Radioplane Company

The Radioplane Company was an American aviation company which produced drone aircraft primarily for use as gunnery targets. During World War II they produced over 9,400 of their Radioplane OQ-3 model, a propeller-powered monoplane, making it the most-used target aircraft in the US. In the post-World War II era they introduced their Radioplane BTT series, which was produced for years and eventually reached almost 60,000 examples. They also produced several radio control and self-guided missiles, the largest being the GAM-67 Crossbow, which didn't enter service. The company was purchased by Northrop Corporation in 1952, and moved to one of Northrop's factories in 1962. One of the last projects carried out at the original Radioplane factory in Van Nuys, California, was the construction of the Gemini Paraglider.

Reginald Denny served with the Royal Flying Corps during World War I, and after the war emigrated to the United States to seek his fortunes in Hollywood as an actor. He was successful as a supporting actor in a dozens of films and made a good living. Like many actors of the era, he took up flying for sport in the 1920s. But he then lost almost all of his money speculating in oil and mining stocks.

Between films, Denny overheard a racket next door and went to investigate. He found the neighbor's son attempting to start one of the earliest radio control model airplanes. Denny attempted to help, but they instead ended up destroying the model. While attempting to get it fixed, Denny became acquainted with the newly forming model industry, one of whom convinced him to take it up as a hobby. In 1934 he started a small hobby shop with a partner on Hollywood Boulevard, but after two years it went out of business.

Denny then approached (or was approached by) Nelson Paul Whittier, grandson of famous California Quaker pioneer, John Greenleaf Whittier. The two formed Reginald Denny Industries in 1935 to develop a new radio controlled model, and were joined by electronics engineer Kenneth Case. For the next three years they attempted to produce a design known as the Radioplane One, or RP-1, essentially a greatly enlarged model airplane, complete with a fuselage area that included the step where a windscreen was in a real aircraft. The control system was based on a telephone dial: dial 4 for elevator down, and then 2 to stop the motion. Due to the latencies in the system, the aircraft were found to be almost uncontrollable.

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