S e t h S h u l m a n
BOOKS:
Unlocking the Sky (HarperCollins, 2002)
A selection of the Book of the Month Club, The History Book Club, and QPB, as well as a Scientific American “editor’s pick.”
The first public flight in the United States. The first commercially sold airplane. The remarkable first flight from one American city to another. The first pilot license issued in this country. These were just a few of the milestones in the career of Glenn Hammond Curtiss, perhaps the greatest aviator and aeronautical inventor of all time.
Unlocking the Sky tells the story of Curtiss’ historic and often bitter battle with Orville and Wilbur Wright at the dawn of aviation.
The Wright brothers threw a veil of secrecy over their own flying machine at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, in 1903, but Curtiss teamed up with engineers in America and abroad, freely exchanging information in an attempt to resolve the most difficult engineering challenges involved in constructing a reliable and stable airplane.
In 1908, when Curtiss piloted his groundbreaking June Bug in Hammondsport, New York, it was the first public flight in America.
Fiercely jealous, the Wright brothers took to the courts to keep Curtiss and his airplanes out of the sky and off the market. But their monopolistic tendencies couldn’t squelch Curtiss’s talent, verve, or his unwavering devotion to the development of flight.
Selected Reviews
An enlightening exploration of the dissonance of history and mythology... Shulman entertainingly traces the early history of aviation.”—New York Times
[A] superbly entertaining and lively story of the visionaries who a century ago raced to invent a 'heavier than air' flying machine.”—Boston Herald
[A] compelling revision to accepted aviation history...[that] succeeds in offering the general reader an up-to-date overview of Curtiss's remarkable achievements.”—Publishers Weekly
A story worth telling. Shulman...makes both the people and the period (1903-1914) come alive.”—Houston Chronicle
To lend the story vibrancy, Shulman relates it in the present tense, enhancing the sense that although air flight was an inevitable technological development in the abstract, in actuality it was the outcome of much trial and error by several experimenters. There's no gainsaying the Wrights' first achievement of flight, but Shulman dramatizes how Curtiss rapidly outdistanced them technologically... With the Kitty Hawk centenary approaching, Shulman's lively work provides balance to the celebration.”—Booklist
An effective tribute to an innovator unjustly overshadowed by his litigious peers... [Shulman] ably evokes an age when innovation was hot in the wind.”—Kirkus Reviews
Flushed with promise, fraught with drama and intrigue, the early years of aviation history were as colorful and dynamic as its daring pioneers...Filled with fascinating stories about the aerodrome, dirigible, glider, hydroaeroplane, tetrahedral kite, ornithopter, biplane and other early 'flying machines,' this vividly written, thoroughly researched volume sheds new light on a wrongly forgotten hero and a little-known chapter in aviation history.”—Book-of-the-Month Club
[Curtiss] comes across as a pioneering hero on these pages - and the Wright brothers as thuggish would-be monopolizers. This may be revisionist history, but it's a history that perhaps could stand revising.”—Amazon.com
The list of Glenn Hammond Curtiss's achievements as a major figure in the early history of aviation is long and impressive... Shulman makes his biography a suspense story by tracing Curtiss's long and bitter legal battle with Orville Wright, who charged Curtiss (and many others) with patent infringement.”—Scientific American (editor's pick of the month)
Seth Shulman wisely uses the eve of the Wright Centennial to resurrect Curtiss's name...[his] story is unplowed ground.”—Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel
[Shulman] reviews the remarkable public career of Glenn Hammond Curtiss and his bitter legal feud with Orville and Wilbur Wright, a contest (1909-1917) that pitted the virtues of open, shared access to technological change against the powerful economic force of monopoly ownership... [Shulman possesses] a facile writing style and gift for presenting a suspenseful narrative...Recommended for all aviation collections, especially in public libraries.”—Library Journal
Anyone curious about early aviation in America will enjoy Seth Shulman's Unlocking the Sky, which chronicles the exploits of the mechanical genius Glenn Curtiss and his competition with the Wright brothers...Shulman gives an entertaining account of personalities and key events, and shows a fine appreciation for irony and humor.”—American Scientist
Shulman has written a captivating story...[a] charming account of aviation's earliest days. There's much to learn, and delight in learning it.”—Minneapolis Star Tribune
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