The First Mechanic

BoeingBoy

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Nov 9, 2003
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From Aviation Week's continuing discussion for the 100th anniversary of flight.

The First Mechanic: The Story of Charlie Taylor
By Frank Jackman/Overhaul & Maintenance
December 9, 2003

[Editor's Note: The biographical information on Taylor was drawn primarily from three sources; an article entitled "Charles E. Taylor: The Man Aviation History Almost Forgot" by Bob Taylor, which was published in the November/December 1999 edition of FAA Aviation News and was later reprinted in Air Line Pilot; the definitive book on Taylor, Charles E. Taylor: 1868-1956, The Wright Brothers Mechanician, by H.R. DuFour with Peter J. Unitt; and "My Story," an as-told-to article by Charles E. Taylor and Robert S. Ball that first appeared in the Dec. 25, 1948 edition of Colliers.]

In June 1901, Orville and Wilbur Wright hired an extra hand to help out in their Dayton, Ohio, bicycle shop. His name was Charles E. "Charlie" Taylor and his wife's uncle was the owner of the building in which the Wrights' shop was located. But it wasn't that connection that got him hired, but rather it was his skill as a machinist and mechanic. And it was those same skills that eventually made Taylor an essential, but often overlooked, contributor to one of the most significant technological events in history -- the first manned, controlled, sustained, powered, heavier-than-air flight.

Charlie Taylor was born on May 24, 1868, in Cerro Gordo, Ill. His family later moved to Nebraska after hog cholera wiped out the family farm. At age 12, he went to work for the Nebraska State Journal as an errand boy before he began working in the Journal's bindery to take advantage of this mechanical skill.

In 1896, Taylor, his wife of two years, Henrietta, and their first child, Reuben, moved to Dayton, where Taylor went to work for a company that made farm equipment and later bicycles. Two years later, Taylor opened a machine shop and soon counted among his customers Orville and Wilbur Wright, owners of a local bicycle shop.

In early summer 1901, after Taylor had sold his machine shop and had gone to work at the Dayton Electric Co., the Wrights offered him a job. "I was a machinist and had done job work for the boys in my own shop," Taylor said in the 1948 Colliers article, published 11 months after Orville Wright died. "I knew they were interested in box kites and gliders, and that they had gone south to Kitty Hawk, N.C., in 1900 with a glider. I didn't know anything about that stuff, but I did know something about the bicycle business.

"So far as I can figure out, Will and Orv hired me to worry about their bicycle business so they could concentrate on their flying studies and experiments," Taylor said. "I suppose the more of the routine work I shouldered, the faster they were able to get on with their pet project, and I must have satisfied them for they didn't hire anyone else for eight years."

Within weeks of hiring Taylor, the Wrights were gone again to Kitty Hawk, leaving the bicycle shop in the care of Taylor. When they returned, they decided to build a small wind tunnel to test some of their theories, and they turned to Taylor for help.

"We made a rectangular-shaped box with a fan at one end powered by the stationary gas engine they [the Wrights] had built to drive the lathe, drill press and band saw [in the bicycle shop]," Taylor said in Colliers. "I ground down some old hacksaw blades for them to use in making balances for the tunnel."

In the fall of 1902, when the Wrights returned from their annual pilgrimage to Kitty Hawk, they told Taylor they were through with gliders and they set about trying to acquire a light-weight, gas-powered engine that could produce at least eight horsepower. Unable to find an automobile or engine company willing to take on the task, the Wrights again turned to Taylor.

"My only experience with a gasoline engine was an attempt to repair one in an automobile in 1901," he said.

Taylor began building the engine in the winter of 1902 to 1903 without formal drawings. According to both the FAA Aviation News and Colliers articles, each part was crudely sketched out by the Wrights or Taylor on a piece of paper. After a thorough discussion about it, Taylor "would pin the drawing above his workbench and go to work to complete it."

The finished engine weighed 180 lbs. and developed 12 hp at 1,025 RPM, but that description doesn't do justice to the engine or to Taylor, who finished the powerplant in six weeks.

More than 44 years after the fact, Taylor described the building process this way: "The crankshaft was made out of a block of machine steel six by 31 inches and 1 5/8 inches thick. I traced the outline on the slab, then drilled through with the drill press until I could knock out the surplus pieces with a hammer and chisel. Then I put it in the lathe and turned it down to size and smoothness. The body of the first engine was of cast aluminum and was bored out on the lathe for independent cylinders. The pistons were cast iron, and these were turned down and grooved for piston rings."

Taylor later said he didn't recall how he heard about the successful flights that December day in 1903; he supposed the Wrights' sister or father came to the shop and told him. "Even when they [Orville and Wilbur] got home, there was no special celebration in the shop. Of course, they were pleased with the flights," Taylor said in Colliers. "But their first word with me ... was about the motor being damaged .. after Wilbur completed the fourth flight. They wanted a new one built right away. And they were concerned with making improvements in the controls. They were always thinking of the next thing to do."

Taylor continued working with and for the Wrights for the next several years, helping them build, test, repair and demonstrate new designs and machines. Taylor said he had always wanted to learn to fly, but that the Wrights dissuaded him out of fear of losing his services.

In September 1908, Taylor and the Wrights were demonstrating a plane to the U.S. Army at Fort Myer, Va. Taylor, who had never flown, was in the passenger seat and Orville Wright was at the controls. As Taylor later recalled, just before takeoff, an Army officer asked if Wright would mind taking along an Army observer instead. Taylor got out and was replaced by Lt. Thomas E. Selfridge. The aircraft crashed shortly after takeoff. Wright was seriously injured and Selfridge was killed. Taylor eventually took his first flight in 1910.

In 1911, Taylor moved his family to California and hooked up with Calbraith Perry Rodgers, who was attempting to make the first transcontinental flight. Taylor followed Rodgers by train, repairing the aircraft at night and/or after crashes. According to Bob Taylor's article, Rodgers crashed 16 times during the 49-day journey. Taylor stayed in California for almost a year, briefly working for Glenn Martin. He returned to Dayton in 1912 and went to work for the Wright Co., testing motors and doing bench work.

Taylor lived and worked in the Dayton area until the late 1920s, when he moved back to California and faded from history's view. In the mid-1930s, he was tracked down by Henry Ford, who was rebuilding the Wright's bicycle shop in Dearborn, Mich. He worked for Ford for a few years and then at a defense factory, before suffering a heart attack in 1945. He died on Jan. 30, 1956.
 
BoeingBoy thanks for the post.This week as most of us know is the 100th aniversary of powered flight.It is nice to see Mr. Taylor mentioned for his contributions to this great accomplishment. :up:
 
sowing the seed-
it first started with father trying to save a buck so he could put food on the table and clothes on our back.little did i realize then that this was the first inkling of being a mechanic and how i would respond in life.
hours spent in the cellar helping to repair the washing machine and whatever else.then many many times lying in the snow to fix a broken starter or muffler or whatever else...these things only break in the winter when you don't have a garage.and i spent hours biding my time holding his flashlite and wishing he'd hurry up....bicycles , then autos became my work...spent some time under a grease rack and somehow aviation seemed to come to play... spent my time in the majors and met many others whom i learned from...still learning to this day.
my trade is owed to a bunch named wright,curtiss,davidson,harley and ford.
hardly a day goes by when something isn't learned from another co-worker.....so it be.
but i guess in the begining i owe it all to my pop.
 
delldude said:
sowing the seed-
it first started with father trying to save a buck so he could put food on the table and clothes on our back.little did i realize then that this was the first inkling of being a mechanic and how i would respond in life.
hours spent in the cellar helping to repair the washing machine and whatever else.then many many times lying in the snow to fix a broken starter or muffler or whatever else...these things only break in the winter when you don't have a garage.and i spent hours biding my time holding his flashlite and wishing he'd hurry up....bicycles , then autos became my work...spent some time under a grease rack and somehow aviation seemed to come to play... spent my time in the majors and met many others whom i learned from...still learning to this day.
my trade is owed to a bunch named wright,curtiss,davidson,harley and ford.
hardly a day goes by when something isn't learned from another co-worker.....so it be.
but i guess in the begining i owe it all to my pop.
:up:
Good Post and Thought!!!

Take Care,
:D UAL_TECH