Early History
The success of Mister Mulligan led to the formation of the Howard Aircraft Corporation on January 1, 1937, to produce commercial versions of the now-famous DGA cabin monoplanes, each custom-built by Ben Howard and Gordon Israel.
One of the airplanes produced by the company was the DGA-11, powered by a nine-cylinder 450 horsepower (340 kW) Pratt & Whitney R-985 Wasp Junior radial engine, was purportedly the fastest four-seat civil aircraft of the late 1930s, able to achieve a top speed of about 200 miles (320 km) per hour. A favorite of the high society and Hollywood circles, the DGA-11 cost about $16,500 in 1938 — a princely sum for the time. A slower and less costly version, the DGA-12, used a 300 horsepower (220 kW) Jacobs engine.
Production of the Howard Aircraft Corporation from 1936 to 1939 totaled about 30 aircraft. In 1939, Howard developed the DGA-15, building about 40 of the four/five-place aircraft, powered by one of three different engines. The founder, Ben Howard, left the company at this time to join Douglas Aircraft Company as test pilot.
Read more about this topic: Howard Aircraft Corporation
Famous quotes containing the words early and/or history:
“It is not too much to say that next after the passion to learn there is no quality so indispensable to the successful prosecution of science as imagination. Find me a people whose early medicine is not mixed up with magic and incantations, and I will find you a people devoid of all scientific ability.”
—Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914)
“History is the present. That’s why every generation writes it anew. But what most people think of as history is its end product, myth.”
—E.L. (Edgar Lawrence)