Allan Haines Loughead

Allan Haines Loughead (January 20, 1889 – May 26, 1969), later changed to Allan Haines Lockheed, formed the Alco Hydro-Aeroplane Company along with his brother, Malcolm Loughead that became Lockheed Corporation.

He was born in Niles, California, the youngest son of Flora and John Loughead, he had a half-brother Victor, a sister Hope, and a brother Malcolm Loughead. After his parents separated, Flora took the children to Santa Barbara, California where the brothers experimented with kites. Later, she moved them to a fruit ranch near Alma, California, where the brothers became interested in the gliding experiments of Professor John J. Montgomery.

Victor Loughead, who was interested in automobiles and airplanes, moved to Chicago, where he became associated with James E. Plew, a wealthy automobile dealer. There, in 1909, Victor wrote a book, "Vehicles of the Air", which became a popular treatise on aircraft design and aviation history. In 1904, Malcolm became a mechanic with the White Steam Car Company in San Francisco. Allan went to San Francisco in 1906 and got a mechanic's job at $6 a week.

Victor convinced Plew to acquire rights to one of the Montgomery's gliders and to buy a Curtiss pusher biplane Plew hired Allan to convert the glider into a powered aircraft. When he left for Chicago, Allan said, "I expect to see the time when aviation will be the safest means of transportation at 40 to 50 miles per hour, and the cheapest, and I'm not going to have long white whiskers when that happens. The airplane will take over both land and water travel. Flying has no barriers". Allan's first flight was in Chicago in 1910 when he climbed aboard a home-made aircraft and operated its ailerons while its builder, George Gates, operated the rudder and elevators. It was the first dual-pilot controlled flight in history. When two of Plew's trained pilots could not get the Curtiss airborne, Allan said, "I've got a $20 gold piece that says I'll make it fly, and I'm offering three-to-one odds! Any takers?" There being none, he got the plane into the air on the second try. Later he said of this flight, "It was partly nerve, partly confidence and partly damn foolishness. But now I was an aviator!"

Allan legally changed his name to Allan Lockheed in 1934. He went on to form two other aircraft manufacturing companies in the 1930s. Both were unsuccessful. After World War II, he continued his career as a real estate salesman while occasionally serving as an aviation consultant. Allan Lockheed kept an informal relationship with the Lockheed Air Corporation until his death in 1969 in Tucson, Arizona.

References

* [http://nationalaviation.blade6.donet.com/components/content_manager_v02/view_nahf/htdocs/menu_ps.asp?NodeID=-1449208259&group_ID=1134656385&Parent_ID=-1 National Aviation biography]
* [http://www.pbs.org/kcet/chasingthesun/innovators/lockheed.html PBS]