WHEN BRADFORD DECIDED TO TAKE OFF

Attention!
We’re leaving the ground. Literally.
The 1920s.
America is in love with the sky.
Airplanes are the Teslas of their time.
And in this atmosphere, Bradford’s story welcomes the Taylor Brothers Aircraft Manufacturing Company.
The Taylor brothers wanted to make aviation simpler and accessible to everyone.
They designed light, single-engine planes – “like cars for the sky.”
Small.
Simple.
Affordable.
Not in a huge factory, but in a workshop that smelled of

•  oil
•  wood
•  and ambition

One investor was William T. Piper – an oil man by training, but with a deep passion for aviation.
He believed in one simple, brilliant idea:
planes shouldn’t be only for the military or millionaires, but for ordinary people.
In 1929, production moves to Bradford.
Why?
Because here

•  there was money
• there were skilled hands
• and a city unafraid of the new

On November 1, 1937, a name appears that’s still known today: Piper Aircraft Corporation.
They built the Taylor E-2 Cub – an early version of what we now know as the legendary Piper Cub, one of the most famous light aircraft of all time.
The road wasn’t easy.

In 1930 the company went bankrupt.
William Piper bought the assets for just $761.
They tried to continue production.

Then in 1937, a fire destroyed the Bradford factory.
That could have been the end.
But Piper didn’t give up.
Production moved to Lock Haven, Pennsylvania.
The aircraft born here became Piper Aircraft – and then Piper Cub.
And it became a huge success.
So imagine this
a small city that started with oil suddenly becomes part of global aviation history.
Not bad for a place that used to drill the ground, right?