Helicopter industry mourns loss of pioneer, inventor Charles
Kaman The helicopter world lost an icon when pioneer, inventor
and philanthropist Charlie Kaman died January 31 at the age of
91. Charles Huron Kaman earned an aeronautical engineering
degree from Catholic University in 1940 and later was employed
at United Aircraft’s Hamilton Standard division, where he worked
with Igor Sikorsky. In 1945, at age 26, he founded Kaman
Aircraft in his mother’s garage, serving as its CEO until 1999
and chairman until 2001. Today Kaman Aerospace has annual
revenues of $1.2 billion. Under Charles Kaman’s leadership, the
company invented rotor blade servo flaps, intermeshing main
rotors that eliminated the need for a tail rotor, composite main
rotor blades, the first single and twin gas-turbine powered
helicopters and the first remotely piloted helicopter. The
company flew intermeshing rotor helicopters as early as 1947
with the Kaman K-125, then in 1951, it introduced the first gas
turbine-powered helicopter-- the K-225.