WacoFan
Bigly
A Laird Swallow! Correct.
Also, please give me Kudo's for the inventive hints - I thought the Linda Lovelace poster was inspired.
Now, in 1919-1920 a very wealth oil man named J.M. "Jake" Moellendick enticed a young pilot and aircraft designer name E.M. "Matty" Laird to move from his Chicago home to Wichita, Ks to design and produce and airplane by offering to front the money for the E.M. Laird Company. The Swallow was the product of this business arrangement. While marginally better than the surplus Jenny's, it did have a two place front cockpit and the orders streamed into Wichita. This is reputed to be the first plane designed and manufactured solely for commercial purposes (as opposed to military or exhibition/racing). So, in effect it is the first commercial airplane from a clean sheet of paper. It also helped establish the town of Wichita as the center of the aircraft manufacturing universe. Early notables who filed through the employ of the E.M. Laird company were Buck Weaver, later of Weaver Aircraft Company (Waco), Lloyd Stearman got his first aviation job here on the factory floor, and Walter Beech was the plant manager. In 1924, Matty Laird left the company to return to Chicago to start Laird Aircraft due to butting heads with Moellendick. The company was named the New Swallow company and Lloyd Stearman was promoted to chief aircraft designer. After a couple of years he and Beech, after consulting with a local notable named Clyde Cessna left and the three of them, plus Bill Snook who had become factory manager at Swallow formed the Travel Air company with underwriting by William Innes, a Wichita merchant.
So, that little airplane sparked General Aviation in a sense. Travel Air, Beech, Cessna, Stearman, and to a more limited extent Waco all owe their genesis to the airplane pictured.
This is not to be confused with Ctab's posting of the C-2 earlier this week. That airplane started General Aviation for the common man - it allowed "normal" people to buy airplanes much the same way the Model T allowed commoners to buy cars.
Also, please give me Kudo's for the inventive hints - I thought the Linda Lovelace poster was inspired.
Now, in 1919-1920 a very wealth oil man named J.M. "Jake" Moellendick enticed a young pilot and aircraft designer name E.M. "Matty" Laird to move from his Chicago home to Wichita, Ks to design and produce and airplane by offering to front the money for the E.M. Laird Company. The Swallow was the product of this business arrangement. While marginally better than the surplus Jenny's, it did have a two place front cockpit and the orders streamed into Wichita. This is reputed to be the first plane designed and manufactured solely for commercial purposes (as opposed to military or exhibition/racing). So, in effect it is the first commercial airplane from a clean sheet of paper. It also helped establish the town of Wichita as the center of the aircraft manufacturing universe. Early notables who filed through the employ of the E.M. Laird company were Buck Weaver, later of Weaver Aircraft Company (Waco), Lloyd Stearman got his first aviation job here on the factory floor, and Walter Beech was the plant manager. In 1924, Matty Laird left the company to return to Chicago to start Laird Aircraft due to butting heads with Moellendick. The company was named the New Swallow company and Lloyd Stearman was promoted to chief aircraft designer. After a couple of years he and Beech, after consulting with a local notable named Clyde Cessna left and the three of them, plus Bill Snook who had become factory manager at Swallow formed the Travel Air company with underwriting by William Innes, a Wichita merchant.
So, that little airplane sparked General Aviation in a sense. Travel Air, Beech, Cessna, Stearman, and to a more limited extent Waco all owe their genesis to the airplane pictured.
This is not to be confused with Ctab's posting of the C-2 earlier this week. That airplane started General Aviation for the common man - it allowed "normal" people to buy airplanes much the same way the Model T allowed commoners to buy cars.
