The Standard E-1 was an early American

Army An army (from Old French ''armee'', itself derived from the Latin verb ''armāre'', meaning "to arm", and related to the Latin noun ''arma'', meaning "arms" or "weapons"), ground force or land force is a fighting force that fights primarily on ...

fighter aircraft, tested in 1917. It was the only pursuit aircraft manufactured by the United States during

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

."Historical Aircraft."
''Virginia Aviation Museum.'' Retrieved: 14 February 2011. It arrived late in World War I, and as a result saw more use in the months following the Armistice than those preceding it.''United States Air Force Museum'' 1975, p. 11.

Design and development

Built by the Standard Aircraft Corporation, the E-1 was an open-cockpit single-place

tractor A tractor is an engineering vehicle specifically designed to deliver a high tractive effort (or torque) at slow speeds, for the purposes of hauling a trailer or machinery such as that used in agriculture, mining or construction. Most comm ...

biplane A biplane is a fixed-wing aircraft with two main wings stacked one above the other. The first powered, controlled aeroplane to fly, the Wright Flyer, used a biplane wing arrangement, as did many aircraft in the early years of aviation. While ...

, powered by an 80 hp (60 kW) Le Rhône or 100 hp (75 kW) Gnome

rotary engine The rotary engine is an early type of internal combustion engine, usually designed with an odd number of cylinders per row in a radial configuration. The engine's crankshaft remained stationary in operation, while the entire crankcase and i ...

Operational history

It proved unsuitable as a fighter, but 128 were bought as an advanced trainer. Of these, 30 were powered by the Gnome rotary engine of 100 horsepower and 98 were powered by the LeRhone C-9 rotary engine of 80 horsepower. After World War I, three were modified as RPVs.

Operators

; *

United States Army Air Service The United States Army Air Service (USAAS)Craven and Cate Vol. 1, p. 9 (also known as the ''"Air Service"'', ''"U.S. Air Service"'' and before its legislative establishment in 1920, the ''"Air Service, United States Army"'') was the aerial warf ...

Survivors

* A late 1918 E-1 was on display at the

National Museum of the United States Air Force The National Museum of the United States Air Force (formerly the United States Air Force Museum) is the official museum of the United States Air Force located at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, northeast of Dayton, Ohio. The NMUSAF is the ...

Dayton, Ohio Dayton () is the sixth-largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County. A small part of the city extends into Greene County. The 2020 U.S. census estimate put the city population at 137,644, while Greater ...

for over 40 years. It was placed on indefinite loan to the Museum by J. B. Petty of

Gastonia, North Carolina Gastonia is the largest city in and county seat of Gaston County, North Carolina, United States. It is the second-largest satellite city of the Charlotte area, behind Concord. The population was 80,411 at the 2020 census, up from 71,741 in 2 ...

in 1959. After Mr. Petty passed on, the aircraft was sold at auction by his estate and eventually was obtained by Kermit Weeks and is now part of the collection at

Fantasy of Flight Fantasy of Flight is an aviation museum in Polk City, Florida. It opened in November 1995, to house Kermit Weeks' collection of aircraft that, until Hurricane Andrew damaged many in 1992, were housed at the Weeks Air Museum in Tamiami, Florid ...

in Polk City, Florida."Standard E-1."
''

''. Retrieved: 26 March 2012. * A 1918 E-1 is on display at the Shannon Air Museum in Fredericksburg, Virginia. This airframe was found at a florist shop in

in the 1950s and restored for display.P. B. Sullivan 1976, P. 2-3.

Specifications

References

;Notes ;Bibliography * Angelucci, Enzo. ''The Rand McNally Encyclopedia of Military Aircraft, 1914-1980.'' San Diego, California: The Military Press, 1983. . * Angelucci, Enzo and Peter Bowers. ''The American Fighter''. Sparkford, UK: Haynes Publishing Group, 1987. . * Donald, David, ed. "Standard Aircraft." ''Encyclopedia of World Aircraft''. Etobicoke, Ontario: Prospero Books, 1997. . * Taylor, Michael J. H. ''Jane's Encyclopedia of Aviation''. London: Studio Editions, 1989. . * ''United States Air Force Museum Guidebook''. Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio: Air Force Museum Foundation, 1975.

External links

Standard E-1 in Fantasy of Flight Museum

{{Standard Aircraft Corporation :''This page contains material originally created fo
Standard E-1
' Standard Aircraft Corporation aircraft Biplanes 1910s United States military trainer aircraft Single-engined tractor aircraft Aircraft first flown in 1917