John Joseph Montgomery (February 15, 1858 – October 31, 1911) was an American inventor, physicist, engineer, and professor at Santa Clara University in Santa Clara, California, who is best known for his invention of controlled heavier-than-air flying machines.
In the 1880s Montgomery, a native of Yuba City, California, made manned flight experiments in a series of gliders in the United States in Otay Mesa near San Diego, California.<ref>"Montgomery's Gliding Experiments", in Hayward, Charles B. Practical Aeronautics: An Understandable Presentation of Interesting and Essential Facts in Aeronautical Science.' Chicago: American School of Correspondence, 1912.</ref> Although not publicized in the 1880s, these early flights were first described by Montgomery as part of a lecture delivered at the International Conference on Aerial Navigation at Chicago, 1893. These independent advances came after gliding flights by European pioneers such as George Cayley's coachman in England (1853) and Jean-Marie Le Bris in France (1856). Although Montgomery never claimed firsts, his gliding experiments of the 1880s are considered by some historians and organizations to have been the first controlled flights of a heavier-than-air flying machine in America or in the Western Hemisphere,Jacobs, James W. "John Joseph Montgomery." In James W. Jacobs, Enshrinee Album: The First Twenty-One Years, 13435. Dayton, Ohio: National Aviation Hall of Fame, 1984.L'Écho Des Ailes: Revue Indépendante pour la Défense des Intérêts Aéronautiques, Vol. 17, No. 2, January 23, 1948. By Fédération des Clubs Belges d'Aviation de Tourisme, Brussels, Belgium.Hearings, Reports and Prints of the House Committee on Science and Astronautics, United States Congress. House Committee on Science and Astronautics, U.S. Govt. Printing Office, Washington D.C., 1972.Davy, Maurice J.B. (1935) Aeronautics, Science Museum. depending on the source.
Montgomery devised different control methods for his gliders, including weight shifting for roll and an elevator for pitch (1884). Subsequent designs used hinged, pilot-operated trailing edge flaps on the wings (1885–1886) for roll control,"Machine with Wings Upsets Theories," "Years of Research Applied to Solving the Problem," San Jose Mercury Evening News, March 31, 1905.Hayward, Charles B. (ed.) (1912) Practical Aeronautics, American School of Correspondence, Chicago.(Introduction written by Orville Wright) and later, full wing warping systems for roll (1903–1905)Chanute, Octave. (1907) "Montgomery." In: Pocket-Book of Aeronautics, edited by Hermann. W. L. Moedebeck, translated by W. Mansergh Varley, Vol. 309, No. 10. London: Whittaker and Co. and for both pitch and roll (1911).
Education
Montgomery attended St. Ignatius High School, graduating in 1873, then at 16, he attended the preparatory division at Santa Clara College from 1874 to 1876 to prepare him for college.
Montgomery attended St. Ignatius College, now known as the University of San Francisco. Here, he studied under Fathers Joseph Bayma, S.J., and Joseph Neri, S.J., two gifted and influential educators. As a student in San Francisco, Montgomery must have mentioned his desire to build a flying machine, according to Fogel and Harwood.They include an observation in their book, made by Montgomery’s contemporary, Rev. Fred Morrison, S.J.: “In those days anyone who even mentioned ‘man being able to fly’ was considered a little bit off. So, when John was in the vicinity, there was a general tapping of heads, which in our present day would be the sign that the party was crazy.” At St. Ignatius College, Montgomery received a Bachelor of Arts in physics in 1879 and a master's degree in physics in 1880. He also received an honorary PhD in physics from Santa Clara University in 1901.
Ornithology
In the early 1880s Montgomery began studying the anatomy of a variety of large soaring birds to determine their basic characteristics, like wing area, total weight and curved surfaces. He made detailed observations of birds in flight, especially large soaring birds such as eagles, hawks, vultures and pelicans which soared on thermals near San Diego Bay.
He initially attempted to achieve manned flight with ornithopters. In 1883, he built and experimented with a series of three ornithopters but found that human strength was insufficient to generate the necessary lift. He abandoned flapping-wing flight, preferring instead to emulate soaring birds with fixed-wing craft. He reasoned that it would be possible to solve the physics of gliding and soaring flight and then add a motor.