Navair...Early 20th Century Style

Via Northrop Grumman:A replica of the Curtiss A-1 Triad, the U.S. Navy’s first aircraft, alighted briefly from San Diego Bay on Feb. 11 to mark the start of the yearlong celebration of the centennial of U.S. naval aviation. [Watch for an Aviation Week & Space Technology special report in April.]Rebuilt specifically for the commemorative event, the Triad represents the aircraft flown by Theodore Gordon Ellyson, the first naval officer designated as an aviator. Trained at the Glenn Curtiss Aviation Camp at North Island, San Diego, Ellyson became Naval Aviator No. 1. in April 1911. A month later the Navy commissioned Curtiss to build the Triad at a cost of $5,500, marking the official start of naval aviation. Ellyson later made history in November 1912 when he made the Navy’s first successful catapult launch from a stationary coal barge at the Washington Navy Yard in DC.Photo: Alan