Spread your wings on National Aviation Day

National Aviation Day is just around the corner, so it’s a great time to get out and spread your wings.

It was in 1939 that President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued the first presidential proclamation designating Aug. 19 — Orville Wright’s birthday — as a day citizens are encouraged to participate in activities that promote aviation.

To help us accomplish that, officials at NASA came up with some of their favorite suggestions:

Spread Your Wings

Have someone take a picture of you and your friends or loved ones stretching out your arms like the wings of an airplane. (For extra brownie points use your hands to make winglets — one of NASA’s many contributions to aviation.) Post your photo to Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or any other social media with the tag #NationalAviationDay.

Go Fly

If you already are a pilot, take some time to fly today to celebrate National Aviation Day.

Take an introductory flight lesson

If you’ve always wanted to be a pilot, make this the day you take flight. Most general aviation airports have a flight school that offers an introductory flight lesson at a discounted price. Many airports have flying clubs that will introduce you to flight.

Or fly from home

If you want a taste of flight from the cockpit without leaving the ground, computer desktop flight simulators, such as X-Plane 11 or Microsoft’s new Flight Simulator, are popular choices and can get you into the virtual sky in short order.

Visit your local science museum or NASA visitor center

Exhibits about aviation and on how an airplane flies are popular staples of local science museums. Check out your local science center to see if they’re open and how they handle aviation, and even if they don’t, it never hurts to spend some time learning about science.

Or better yet, visit an aviation museum. Just type Aviation Museums into your search bar and see what comes up. There also is a list of museums at AirplaneMuseums.com.

Visitor centers for NASA’s Langley Research Center near Norfolk, Virginia, and Glenn Research Center in Cleveland – two of the four NASA field centers that conducts aeronautics research – are open. Find out more here.

Watch an aviation-themed movie

There’s no shortage of classic aviation-themed movies available to watch. A few NASA aeronautics staff favorites include Jimmy Stewart’s “The Spirit of St. Louis” or “Strategic Air Command” or, more recently, Amazon Prime’s “The Aeronauts,” National Geographic’s “Living in the Age of Airplanes,” or Disney’s animated “Planes.”

Movies that combine aviation and space can be fun, such as “The Right Stuff” or the documentary “One More Orbit,” which tells how former NASA astronaut Terry Virts attempts to break the speed record for circling Earth over the poles in a business jet.

Build an airplane

Why not? It doesn’t have to be big enough to actually fly in – although homebuilt airplane kits are available if you have the money, time, and perseverance to complete the job.

Putting together a smaller plastic model kit of one of the world’s most historic aircraft can be just as rewarding and just as educational, especially for younger kids who might be thinking about a career as an engineer or aerospace technician. In fact, many astronauts will tell you their love of aviation and space began with putting models together as a child.

Another idea: Grab some LEGO bricks and build the airplane of your dreams.

Or make it easy on yourself: Fold a paper airplane like this one of NASA’s X-59 Quiet SuperSonic Technology aircraft and shoot it across the room. Sometimes simple works best.

Visit your local library

Aviation-themed books, whether fact or fiction, are all over the shelves of your local library — literally. That’s because there’s no single Dewey Decimal number for aviation. A book about aviation history will be in a different section of the library than a book about how to design an airplane. And fictional books such as the Arthur Hailey classic “Airport,” or autobiographies such as Chuck Yeager’s “Yeager,” are off on yet another shelf somewhere else. Don’t hesitate to ask your reference librarian for help.

Download a free NASA e-book

When you get back from the library, or while still there, jump online and check out the NASA e-books you can download for free, such as “Green Light for Green Flight,” “Flying Beyond The Stall,” or the “Elegance in Flight.”