Long Island Air and Space Hall of Fame names four new inductees

The Long Island Air and Space Hall of Fame added four Long Islanders on Monday during a luncheon at the Cradle of Aviation Museum in Uniondale — among the inductees: a would-be beautician who became the nations' top female racing pilot, a NASA astronaut, and the founder of a Bohemia-based aviation engineering firm and his son.

This year's inductees join the likes of aviation royalty such as Charles Lindbergh, who took off from Long Island's Roosevelt Field in 1927 for the first successful solo flight across the Atlantic, and astronaut Michael Massimino, who flew on space missions in 2002 and 2009.

“If you look at the people we have inducted, they are really people who have done important things,” said Joshua Stoff, the museum's curator. “It's amazing how much aviation history has happened [on Long Island] over the course of the 20th century.”

Astronaut Frank Caldeiro, who died in 2009, was represented at the luncheon by Charlie Carmada, a fellow astronaut. Both became NASA astronauts in 1996 and grew to be very close friends. Caldeiro immigrated to Queens from Argentina as a child and earned a degree in aerospace technology from SUNY Farmingdale.

Carmada described Caldeiro as a family man who loved nothing more than to share his passion for  aviation with his children. Caldeiro's death from brain cancer ended his goal of getting assigned a space mission.

“He trained really hard but unfortunately never got to live his dream of flying in space,” Carmada said. “I'm so glad the folks here at the Cradle of Aviation are honoring him.”

Julia Lauria-Blum, editor of Metropolitan Airport News, attended as the representative for Jackie Cochran, who rapidly rose to fame as a young racing pilot in the 1930s.

“She left an amazing legacy in aviation and is undoubtedly one of the greatest highlights of the 20th century,” Lauria-Blum said.

Cochran left behind her birth name and life in Florida for a fresh start in New York, Lauria-Blum added. Though she initially planned on working as a beautician, Cochran became fascinated by flying and earned her pilot's license after learning to fly at Roosevelt Field.

During World War II, Cochran led the Women's Airforce Service Pilots. According to a profile on the Hall of Fame website, she trained more than 1,000 women “to ferry aircraft on Long Island. After the war, she became the first woman to fly faster than the speed of sound and a strong advocate for women’s equality in the Air Force.”

Also inducted were Dayton T. Brown Sr., who founded Dayton T. Brown Inc., a Bohemia-based aircraft testing laboratory, and his son, Dayton T. Brown Jr., who became company chairman after his father died in 1979, according to the website.

The company works with SpaceX and Blue Origin, two staples of the modern-day aerospace industry. 

Jim Kelly, president of Dayton T. Brown Inc., said the father and son set a "high level of excellence that has really made the company what it is today."