Issue date: May 27, 1998
Opening June 5, Hiller Aviation Museum spans 228 years of flying in Northern California: from 1869 to 2100.
By MARION SOFTKY
How many people know that the first honest-to-god airplane ever flown took off in San Mateo County in 1869?
Thirty-four years before the Wright Brothers first rode a flimsy biplane over the dunes at Kitty Hawk, Frederick Marriott (no relation to the later hotel chain) flew his unmanned Avitor for more than a mile over the shell mound racetrack in South San Francisco.
Now a replica of the Avitor -- an unlikely looking airplane, with a big bag of hydrogen to help the 18-foot delta wings lift the craft, plus two propellers and a one-horsepower steam engine -- hangs at the entrance to the great aircraft hall of the new Hiller Aviation Museum, which will open at the San Carlos Airport June 5.
"It was the first real airplane to fly. It had modern controls of pitch and yaw and tilt," says aviation pioneer Stanley Hiller of Atherton, looking at the spacious room filled with the extraordinary craft that people have fashioned to challenge gravity and fly with the birds.
To Mr. Hiller, every one of the dozens of airplanes displayed in the great hall tells a story. Together, these stories add up to a history of heroism, innovation, and the march of an industry that has transformed and is still transforming our world. "We have great stories to tell," he says.
Mr. Hiller's collection -- built over the past 30 years -- highlights innovations that originated in Northern California: overhead is a replica of Eugene Healy piloting the first airplane, a Curtiss Pusher, that landed and took off from the decks of an aircraft carrier, the U.S.S. Pennsylvania, in 1911 "That was the beginning of naval aviation," says Mr. Hiller.
Some 40 aircraft on display tell many stories. There are early gliders; Stanford's 1915 wind tunnel dug up from the fields near Interstate 280 near the radiotelescope "dishes"; a replica of the Fowler Gage that first flew non-stop coast-to-coast (over the Panama Canal) on a bet in 1913; an early Hiller-copter built by Mr. Hiller in Menlo Park; the flying platform that caught the imagination of the country during 1950s.
But Mr. Hiller's museum is about more than stories. It is about educating people and preparing for the future role of aviation in the age of the Pacific Rim. The museum is also an accredited educational institution where experts can give extension courses for credit.
Mr. Hiller's museum reflects his vision of the history of aviation as prelude to its future. Each plane on display is a link to the future. "We're trying to mix past and future and convey to people what the future is going to look like," he says.
Besides the hall full of aircraft, the museum features a large atrium hanging with airplane models flying among clouds made of white balloons where up to 800 can enjoy a party. There, visitors will see the front 90 feet of America's first supersonic transport (SST) being restored. It arrived two weeks ago in extremely dented condition and is undergoing intensive cleaning to be ready -- maybe -- for opening day.
To one side of the atrium, is a picture window to a 5,000-square-foot shop where the public can watch volunteers restoring old planes. Right now the "Black Diamond," an early airplane manufactured near the Black Diamond mine, east of Mt. Diablo, shows its delicate wooden skeleton stuck with shreds of dry, ragged cloth. It's being restored for the Smithsonian, says Mr. Hiller.
There will be lots of videos and interactive displays to help people learn about more than just what's on display. More than 400 aviation buffs have already signed up as volunteers. There is also a 50-seat interactive theater, equipped with seats from a Boeing 767 -- first class, not economy.
Mr. Hiller says hopefully, "This is going to be a great venue for children of all ages."
Past as prologue
Actually, the Hiller Aircraft Company itself produced more than 3,000 aircraft at its plant on Willow Road between 1946 and 1964. Old-timers still remember looking south on the approach to the Dumbarton Bridge to see helicopters gently rising and falling like giant insects from the Hiller airfield.
Mr. Hiller likes to list other aviation firsts, besides the Avitor, in Northern California: the first take-off and landing from an aircraft carrier in 1911; the first chartered airfield in Grass Valley; the first airmail in Sacramento. Since 1910, Northern California has been home to nine or 10 engine manufacturers, 50 aircraft companies, and more than 600 airports or airstrips, he says.
Walking through the museum with Mr. Hiller, the visitor is caught up in the sweep, adventure and vision of "those magnificent men in their flying machines."
An airplane motor in the restoration shop was built in the Wright brothers' factory in Dayton Ohio; it powered R.B. Fowler's first transcontinental flight from the Pacific to the Atlantic in 1911, Mr. Hiller says. He plans to mount it in a replica of the Wright B plane, and then build another replica of both engine and plane that will actually fly. "It's a beautifully done bit of history," he says. "It's a window into the thinking process of the Wright Brothers."
In the main hall near the Avitor, three gossamer gliders were built by James Montgomery, a professor at Santa Clara University. "He killed himself in the third," Mr. Hiller says.
A key link in the surge of aviation in California after World War I just arrived at the museum last week: an original Curtiss Jenny. These versatile trainers were built by the hundreds in California during the war, but never got to fight, Mr. Hiller says. After the war, "they were available at pennies on the dollar (for flying and barnstorming). That was the jump start for the next generation of aircraft."
Among the airplanes on display in the museum is the Varney Airlines Stinson Detroiter in which Mr. Hiller learned to fly in 1937. Varney was the parent of today's United Airlines.
Mr. Hiller talks about aircraft that stretch the imagination. The flying submarine was canceled because the services couldn't figure out who would control it. Then there was the silent airplane, the Quiet Star; 11 were built "in great secrecy" by Lockheed at Bohannon Park in the 1960s for night surveillance in Vietnam. There's also the world's first gunship helicopter, and a portable helicopter kit -- never used in battle -- that pilots could assemble and take off in if they were shot down in the jungles of Vietnam.
Hiller Aircraft probably got the most public attention for its flying platform, which did many turns on television and the movies back in the 1950s. An outgrowth of that, which was tested but never flown, is the Coleopter, also on display. The futuristic plane, which sits like a flying platform shaped like a streamlined barrel, is designed to take off vertically like a platform and then convert to an airplane and fly forward.
Future vision
With a 201-foot wingspan, the Condor, can fly unmanned for 19,000 miles and reach 80,000 feet. The model on display came from the Atomic Energy Commission at Livermore and has been flown in service in the 1990s. It can fly by itself, check with weather stations, and choose its own route and altitude, Mr. Hiller says.
"All it needs to know when it starts is it has to go from A to B. It has the longest range of any large aircraft in the world," says Mr. Hiller. "It begins to tell a future story."
Unlike most air museums, which start with airplanes and then focus on space, Mr. Hiller's museum looks at aviation over the next century. "Few look at where airplanes are going," he says. "Aviation will be the controlling influence on commerce."
Air transportation has to play this role in the future economy of the Pacific Basin, Mr. Hiller believes. "You can't wait two weeks or a month while a ship is at sea. You need overnight delivery of cars and refrigerators -- going both ways," he continues. "Heavy robotic freighters are going to knit the continents. Aircraft in all configurations are going to be the linkage bringing the world together."
Mr. Hiller's vision -- and his museum -- include Silicon Valley as the source of many products that will fuel the new era. Controls, self-healing components, miniaturization, sensors -- "these are all new product opportunities for Silicon Valley," he says. "Silicon Valley will play an enormous role.
"I'm looking forward to the next 100 years."
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