John Valentine Pliska

John Valentine Pliska was a mechanical genius who made and flew the first locally owned aircraft. Born in Austria, he came with his parents to Texas and after 1903 followed the blacksmith trade in Midland. In 1912 he built and flew, at intervals up to 15 minutes, an aeroplane of his own invention, which is now in a museum at the Midland-Odessa air terminal. Pliska was a master smith. General John J. Pershing had U.S. Army horses shod here during border trouble prior to World War I, and branding irons for a large West Texas area were also made here. Pliska married Louis Hundle, and they had seven children.

Midland, Texas · United States