William Starling Burgess
| William Starling Burgess | |
|---|---|
Starling Burgess
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| Born | December 25, 1878 Boston, Massachusetts |
| Died |
March 19, 1947 (aged 68) Hoboken, New Jersey |
| Education | Milton Academy |
| Known for | Collier Trophy winner |
| Spouse(s) | Helene Adams Willard Rosamond Tudor Else Foss Nannie Dale Biddle Marjorie Young |
William Starling Burgess (December 25, 1878 – March 19, 1947) was an American yacht designer, aviation pioneer, and naval architect. He was awarded the highest prize in aviation, the Collier Trophy in 1915, just two years after Orville Wright won it. In 1933 he partnered with Buckminster Fuller to design and build the radical Dymaxion Car. Between 1930 and 1937 he created three America's Cup winning J-Class yachts, Enterprise, Rainbow and Ranger (the latter in partnership with Olin Stephens).
Burgess was born in Boston, Massachusetts on Christmas Day, December 25, the son of yacht designer Edward Burgess and Caroline "Kitty" Sullivant, a legendary beauty and the daughter of William Starling Sullivant, an eminent natural scientist. Both of Burgess' parents died within weeks of each other when he was 12, leaving him and his 3-year-old brother to be raised by relatives.
Like his father, Starling had a great mechanical and mathematical ability and a refined sense of line, form and spatial relationship. From his mother he received a love of literature and poetry, which he regarded as the foundation for all accomplishment.
After the death of his parents, Burgess was mentored by many of his father's colleagues, including Nathanael Greene Herreshoff. This relationship was terminated by Herreshoff when Burgess confided his aspiration to become a yacht designer himself.
Starling attended Milton Academy, a progressive boarding school near Boston, where he became interested in aviation, designed his first sailboat, Sally II, and patented a sophisticated lightweight machine gun. Burgess graduated from Milton Academy in 1897 and entered Harvard College with the Class of 1901. As Burgess began life at Harvard, tension was building between Spain and the U.S. The sinking of an American battleship, the USS Maine, on February 15, 1898, increased the drumbeat for war, and war was declared on April 11, 1898. Starling Burgess was one of a hundred Harvard undergraduates (out of 2,400) to volunteer for military service. He enlisted in the U.S. Navy, and because of his proven expertise in weapons design, was promoted to the rank of Gunner’s Mate. He received credit for the courses he missed during this period by special vote of the Harvard faculty. For reasons not entirely clear, he left Harvard without completing his degree, and opened his own yacht design office in Boston.
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