CURTISS, GLENN (HAMMOND)

born May 21, 1878, Hammondsport, N.Y., U.S. died July 23, 1930, Buffalo pioneer in the development of U.S. aviation whose aircraft were widely used during World War I. Curtiss began his career building engines for bicycles. In 1904 he designed and built a motor for the dirigible California Arrow. His success in building aircraft engines drew him into the Aerial Experiment Association (AEA), founded by Alexander Graham Bell. In 1908, using a plane built by the AEA, Curtiss won the Scientific American trophy for the first U.S. flight of one kilometre (0.6 mile). Curtiss was the first builder of seaplanes in the U.S.; after demonstrating to the U.S. Navy the practicability of using a seaplane in conjunction with a warship, he was awarded the first contract to build U.S. Navy planes. His factories, which were greatly expanded in 1917, supplied planes to Great Britain and Russia as well as to the U.S. Probably his best known plane was the JN-4, or Jenny, a trainer widely used during World War I. It was also a popular plane among barnstormers after the war and became famous for such exploits as the first Canadian mail flights over the Rocky Mountains. Though Curtiss and his company were deeply involved in litigation with the Wright Company for patent infringement, the question was dropped during World War I, and afterward the two companies merged into the Curtiss-Wright Corporation.