MANAGEMENT IN AVIATION HISTORY BENCH MARKS
When Anthony “Tony” Stadlman entered the Chicago School of Aviation in 1910, the residents of the “Windy City” became what one journalist described as “air fans” and formed the Aero Club of Illinois. The cartoon accompanying the article was entitled: In Another Ten Years All Chicago Will Be Up In the air. According to the Prognostications of the Newly Organized Aero Club. Chicago Tribune, February 13, 1910. Chicago School of Aviation ad: The Inter-Ocean, August 18,1911.
“TONY” AND THE LOUGHEADS
In 1986 the remaining members of the Early Birds of Aviation scheduled their annual reunion in San Francisco. Each of these pioneers had qualified to have soloed prior to WWI, and many were, by then, advanced in age. Member Anthony “Tony” Stadlman, 96, lived in San Francisco at the time, and was still active although not without recent falls resulting in bone injuries. Nevertheless, he wrote to his colleagues that he looked forward to seeing them. “You wait till you come to my home ground — we’ll really show you a good time,” he wrote to a fellow Bird. Unfortunately, Stadlman died at his long-term home near Golden Gate Park just prior to the meeting. One friend wrote, “we lost our dear Tony Stadlman. . .who brought us a wealth of knowledge and know-how.” In the Early Bird’s newsletter, CHIRP, one member
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added that in addition to Stadlman’s known aptitude as an aircraft mechanic and designer, he also was a “wonderful philosopher — not lacking in a sense of humor.” The man who died peacefully
in his own home had lived a long and occasionally dangerous career designing and testing aircraft. Having left his native country far behind him, Stadlman created a successful aviation career in the U.S., and raised a family with Gertrude, his wife of 60 years.
FROM THE BLACKSMITH SHOP
TO THE AIRPLANE SHOP Anthony Stadlman was born in Kourim, Czechoslovakia in 1866 to a family he once described as “musically inclined,” perhaps substantiated by a potential relative, George Stadlman, a drummer in
1922 for a jazz band called the Meadowbrook Snycopators in Newark, NJ. Apparently uninterested in music, young Stadlman was athletic and gained mechanical skills working for his uncle’s blacksmith shop. He attended school in Prague, most likely at one of the prestigious technical colleges which was less than thirty miles from his home. In 1905, at age 20, he emigrated to the U.S. and settled in Chicago, working in a hotel engine room until he earned enough money to enter the Chicago School
BY GIACINTA BRADLEY KOONTZ
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