Volunteers Hope Event Will Honor "Man Who Inspired Seaplane Development"

Some Glenn Curtiss Museum volunteers have been hard at work lately in the museum's Restoration Shop in Hammondsport, NY, recreating the Curtiss flying boat "America" that became the prototype for the first anti-submarine patrol plane in Britain's Royal Navy air service.

They're hoping to actually get it in the air for a flight test Saturday. The hull passed a float test this week.

The seaplane was conceived and constructed more than 90 years ago, according to the Associated Press. Curtiss dubbed it "America" and first flew it successfully in 1914 over one of the Finger Lakes in New York.

"America" was built to make the first-ever Trans-Atlantic flight, but World War I scrapped that idea and it was eventually sold to the British.

The museum will be hosting the Seaplane Homecoming in September to "honor the man, Glenn Hammond Curtiss, who inspired men to pursue Seaplane development," according to the museum's Web site. 

"He was, after all, the first to fly off water and had ideas well ahead of their time that are still used today in every seaplane flying."

FMI: www.glennhcurtissmuseum.org