source: Early Aviators: Korn Brothers of Jackson Center

shared by Scott Counts

Aug 19, 1913 Lima Daily News

shared by lynlin65

Article about the crash of the Korn brothers' plane in The Billboard (Fulton, NY) on 23 August 1913.

(Article published before 1923 and therefore no longer subject to copyright.)

The Lima Republican Gazette Wed. Aug 20, 1913

The Benoist-Korn TypeXII aircraft on display at the National Air and Space Museum. Note that the aircraft is covered in rubberized cloth that was originally white, but is slowly affected by oxidation which has turned it brown.

This is the very aircraft in which Milton Korn was fatally injured and his brother Edward Korn was seriously injured when it crashed on Korn Field in Jackson Township, Shelby Co., Ohio on 13 August 1913. Milton died of his injuries five days later. It was the second of five Benoist Land Tractor Type XII aircraft ever made and was assembled by Milton & Edward (beginning in March and completed on 20 May 1912) at the Benoist shop in St.Louis, Missouri. The Korn brothers performed many shows and exhibitions with this aircraft.

The wreckage of the plane was stored until it was restored and heavily modified in 1917 by local manual arts students, but it wasn't flown. The plane was broken down and stored in a barn at Korn Field until the Smithsonian asked for it in 1948 (the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum was founded in 1946) and donated by Edward Korn in 1949. It remained in storage until it was restored to its original condition in 1981-2. It is now on permanent display in the Pre-1920 Aviation exhibition at the NASM's Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center annex, adjacent to Dulles Airport, Maryland. According to the NASM:

"The NASM Benoist Type XII is an extraordinarily significant early airplane. It is a prime example of pre-World War I U.S. aeronautical technology. Most American aircraft produced during this period were direct copies of Wright, Curtiss or European machines. Benoist was one of the very few U.S. firms building and selling original designs in the pioneer era."

The photo was taken by Wikimedia Commons user "FlugKerl2" and released with a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license. The license basically allows any use, as long as the author is given credit and the license is stated (Full license details).