Giuseppe Mario Bellanca
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| Giuseppe Mario Bellanca | |
 Giuseppe Mario Bellanca (1886-1960)
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| Born | March 19, 1886 Sciacca, Italy |
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| Died | December 26, 1960 New York City |
Giuseppe Mario Bellanca (March 19, 1886 – December 26, 1960) was an airplane designer and builder who created the first monoplane in the United States with an enclosed cabin.
Bellanca was born in Sciacca, Italy and he graduated with an engineering degree from the Politecnico di Milano university. In 1927 he started the Bellanca Aircraft Company and on July 4, 1927 he was featured on the cover of Time. In 1911 he emigrated to the United States. He died in New York City in 1960.
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[edit] Timeline
- 1886 Born in Sciacca, Sicily
- 1909 Built first airplane. It completed the first flight of an Italian-designed, Italian-built, aircraft on December 8, 1909.
- 1911 Immigrated to America, settled in Brooklyn, New York.
- 1912 Completed construction of parasol monoplane. Successfully learned to fly this aircraft at Mineola, Long Island
- 1912 Taught others to fly the parasol monoplane, including Fiorello La Guardia
- 1916 Ends teaching
- 1917 Employed as a consulting engineer for Maryland Pressed Steel Company of Hagerstown, Maryland. While there, he designed and built the Bellanca CD and CE tractor biplanes.
- 1920 Ends consulting
- 1921 Moves to Little Italy in Omaha, Nebraska, and with Victor Roos, formed the Roos-Bellanca Aircraft Company. Bellanca designed and built the Bellanca CF
- 1922 Married Dorothy Brown on November 18, 1922, in Omaha, Nebraska
- 1923 Moved back to New York, and designed and built new sets of wings for the Post Office Department's DH-4 mailplanes.
- 1925 Employed by the Wright Aeronautical Corporation of Paterson, New Jersey, designing an aircraft around their new "Whirlwind" engine. The Wright-Bellanca 1, or WB-1, was the result, and was first flown in the latter part of that year.
- 1926 First flight of the WB-2
- 1927 Wright decided not to enter into quantity production of the WB-2. Bellanca entered into a partnership with Charles A. Levine, and together, they formed the Columbia Aircraft Corporation.
- 1927 On June 4th, the Columbia set off across the Atlantic
- 1927 Clarence Chamberlin and Bert Acosta set a new world's non-refueled endurance record in the WB-2, which was shortly thereafter, renamed the "Columbia"
- 1927 Bellanca started the Bellanca Aircraft Corporation of America, on Staten Island, New York
- 1927 Bellanca established the Bellanca Aircraft Corporation of New Castle, Delaware
- 1941 Head of the aviation department at Higgins Industries, Inc., in New Orleans, designing large cargo aircraft for troop movement during the war.
- 1943 Ends term at Higgins
- 1954 Formed the Bellanca Development Company, to conduct research in lightweight aircraft construction materials.
- 1960 Died of leukemia in New York, December 26th.
[edit] Archive
In 1993, August Bellanca donated his father's personal and professional papers to the National Air and Space Museum Archives. Prior to that time, they were kept in the Bellanca home near Galena, Maryland, and administered by Dorothy and August Bellanca.
