In the few short years between the Wright Brothers' first flight and World War I, airplanes really took off, so to speak. England, France, and Germany all used them in the war as bombers, which at first consisted of pilots throwing bombs by hand, but advanced quickly.
The US did not enter the war until 1917, but for years beforehand had supplied the British with gunpowder and various explosive ordinance. These were produced by DuPont, who expanded their operations with new facilities across the eastern half of the country. Their workforce grew from 5,300 people in 1914 to 48,000 by 1918. And there were quite a few factory explosions. A rash of explosions during the war could be explained by the rapid expansion of the project, with many new factories and inexperienced workers. But there were plenty of eyewitness accounts of airplane sightings just before a factory disaster. Were German infiltrators spying on those munitions factories? Were they actually throwing bombs? It was hard to tell, since the reports came from ordinary citizens, many of whom had never seen an airplane before. At least one sighting as attributed to balloon toys. No evidence was ever found to prove or disprove the possibility that DuPont's gunpowder factories were the victims of German bombing. Read about those scary days at American Strangeness. -via Strange Company
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