In the small town of Corinth, Texas, on November 22, 1898, Mae Post gave birth to Wiley Hardeman Post. Wiley's family were small cotton farmers who struggled to feed Wiley and his five siblings. This forced Wiley's family to try their luck elsewhere. They moved several times throughout Texas and Oklahoma before finally settling on a farm in the town of Maysville, Oklahoma. Post died at the age of 37, but not before making several very important contributions to aviation as well as space travel. In 1913, at the age of 15, Wiley Post saw his first actual airplane in flight at the County Fair in Lawton, Oklahoma. Post immediately fell in love with the Curtiss "pusher" plane, and soon after enrolled at the Sweeney Automobile & Aviation School in Kansas City. After graduation, Post returned to Oklahoma to work at Chickasaw & Lawton Construction. Post quickly grew tired of his construction job and turned his attention back to what he was truly passionate about; aviation. Eager to become a pilot, Post enrolled in the student military boot camp located at the University of Oklahoma where he learned the basics of radio and communications technology. Due to Germany's defeat, Post was unable to become a pilot for the United States Air Force and found himself unemployed once again. Post then continued his work in the Oklahoma oil fields. While working in the oil fields, he took a second job at Burrell Tibbs' Flying Circus, where he first worked as a skydiver and later learned to fly. In the fall of 1926, Post was injured in the oil fields when a piece of metal struck his left eye, rendering him permanently blind. With the money he received for his injury, Post bought his f...... middle of paper ......oon in Barrow Point, Alaska. Post and his friend William Rogers were killed in this tragic accident. Wiley Post was buried at Memorial Park Cemetery in Edmond, Oklahoma. Hangars, aviation schools, and airports were named in honor of Wiley Post's accomplishments throughout the Southwest. As for Winnie Mae, it was retired to the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, near Dulles International Airport in Washington. Post's short life had a huge impact on aviation and helped pave the way for the modern aviation we have today with his record-breaking flights, aviation experiments and his drive to always push the boundaries of aviation at the time. In 1979, the U.S. Postal Service even issued a stamp commemorating the Postal Service's contributions to aviation that helped it get to where it is today...