WALTER L. FAIRCHILD

 

 

Early Pilots Collection. Photographs, clippings, correspondence; 1894-1978; 2.2 cubic feet. There is material on Thomas S. Baldwin, Lynn Bauder, Lincoln Beachey, Joe Bennett, Tony Bitetti, Art Boston, Ralph M. Brown, Frank H. Burnside, Joe Costa, William E. Doherty, Fred Eells,Theodore Ellyson, Eugene Ely, Walter L. Fairchild, John J. Frisbie, Bert Hassell, Beckwith Havens, Frederick A. Hoover, Ray Hylan, Fulton Irwin, John Kaminski, Charles B. Kirkham, Henry Kleckler, E. M. Laird, Ruth Law, William S. Luckey, Damon Merrill, Harvey Mummert, Hugh Robinson, Blanch S. Scott, Windy Smith, Francis Wildman, J. Newton Williams, and others, including a number of student pilots from Japan. Also a typed history of the Curtiss-Wright Corporation Airplane Division, 1910-1945, by Art Butler, and reminiscences of Curtiss Airplane Company of Buffalo, 1915-1919. RLIN ID NYHV2306-A. Editor's Note: This collection is housed in the New York Historical Society Collection.

 

ONLINE RESOURCES      If you search for "Walter L. Fairchild" +aviation, using the Google search engine, (9-22-07), you will find about nine links.

 

Walter L. Fairchild on the AeroFiles website FA to FU      You will find this entry on the AeroFiles website describing a plane which was made by Walter. It also mentions that he was one of the pioneers at Hempstead Plains. You can access the page by clicking on the title above.

 

Walter L. Fairchild on the AeroFiles website M F P      This entry on the AeroFiles website offers three pictures of the plane which was produced by the Polson Iron Works Ltd, Toronto Canada. The initials come from the three founders, J B Miller, Walter L Fairchild, and Walter H Phipps. You can access the page by clicing on the title above.

 

RECOMMENDED READING

CONTACT! The Story of the Early Birds   Henry Serrano Villard   Product Details Hardbound: 263 pages; 8 x 10 1/2 inches Publisher: Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1968 Out of print: Occasionally available used. L. C. Card 68-21615

Foreward by S. PAUL JOHNSTON Director, National Air and Space Museum Smithsonian Institution      In today's age of space probes and moon rockets, it is hard to believe that the aeroplane is scarcely sixty years old. Here Henry Serrano Villard, who knew many of the pioneer pilots and flew in their "bits of stick and string,"re-creates the romantic era when man first dared the miracle of flight. His anecdotal account, illustrated with 125 photographs--many from his personal album--covers the decade and a half of aeronautical history from the Wright brothers' exploits at Kitty Hawk to the outbreak of World War I.   Editor's Note:      I had the pleasure of knowing Henry for several years before his death. I found him to be a delightful companion and a remarkable source of information on the entire field of aviation. I can recommend his book, without hesitation, as an essential resource for anyone interested in the history of early aviation..

Quotation from The Year of the Great Races, p.129      "American monoplanes were far behind European designs of the period. Dr. Henry W. Walden in 1909 had built and flown a pusher type, wth tricycle landing gear, that resembled a Curtiss biplane minus the upper wing. Eventually its inventor found a place in the National Avfiation Hall of Fame--"for conceiving, building and demonstrating the first succssful monoplane in the United startes." A tractor monoplane built by Walter L. Fairchild at Mineola in 1911 pioneered the use of steel-tubing construction in this country."

 

I have been unable to find any information as to the dates of his birth or death.   Editor's Note: If you have any more information on this pioneer aviator, please contact me. E-mail to Ralph Cooper   Back