The Curtiss R3C is an American racing aircraft built in landplane and floatplane form. It was a single-seat biplane built by the Curtiss Aeroplane and Motor Company .
7-574: The R3C-1 was the landplane version and Cyrus Bettis won the Pulitzer Trophy Race in one on 12 October 1925 with a speed of 248.9 mph (400.6 km/h). The R3C-2 was a twin float seaplane built for the Schneider Trophy race. In 1925, from 23 to 26 October, it took place at Chesapeake Bay in Baltimore, Maryland . With 232.57 mph (374.29 km/h), pilot Jimmy Doolittle won
14-506: A road where he was found by highway workers on Wednesday. He was admitted to Bellefonte Hospital and then airlifted to Walter Reed Hospital in Washington. Initially he was in serious but not critical condition, and expected to survive. However, he died on September 1, 1926, of spinal meningitis . Bettis Field in Pittsburgh was named in his honor. When Westinghouse bought the site in
21-540: A telephone company. He joined the army in 1918. He was the winner of the 1924 Mitchell Trophy Race and the 1925 Mackay Trophy . He was also a winner of the Pulitzer Trophy in October 1925, flying a Curtiss R3C -1 racer. In winning the trophy, he set a new airspeed record of 248.99 mph for a closed-circuit race. The record was broken shortly after by Lieutenant Jimmy Doolittle . On Monday, August 23, 1926, he
28-497: The 1925 Schneider Trophy race is preserved at the National Air and Space Museum 's Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Centre, at Washington Dulles Airport , Virginia . It still wears its '3' 1925 racing number. Data from Curtiss Aircraft 1907–1947 General characteristics Performance Cyrus Bettis Lieutenant Cyrus K. Bettis (January 2, 1893 – September 1, 1926) was an American army aviator who won several races and set
35-519: The then airspeed record for a closed-circuit race in 1925. He died after he crashed his aircraft less than a year later. Bettis was born on January 2, 1893, in Carsonville, Michigan , to John C. Bettis and Mattie Crorey. His grandfather, David Crorey, was an Irish immigrant who founded the "Exchange State Bank" in Carsonville, Michigan. Cyrus was brought up on a farm, and after high school he worked for
42-564: The trophy with a Curtiss R3C-2. The other two R3C-2s, piloted by George Cuddihy and Ralph Oftsie, did not reach the finish line. The next day, with the same plane on a straight course, Doolittle reached 245.7 mph (395.4 km/h), a new world record. For the next Schneider Trophy, which took place on 13 November 1926, the R3C-2's engine was further improved, and pilot Christian Franck Schilt took second place with 231.364 mph (372.344 km/h). The R3C-2 that Jimmy Doolitle piloted to victory in
49-601: Was leading a formation of three army planes leaving the Sesquicentennial Exposition in Philadelphia heading toward Selfridge Field in Michigan when in heavy fog he hit a tree and crashed on Jacks Mountain near Bellefonte, Pennsylvania , and was missing for two days. He was seriously injured, including a broken leg, and multiple skull fractures. After waiting in vain for rescue he crawled two-and-a-half miles to
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