Edwin Albert Link

Edwin Albert Link (July 26, 1904 – September 7, 1981) was a pioneer in aviation, underwater archaeology, and ocean engineering . He is most remembered for inventing the flight simulator in 1929, called the "Blue Box" or "Link Trainer", which started the now multi-billion dollar flight simulation industry. Prior to his death in 1981, he had accumulated more than 27 patents for aeronautics, navigation and oceanographic equipment.

Born in Huntington, Indiana in 1904, he moved with his family to Binghamton, New York in 1910. As a young man Edwin Link used apparatus from his father's automatic piano and organ factory to produce an advertising plane. A punched roll and pneumatic system from a player piano controlled sequential lights on the lower surfaces of the wings to spell out messages like "ENDICOTT-JOHNSON SHOES". To attract more attention he added a set of small but loud organ pipes, also controlled by the roll. In the construction of the "Link Trainer" much of the pneumatic system was adapted directly from technology used in the organ factory: in the 1970's Link used parts scavenged from an inoperative trainer to help rebuild a Link pipe organ.

Together with his wife Marion Clayton Link, whom he had married in 1931, Edwin Link managed the very successful "Link Aviation, Inc.". He contributed a great deal to the Binghamton, New York area, where he set up a production facility that at one time employed thousands of workers. The field on which Greater Binghamton Airport lies is named after him, and there is an original "Blue Box" on display in the terminal.

After he disposed of his company in 1954, he addressed himself to underwater archeology and underwater research. Link worked at developing equipment for deeper, longer lasting and more secure diving. To this end he designed several submersible decompression chambers. He was the first to use a mixture of oxygen and helium for breathing underwater.

The Links suffered a tragic loss in June 1973, when their 31-year-old son, E. Clayton Link, and another diver, 51-year-old Albert D. Stover, died after a seemingly routine dive off Key West, FL. They suffered carbon dioxide poisoning when the Sea-Link, a submersible designed by Edwin Link, became trapped in debris around a Navy destroyer, the "Fred T. Berry", which had been sunk to create an artificial reef. Over the next two years, Edwin Link designed an unmanned cabled observation and rescue device (CORD) that can free a trapped submersible.

In 1953, Edwin and Marion Link established The Link Foundation. Still active in 2007, the foundation provides grants and fellowships in aeronautics, simulation and training, ocean engineering, energy, and organizations of interest to the Links.

External links

* [http://www.lib.fit.edu/pubs/linkbib/sketch.html A biographical sketch of Edwin A. Link]
* [http://library.lib.binghamton.edu/special/link1.html Biography of Edwin A. Link, Binghamton University Libraries]
* [http://library.lib.binghamton.edu/special/findingaids/linkcoll.html The Edwin A. Link and Marion Clayton Link Collections Finding Aids, Binghamton University]
* [http://www.lib.fit.edu/pubs/linkbib/index.html?CFID=127297&CFTOKEN=86088560 Bibliography of The Edwin A. Link Collection of the Evans Library at Florida Institute of Technology]
* [http://www.binghamton.edu/home/link/link.html The Link Foundation]
* [http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,879228,00.html Time Magazine article about the deaths of Clayton Link and Albert Stover]