Albin Kasper Longren papers

Biographical sketch: Called AK by his wife and friends, Albin Kaspar Longren was born and buried near Leonardville, Kansas. He was the first Kansan to successfully fly a plane in Kansas built in Kansas. This feat took place on the west side of Berryton Road, southeast Shawnee County, on September 2, 1911.

Longren built a tractor airplane and in July of 1913 he took it to McCook, Nebraska in his special Mitchell truck where it was assembled and became the first airplane to fly over that city. Longren's flying field for his rolled plywood fuselage airplane was southeast of Pauline at the very spot where the Kansas Air National Guard flies today.

In an old wooden mill in Oakland, he designed, engineered and built his hard vulcanized fiber molded fuselage bi-plane. The wings folded back so it could be towed home and housed in a Model T Ford garage. With a three cylinder, 60 horsepower radial Lawrence engine, it won contests and set records.

Albin should be remembered as one who "learned to dream and dare," the words from a poem in his scrapbook. The news media called his new Longren airplane "the flyer of the air", it was light weight, simple, strong, dependable, practical, easy to repair and maintain,, had great performance, low priced and a special beauty all its own.

Longren was the Henry Ford of the air when it came to design, engineering and quality of product.

[Wings Over Kansas, "Aviation Pioneers - Kansas Aviation Hall of Fame Awards," http://www.wingsoverkansas.com/profiles/article.asp?id=124 (accessed 27 October 2010).]

Abstract: Consists of materials relating to Albin Kasper Longren and Longren Aircraft, Inc. Includes a scrapbook (photocopy) and photograph album (Unit 220946), newspaper clippings, and other materials documenting airplanes designed, built, and flown by Longren, as well as photographs of an abandoned woolen mill in Oakland, Topeka that Longren planned to renovate as an airplane factory. It also includes the corporate minutes for Longren Aircraft, Inc. from Kansas City, Missouri, for the years 1930-1932, as well as technical drawings, mostly handmade sketches, for airplane designs, pieces of airplanes, business correspondence, clippings of the A.K. Longren Aircraft Corporation in Topeka, KS. Longren was a pioneer in the aircraft industry. Also, a postcard from Lili Benenson, London to Dolly Longren, 1967.