Bert Howland at "Ultraflight" Fly-in 1991

Bert Howland, whose very light sportplane designs became well known among air sports enthusiasts in the 1980s, was born in New York state on June 15, 1927. As a teenager, he soloed a J-3 Cub, then served in the Navy late in the Second World War as an airborne avionics test technician at Patuxent Naval Flight Test Station, Maryland. After the war, he continued his aeronautical endeavors, including ground school with Ellen Santoro, a CAA-certified flight instructor, who, during the war, had been a trainee in Women Airforce Service Pilot class 44-4. After earning his pilot license, he married Ellen and they had two sons. From 1949 to 1961, Howland worked as a designated engineer for Conner Engineering Co. in Danbury, Connecticut, then established his own manufacturing business, American Spinning and Metal Products Co. During those years, he owned, restored, and flew several surplus military aircraft, including the formidable Grumman F8F-2 Bearcat.

Bert's F8F-2 Bearcat (Click for larger image) 

In 1968, he moved his manufacturing operation from Connecticut to south central New York, in the village of Maryland, near Oneoto. After owning a variety of general aviation aircraft, he eventually became involved in building and flying ultralight aircraft from his own private strip, in a valley just below his manufacturing facility. But none of the designs he tried out provided what he really wanted, so he began to develop his own, using his expertise in aluminum fabrication to break new ground. By the mid-1980s, Howland had shifted most management responsibilities for his business to one of his sons, to allow his own work to focus on design and building of lightweight sportplanes. This effort resulted in the appearance, in rapid succession, of several very lightweight single-place designs over the next few years. In 1985, the H-1 Meteor, a low-wing, open cockpit monoplane came out, designed around the 28 horsepower Rotax 277 engine.

    H-1 Meteor (Click for larger image)

It had a fabric-covered , TIG-welded, round aluminum tube fuselage and aluminum spars supporting aluminum-capped foam ribs and full-span ailerons, with a 28-foot wing span. Only one prototype was built, but it proved the feasibility of the TIG-welded aluminum fuselage concept, although the next design used a different type of tubing. With the construction of the H-2 Honey Bee biplane in 1986,

Prototype H-2 Honey Bee (Click for larger image)   

Howland introduced square tubing for the fuselage, which provided greater welding surface and more strength. The square tubing for the fuselage frame became standard on all Howland models from that point on. That design first flew in 1987, fitted with the Rotax 447 but, but only one additional example was built at that time. Howland put most of his attention on his new low-wing monoplane called the H-3 Pegasus, which made it debut in 1988 with the same single-cylinder Rotax 277 engine type used in his first design.

    The original H-3 Pegasus (Click for larger image)

The prototype H-3 won a first place award at EAA Sun 'n Fun Fly-in's in 1989 and another was best in its category there in 1990. Public interest in the H-3 was was high, and several fly-away models were built. But, as his lightweight sportplanes began to grow in popularity, Howland had formed an airfraft company, Howland Aero Designs, which began to offer prefabricated kits for the H-3. The first kit built model was produced in 1989.

    Tommy Warren's First Kit-built H-3 (Click for larger image)

In that same year, a new design appeared on the scene: a high-wing, enclosed cabin monoplane, called the H-4 Chimp, reminiscent of late prewar and early postwar trainers.

H-4 Chimp (Click for larger image)   

Despite its popularity, only one example of the Chimp was built and plans to offer it as a kit were never realized.

The H-2 and H-3 designs were featured attractions at the popular "Ultraflight" events each summer in New York's Finger Lakes region during the late 1980s and early 1990s. Although the H-3 had become well known at the EAA Sun 'n Fun Fly-in at Lakeland , Florida from 1989, the H-2 biplane was not initially offered as a kit. However, based on popular demand, Howland decided in 1991 to produce H-2 kits as well, including the H-2A version adapted for competition aerobatics with four ailerons, an inverted fuel system, and

    H-2A Honey Bee with 4 Ailerons (Click for larger image)

larger engine. The H-2A was the prototype for H-2 kit production and that model first appeared at Sun 'n Fun in 1992. That same year, the H-2A was recognized as best in the Ultralight/Lightplane category at the 1992 EAA East Coast Fly-in. Throughout these years, Howland also did considerable work on a low-wing, two-place design, with side-by-side seating, designated H-5 Gemini,

but it remained unfinished when the company relocated to a warmer climate, late in 1992. After moving his kitplane manufacturing business to DeBary, Florida, Howland used the H-3 design as the basis for building a scaled down replica of the Flying Tigers' Curtis P-40, designated HP-40 Warhawk.

HP-40 Warhawk (Click for larger image)  

But, in the absence of his own manufacturing facility in Florida, Howland decided to contract out production responsibility for kits to another firm in early 1993. He then focused his own attention on design work, including his wife's favorite, the H-5 Gemini two-seater, and developing concepts for a two-place Honey Bee and other replica warbirds. However, before any of that effort could come to fruition, ill health forced him to relinquish control of Howland Aero Design in September 1994. Six months later, on March 25, 1995, Bert Howland died. Unable to continue the business without him, his widow, Ellen, liquidated the firm by year's end. Despite the premature end of his work as an aircraft designer, Bert Howland had made a significant impact on sport flying. With his classic designs, he recaptured the romance and thrill of flying as it had been in aviation's "Golden Age," a half century earlier.

Interest in the Howland designs remained strong, so in the fall of 1995, Ellen Howland transferred the copyrights to Classic Aero Enterprises, whose principal, H. O. Malone, had worked closely with Howland in developing the H-2A variant of the Honey Bee.

H.O. Malone and Bert Howland with the H2-A

Since early 1996, CAE has published and marketed the homebuilder plans for both the H-2 and the H-3. In 1997, arrangements were concluded with two nationally known homebuilt aircraft suppliers to offer builders raw materials packages for the H-2 and H-3 designs. Thus, the legacy of Bert Howland lives on in the work of homebuilders, who continue to produce his award-winning sportplanes.

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