Air Capital, Pizza Pioneers RoadyGoat
Wichita earned its 'Air Capital of the World' nickname the hard way, by actually building the planes. Cessna, Beechcraft, Learjet and Stearman all took root here, and to this day a huge slice of the world's general-aviation aircraft are stamped 'made in Wichita.' But the city's other claim to fame is dinner: in 1958, brothers Dan and Frank Carney borrowed six hundred dollars from their mother and opened the first Pizza Hut in a tiny rented building on the corner of Bluff and Kellogg. The hut-like roof and a sign with room for only eight letters gave the chain its name. Within a year they had six more shops; within a couple decades it was the biggest pizza chain on earth. (That original building was later moved to the Wichita State campus, where it's now a small museum.) Wings overhead, pizza on the ground.