Powering the Age of Flight

GLENN HAMMOND CURTISS (1878-1930) was often called “The Colossus of Aviation” with good reason.

- BY JOE GERTLER

A self-made man with only an eighth-grade education and lacking family wealth, his aviation accomplishments and vision led the aviation industry from its infancy. He was a respected leader, inventor and businessman, who pioneered the evolution to the maturity of the global aerospace industrial conglomerates that still influence the social, political and economical developments that shaped the 20th century. Like many of his numerous contemporary competitors, he became involved in turn-of-the century bicycle racing. His unquenchable thirst for mechanical knowledge soon turned to motorcycles, then engines, then aeroplanes. He saw the aircraft engine as the weak point in aviation development and rapidly developed marketable engines of his own design that were advanced enough to mark him as a leader in the field. He attracted the interest of numerous other pioneer designers and joined Alexander Graham Bell in the Aerial Experiment Association. While the famous Wright