Frank P. Lahm

Frank Purdy Lahm was an American aviation pioneer, the nations first military aviator, and a general officer in the United States Army Air Corps and Army Air Forces.

Lahm was born on November 17, 1877, in Mansfield, Ohio, to Adelaide Way Purdy and Frank Samuel Lahm, owner of a hat shop. He was the grandson of Samuel Lahm, a Canton lawyer and Ohio congressman, and related through his grandmother to Daniel Webster. His mother died unexpectedly in March 1880 while giving birth to a third child, which also died shortly after. His father had been in poor health for five years, and on the advice of doctors, undertook a trip to Southern France, Italy, and Switzerland in October to improve his condition. Lahm, then two, and his fouryearold sister Katherine were left in the care of relatives. Soon after culminating his recovery by scaling the Matterhorn in August 1881, Frank S. Lahm became the European agent for the Remington Typewriter Company. He resided in Paris until his death in 1931. The elder Lahm kept his family connected to one another through frequent correspondence, visits, and educating each child for a year in France.

Source: Wikipedia