| Albert Francis Zahm | |
|---|---|
| Born | New Lexington, Ohio, U.S. |
| Died | July 23, 1954 |
| Citizenship | American |
| Fields | Aeronautics |
| Institutions | University of Notre Dame, Catholic University, Library of Congress |
| Alma mater | University of Notre Dame, Cornell University, Johns Hopkins University |
| Known for | testimony in Wrights v. Curtiss |
| Notable awards | Laetare Medal |
Albert Francis Zahm was an early aeronautical experimenter, a professor of physics, and a chief of the Aeronautical Division of the U.S. Library of Congress. He testified as an aeronautical expert in the 1910–14 lawsuits between the Wright brothers and Glenn Curtiss.
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Zahm testified as an aeronautical expert in the 1910-1913 patent lawsuits by the Wright brothers who alleged patent infringement against inventor and manufacturer Glenn Curtiss.[6] His testimony took over a month. He testified on behalf of the Curtiss after declining to testify for the Wrights.[7] There is considerable controversy on this point, as other sources (see T. Crouch, THE BISHOP'S BOYS, p. 422) report that the Wrights refused to pay Zahm to appear as an expert witness while the Curtiss interests did so with alacrity. Zahm had been on friendly terms with both sides previously but became a long term adversary of the Wrights during and after the trial.[3][8] Indeed, he worked closely with Glen Curtiss on the controversial 1914 flying tests of the (substantially rebuilt and modified) Langley Aerodrome in an attempt to prove that Langley's machine (and not the Wrights')was the first one "capable" of flying with a man aboard (see R. Hallion, TAKING FLIGHT, pp. 292-293).
He testified that earlier experimental gliders and glider designs and publications, before those of the Wrights, had included a variety of monoplane and biplane designs, with horizontal and vertical rudders, and steering concepts of ailerons and wing warping. There were complex technical issues, notably whether Curtiss's airplanes used a vertical rudder and ailerons in ways that closely matched those aspects of the Wright patent which were legally protected. Numerous experts testified on both sides and sometimes contradicted one another on matters of fact. In the end judge John R. Hazel ruled in Feb. 1913 for the Wrights, and on appeal a higher court agreed with this decision in 1914.[8]
Zahm became the chief research engineer of Curtiss Aeroplane Company in 1914-1915 and then the director of the U.S. Navy's Aerodynamical Laboratory, 1916-1929.[1]
Zahm became the chief of the Aeronautical Division at the Library of Congress from 1929 or 1930 until 1946, and held the Guggenheim Chair of Aeronautics there.[1][9]
He died in 1954, and was buried in the Community Cemetery, Notre Dame, Indiana.[1]
More than 100 of his articles and papers were collected in Aeronautical papers 1885-1945 of Albert F. Zahm, volumes I and II.[11] He wrote the book Aerial Navigation (1911), and a booklet called Early Powerplane Fathers. His papers are kept by the University of Notre Dame.