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One hundred years ago (and 10 years after the Wright Brothers’ “flying machines”), one Percy Fansler, an engineer from Jacksonville, envisioned flying passengers aboard an aircraft.
On Jan. 1, 1914, the open-cockpit Benoist XIV Flying Boat lifted off with a single passenger: a former St. Pete mayor who snagged the auctioned ticket for $400 (equivalent to $12,300 today). Three thousand spectators watched the plane take off from St. Pete, skip across Tampa Bay just five feet above the water and land 23 minutes later.
Subsequently, the federal government determined that pilots of commercial flights should probably, um, be licensed …
– Eve Lederman, The 100 Companies