Curtiss, Glenn Hammond, 1878–1930, American inventor and aviation pioneer, b. Hammondsport, N.Y. He was a member of Alexander Graham Bell's Aerial Experiment Association (1907–9). In 1908 he made the first public flights in the United States, and in 1909 he established the first flying school there. His greatest triumph was his then daring and spectacular flight from Albany to New York City in 1910. In 1911, Curtiss invented ailerons, which he attached to his newly developed seaplane. He organized (1916) the Curtiss Aeroplane and Motor Corp., which built many planes for the Allied nations during World War I. After the war Curtiss continued to contribute radical improvements in the design of both planes and motors.
See biographies by C. C. Roseberry (1972) and C. Studer (1937, repr. 1972); study by S. Shulman (2002).
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