the way I was around the Reverend. That was more blind fear.

It does not seem right to finally, shockingly, fall in love at this stage of life and lose the love of one’s own brother. Truthfully, I have never heard of this happening to anybody, not anyone I have encountered or read about in novels, in English or in French. I have heard of people being disowned for some unspeakable sin, of course—for having a child out of wedlock, for committing adultery—but there is no sin (as sinful as I sometimes feel) in my marriage. Our love is not out of wedlock.

Tomorrow Harry is giving me a bicycle tour of our neighborhood.

Later on November 23, 1926

PREACHER’S KID MARRIES PREACHER’S KID

Harry and I are both the grown children—very grown—of men of the cloth; we’re PKs, as we say, as is Orv, of course.

Harry and Orv always got along before. I do not think Harry felt superior in any way because he went to college and my brothers did not. As he said, Eli Whitney and Henry Ford started out as farm boys. They certainly could have taught us Oberliners a thing or two. And I do not think Orv felt superior to Harry because of the aeroplane. They were friends. There was no doubt about that. We had all known one another for years and were friends with Isabel as well.

November 24, 1926

FIRST HUSBAND, SECOND WIFE

Does Harry have any flaws? We all do, of course. I would say the one thing I am beyond unaccustomed to is his mess of papers. I secretly and sometimes not so secretly refer to him as the Paper Monster. If there is a surface—and there are: the kitchen table, the dining room table, our bed—it becomes instantly covered with newspapers and books the moment he enters the room. I am so used to Orv’s neat way of doing everything, his cataloging and arranging, a trait that causes other people alarm but is so familiar to me. But this marriage business is all a fine howdy-do at this point. I’ve left the house of one man and gone to live with another. As Will used to say when we were sewing the wings, We’ll just have to see if this machine can fly.

Have to make pumpkin, apple, and pecan pies tonight. Must ask Orv to send me at least two of Mother’s pie tins.

Thursday, November 25, 1926

Our first Thanksgiving apart

Dear Orv, Orv dear,

If this paper is stained, I cannot help myself, for I have been weeping on the typewriter. I just had my first Thanksgiving as Mrs. Harry Haskell, and I love Harry so, but there was a point during the dinner, with him and his son, and without you, when the maid spilled gravy in my lap, I believe on purpose, and I thought I would leap from the table. Being a second wife is not for the faint of heart.

We had our meal at noon, and by that I mean we were at the table at 11:45 in the morning, which of course is beyond ridiculous. I barely had recovered from breakfast. I love an evening meal, the way we always did, but it seems that the first Mrs. Haskell had a noon Thanksgiving dinner and that is that.

Harry’s grown son is nice enough, a fine young man, as Mother would say, also a journalist, but there was not the joking or singing I am accustomed to, and there was a prayer before the meal, which felt familiar, but we all held hands, which of course we never did. I was holding Harry’s lovely hand to my right and his son’s to my left, and I just felt like I would start giggling, like we were about to play ring-around-the-rosy. My emotions are off-kilter, like someone has tossed me in a barrel over Niagara Falls.

Speaking of which, most of my mail seems to be forwarded to me here in Kansas City, but please send me anything that ends up in Dayton. Can you believe part of Kansas City is in Kansas and part in Missouri? Already there is something wrong here. I am in Missouri, which I have to remind myself daily. Some of the mail I’ve received is clearly for you as well, from people who have not caught up with my nuptial news. Yesterday I opened a letter from a gentleman, addressed to The Wright Sister, inquiring whether we would both like to take a trip in a barrel over the falls.

Dear Mr. Wright and His sister, he addressed it. I think His was capitalized as if you were royalty. I think it’s the same crazed man who sent a similar invitation eight years ago, but I don’t have my files to check. You could—they are in the tall filing cabinets in the study. They are chronological, except if there is a correspondence with one person, which will be in a separate folder marked in blue ink. It is strange not to be having this conversation with you face-to-face, not to laugh or fume about it together in the same room.

And you, my dearest brother? What did you do for Thanksgiving? Did you sit at the table with Carrie? I cannot imagine you having Thanksgiving alone. I made apple, pumpkin, and pecan pies, and the maid made some kind of dry raisin and nut bread I could not abide. You would have said, Perhaps this was meant to be for gluing kites, as you did one time when a raspberry tart I had made failed. Please tell me everything. I am also heartsick that I did not vote in this recent election. I will have to register to vote here in Kansas City, but I do not yet have my sea legs. I don’t know if I ever told you, but that first triumphant day, when I had the privilege of voting in 1920, while I was waiting in line to vote for our Ohio man Harding, a dreadful character came by and spit on my shoes! I was horrified. As if I didn’t have the right to be there. I never told you because I was ashamed, but now that you and I are apart, in some sense I believe I want to confide in you more. I wonder why that would be. Perhaps Dr. Freud would have an opinion on that, although I know you are not a disciple.

I am obviously a bit blue, but a word from you would change my color.

Love,

Your only sister, K., who is a bit all over the map.

P.S. All those months when I still lived at home, yet knew I would be marrying Harry, it was like living with a specter, Orville Wright, an impossible specter, who would not say boo, I might add.

November 30, 1926

HARRY HASKELL IS A RASCAL

I have been married for ten days. I have a hus-band. I say that over and over like it’s two words, hus-band, hus-band. Harry’s lips turn down slightly whenever I talk about Orv, which is too much!

I feel my life has been like an endless series of musical chairs, a game most people love as children, although it always set off a sentiment

Reviews for The Wright Sister

[cherylk_44 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I am familiar with The Wright Brothers but not really familiar with Katharine. This book is told through a series of letters by Katharine to her brother, Orville. The Wright Brothers are what helped me with my inspiration in aviation.After reading this book, I found another of the Wrights that I did like. Katharine was a good voice of this book. The further I got into the book; the more connected I became towards her. Although, in this case, I was turned off by Orville. Ok, so I understand he was hurt by his sister marrying his best friend but I felt like he carried the grudge on too long. In fact, he acted like a child. If not for his sister, he really would be lost. While, I did enjoy reading this book; I found it to read both fast and slow. Fast because the chapters were short and the overall page count of this book is on the shorter length. Slow because there was not a lot happening. It was really one sided...Katharine's. Overall, I did find this book to still be an enjoyable read.