Glenn L. Martin

James Irvine II (left) and Glenn L Martin, circa 1913

Locals who remember the last half of the 20th century know Orange County was a major hub for America’s aerospace design and manufacturing industry. Fewer know that the father of that industry built and flew his first planes here.
 
Born in Iowa in 1886 to Clarence and Arminta “Minta” Martin, Glenn Luther Martin was raised in rural Kansas and showed an early mechanical aptitude with farm equipment. He later became fascinated with constructing box kites, which taught him about aerodynamics, precision craftsmanship, and – by selling kites to other kids – business. He later worked in a bicycle shop, gaining still more mechanical skills, before attending Kansas Wesleyan University for a couple years.  When he was still a young man, his mother developed health problems that inspired her to move to warm and sunny California. Her family, including noted mama’s boy Glenn, followed her to Santa Ana.

Working with auto mechanics in a vacant Santa Ana church building, Martin was only the third American to design, construct, and fly his own airplane. Around 1909 he built his first plane but destroyed it during an attempted flight from the top of Red Hill in Tustin. His second plane soon followed, in which he managed to make a more successful short flight.

In 1912, he completed the construction of a seaplane and flew it from Newport Bay (now Newport Harbor) to Catalina Island and back. It was the first water-to-water flight and broke the record for over-water flight.

GlennMartin's 1912 water-to-water flight

That same year, he founded the Glenn L. Martin Co. and moved his plane-building operations to Los Angeles. There, here he had a brief partnership with the Wright brothers before successfully continuing on his own. 

Martin even had a brief film career, starring in A Girl of Yesterday (1915) with Mary Pickford. He was more than prepared for his scenes as an accomplished young pilot, but he had to be arm-twisted into kissing a girl on camera.

Over the years, he employed many future innovators, entrepreneurs and stars of the aerospace industry, including William Boeing, James S. McDonnell and Donald Douglas. His company also built more than 80 kinds of aircraft, from the MB-1 bomber of World War I, to the B-10 bomber of the 1930s, to the iconic China Clipper flying boats. Martin later helped lead the country into the Space Age, building missiles, spacecraft and cutting-edge electronics. 

Glenn Martin died in Baltimore in 1955, but his company kept marching along. In 1961, the Glenn L. Martin Co. merged with American-Marietta Corp., becoming Martin Marietta. After another merger with Lockheed in 1995, it became the Lockheed Martin Corp. As of 2014, this global company, based in Maryland, was the world's largest defense contractor.

And to think it all started in an abandoned Santa Ana church!