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Curtiss, Glenn Hammond
1873 - 1930
 
 
1907 Jan, 24 Sets an unofficial world speed record on a motorcycle of his own design, reaching 136.29 mph at Ormond Beach, Florida.
1907 Nov, 30 Founds the Curtiss Aeroplane Company. this is the first airplane manufacturer in the U.S..
1908 Jul, 04 Glenn Curtiss wins the $2,500 silver trophy offered by the Scientific Amercan journal for an official flight over one kilometer. He flew the AEA's "June Bug" 1.1 miles, nearly twice the required distance, at the Stony Brook Farm race-track, the AEA base.
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1908 Jul, 20 Orville Wright warns Glenn Curtiss that the wing flaps in use on the AEA's "June Bug" are an infringement of the Wrights' patents.
See also: Wright, Orville ,
1908 Dec, 06 The AEA's fourth aircraft, the "Silver Dart", was flown for the first time at the AEA's Hammondsport home base. It was designed from a collaboration between John McGurdy and Glenn Curtiss; an improvement on the design of the "June Bug".
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1909 Mar, 02 The Aeronautical Society of New York places an order for a Curtiss No. 1 Gold Bug airplane.
1909 Mar, 20 Glenn Curtiss and Augustus Herring form the Herring-Curtiss Company, starting with $360,000.
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1909 Aug, 29 Curtiss wins the Gordon Bennett trophy race in his own "Reims Racer". He beat the second-place Bleriot by 5.8 seconds, flying two laps in 15 mins. 50.4 sec. at an average speed of 46.6 m.p.h..
1909 Oct, 07 Glenn H. Curtiss becomes the first American to hold an FAI airplane certificate.
1910 Jan, 20 Glenn Curtiss participates in the first large-scale air show in the U.S., in Los Angeles. He sets a new air speed record of 54.7 m.p.h. in one of his own biplanes. The Curtiss team makes $10,250 in prizes overall.
1910 May, 29 He flies his "Hudson Flyer" biplane from Albany to N.Y.C. in 51 mins., winning the $10,000 New York World Hudson-Fulton Centenary prize for this purpose. This is the longest U.S. flight to date, for which he also wins the Scientific American trophy.
1910 Jun, 30 Demonstrates aerial bombing from one of his own aircrafts to Navy officers. He drops eight inch long lead pipes on a warship-shaped target, which was hit with 18 of the 20 'bombs' -- scoring a hit 15 in 17 times. Adm. Kimball was one of those observers.
1911 Feb, 01 Glenn Curtiss and Neil Burgess together become the first licensed aircraft manufacturer in the U.S..
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1911 Jul, 01 The first aircraft of the U.S. Navy, the Curtiss A-1 Triad, is flown for the first time by Glenn Curtiss himself. The flight, which started at 6:50pm, lasts five minutes and is flown at a height of 25 ft..
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1914 May, 28 The Langley "Aerodrome" is flown successfully by Glenn Curtiss, who has rebuilt and greatly modified the aircraft for Mr. Walcott, the secretary of the Smithsonian Institution.

Together, they planned to prove that an aircraft could have flown prior to the Wright brother's first flight and hoped this would invalidate their commercially valuable patents.
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