Аннотация: A takeoff from a hayfield. A note on the history of the Lockheed Martin Corporation.
A takeoff from a hayfield. A note on the history of the Lockheed Martin Corporation.
Allan Lockheed, one of the founders of the Lockheed Corporation, was a talented aviator and aircraft designer.
As a child, Allan Lockheed experimented with kites.
He did not receive higher education. As an adult, he began working as a car mechanic and a pilot for high-speed cars.
His airfreight and aircraft manufacturing companies had a changeable (fickle) success.
The Lockheed Aircraft Corporation was founded in December 1926. In this company, Allan Lockheed (1889 - 1969) became vice president and general manager, and Jack Northrop (1895 - 1981) became chief engineer.
One of the outstanding achievements of this company was the aircraft with a plywood fuselage, which was named Vega.
On its first successful flight, Vega takeoff (from) hayfield near Inglewood, California.
Allan's surname was originally spelled Loughead. One of the decoding options could be Loug (meadow) (option: flame) and head (leader).
Loughead's last name was officially changed to Lockheed. This spelling can be deciphered as Lock (lock) and heed (pay attention). As technology evolved and the overall context changed, Lockheed could be perceived as "a readiness."
This model (Vega) was used in 1927 in the Dole Air Race for flying.
Vega didn't make it to Wheeler Field in Hawaii. She disappeared in the Pacific Ocean.
However, this model of the aircraft was successfully used for the flight to Spitsbergen (Grumant) (April 1928) and for flights over Antarctica (in December 1928). The successes in Arctic and Antarctic travel have brought glory to the aircraft and profits for the company.
In mid-1928, Jack Northrop left Lockheed Aircraft to start his own company. Northrop, firstly, was a supporter of the manufacture of all-metal fuselages, rather than plywood fuselages, and secondly, he was fascinated by the idea of idea of a flying wing.
Due to an attempted takeover of the company, Allan Lockheed resigned as as president and general manager on June 3, 1929. He managed to sell his shares at a relatively high price.
The company did not survive the October 1929 stock market crash: By 1932, Lockheed Aircraft was bankrupt.
A group of investors led by brothers Robert Gross and Courtlandt S. Gross, and including Walter Varney, bought the Lockheed company out of receivership in 1932.
In 1941, Lockheed became vice president of the Berkey & Gay Furniture Company in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
After World War II, Allan Lockheed worked in real estate and was consultant for the Lockheed Aircraft Corporation (but he had no formal management role with his namesake company). Once, when someone asked Allan Lockheed what he was doing in the early days of aviation, he replied: "I survived!"
Lockheed Corporation and Martin Marietta merged in 1995. Lockheed Martin was founded.
Glenn L. Martin (1886 - 1955), a distinguished pilot and one of the captains of the aviation industry, was fond of flying kites as a child.
In 1955, Glenn L. Martin died, but the company continued to function successfully.
The Martin Company moved into the aerospace manufacturing business. It became the general contractor for the Vanguard rocket (1955), which was used by the US space program as one of the first satellite launch vehicles under the Vanguard project.
The Martin Company merged in 1961 with the the American-Marietta Corporation, a chemical and building materials manufacturer, to form the Martin Marietta Corporation. Apparently, this was due to the design and manufacturing of jet engines.
Lockheed Martin was founded in 1995.
People with a passion for kites and aviation in the first half of the 20th century created companies that, in the second half of the 20th century, achieved outstanding results in the design and construction of products for the space sector.
[MMСCLXIII. How to become a space entrepreneur. A biographical note about Leroy Grumman. - 12 July 2021.
MMСCLXIV. A unique rope for the Northern Seas voyages, to Spitsbergen (Grumant). Jack Northrop and his long road into the outer space. A biographical essay. - July 13, 2021.].
July 16, 2021 20:16
Translation from Russian into English: July 17, 2021 09:05.
Владимир Владимирович Залесский 'Взлет с сенокосного поля. Заметка об истории компании Локхид Мартин'.