Glenn Curtiss: The Aviation Genius Who Built Three Florida Cities
Glenn Curtiss raced motorcycles faster than anyone alive, helped invent the airplane, and trained the Navy’s first pilots. Then he moved to South Florida and did something stranger: he built three cities from scratch.
The Fastest Man on Earth
Born in New York in 1878, Curtiss started with bicycles, moved to motorcycles, and in 1907 rode one of his own machines to 136 miles per hour, earning the title “fastest man on earth.” He soon turned to flight, won the first major aviation prizes, and built planes and flying boats that earned him the nickname “father of naval aviation.” His rivalry with the Wright brothers helped push the entire industry forward.
A New Career in the Sand
Curtiss ran a flying school near Miami, and around 1920 he fell for South Florida real estate during the great land boom. With his partner James Bright, he began buying and developing land north of the city. He loved themed towns. He laid out Country Club Estates, now Miami Springs, in a Southwestern Pueblo style, helped create Hialeah, and dreamed up Opa-locka in the style of the Arabian Nights, with domes, minarets, and streets named for characters from the tales.
The Cities He Left Behind
Opa-locka still holds the largest collection of Moorish Revival architecture in the country, anchored by its fairy-tale city hall. Miami Springs keeps the curving, garden-city plan Curtiss gave it, and Hialeah grew into one of Florida’s largest cities. Curtiss died in 1930 at fifty-two, after appendix surgery, his aviation fame already cemented and three living cities rising from the Florida flatlands he had reimagined.
