Rocket PoweR, InteRstellaR tRavel and eteRnal lIfe

engines and airplanes. Among Curtiss airplane types,
the “first successful flying boat” arrived in 1912. Author
Louis S. Casey’s Curtiss [,] The Hammondsport Era
1907–1915 documented the history of Curtiss airplane
construction. While Hungerford who lived in Elmira
only a few miles from Hammondsport, Casey’s did not
mention him among several Curtiss employees and colleagues.
27
The August 7, 1955 edition of the Elmira Sunday
Telegram reported that on August 13, 1913 Daniel and
Floyd had acquired a Bleriot Type XI monoplane built
by August Rauschenbusch of Greenville, Pennsylvania.
Such an airplane in 1909, piloted by Louis Bleriot, had
become the first to fly across the English Channel.
Bleriot himself built and sold Type XI monoplanes
while other manufacturers, such as Rauschenbusch,
built copies.
The Telegram in 1955 continued, “The motor in the
plane was broken when acquired by the Hungerford
brothers. They made patterns and had the necessary
castings made at the Weller Foundry in Horseheads and
the Sayre Stamping Works. These were welded into
place by William T. Shoemaker . . . The Hungerfords
and Frank Edic . . . also converted the craft into a
biplane. They later sold it to a Capt. Walters of
Lumberton, N.C.”
A clip from an Elmira newspaper in 1913 or 1914 28
reportedly shows a photo of Daniel Hungerford taxiing
the Bleriot “in a field in the western part of the city.”
While Hungerford was using a Detroit Aeroplane
Company engine in the airplane at that time, he had
plans to install his own power plant. Hungerford
expected to make “many flights in the city during the
summer and promises royal entertainment in this line.
He believes his motor will prove superior to others on
the market. He is working very quietly but he expects in
a month to be able to make a flight.”
A newspaper clip dated May 13, 1958 with the same
image purportedly shows a photo of Leon (Windy)
Smith
just becoming familiar with the controls of an airplane.
It was then that he “hopped” this 1909 [sic]
Bleriot monoplane from 823 W. Second St. to the
corner of Hoffman and Second Sts. The plane,
believed to be the first in Chemung County, was
owned by Daniel D. Hungerford, who took this
picture, and his brother, Floyd F. [sic] Hungerford.
In a 1961 letter Daniel Hungerford wrote that the
Detroit engine with a 5.5” bore and 5” stroke developed
thirty horsepowers. A rod had “broken and took a piece
of the cylinder and crankcase with it. We made patterns
of the missing parts and had castings made and molded
them up but she was underpowered—just as well or
I might not be writing this.” 29
While one might wonder if the similar Hungerford
airplane engine is actually the rebuilt Detroit, a comparison
of the two engines shows that the component
parts differ. Perhaps the Hungerfords had been inspired
by photographs and descriptions of the Detroit engine
produced as early as 1909. Daniel Hungerford wrote
that he and Floyd built their engine “back in
1909–1910.” 30
J. Philip Young in a 1975 letter to the Glenn H. Curtiss
Museum wrote:
Dan and his brother Floyd worked as machinists in
my father’s machine shop known then as The Glass
Cutters Supply Co., later the Young Machine Corp.,
on Railroad Ave., in Elmira…
While working in Dad’s shop they were bitten by
the “aeroplane bug” and talked Dad into letting
them build an aeroplane Vertically [sic] in an open
area in the shop. It was necessary for them to get
permission to remove the flooring and joist, from a
space, from the floor above.
The plane was successful for they flew it in
Schornsteiners [sic] cow pasture, near their home. 31
A photo dated 1912 [sic] shows Daniel Hungerford
and a friend, Stanley Kosmicki, with the same airplane.
Marvin said the Hungerfords participated in “airplane
meets and barnstorming events with their Bleriot
monoplane.” 32 But Kosmicki wrecked the Bleriot monoplane;
a photograph documents the damage. A nonattributed
typescript at the Glenn H. Curtiss Museum
says the nineteen-year old pilot “got too close to the
ground, hit a knoll, and destroyed the airplane, fortunately
doing no damage to himself.” Kosmicki’s grandson
Joseph E. said in 1994 that the Hungerford-Stanley
Kosmicki “relationship nearly ended (along with the
future of the Kosmicki family) when my grandfather
crashed the plane into a grove of trees, in what is
believed to be the first air crash in New York State. We
do have pre-crash photos of the plane.” 33
Daniel and Floyd Hungerford along with Frank N.
Edic rebuilt the craft as a biplane. City directories for
1921 and 1922 include a photo of the modified Bleriot
airplane in advertisements for Hungerford
“Automobile Repairing and Airplane Builders &
Repairers” at 823 W. Second Street.
Other photographs labeled by Hungerford show first
the redesigned frame and later the refinished airplane.
ELMIRA, N.Y. Oct. 1922
Small biplane—built from our old Bleriot monoplane
cross channel type -1909—model. (dam fools
we were) and sold it to J. E. Walter, mgr. “Carolina
8 Daniel and Floyd Hungerford: Rocket Power, Interstellar Travel and Eternal Life, by Geofrey N. Stein