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Wall of Honor Level:
Air and Space Friend

Honored by:
E. Douglas Loesch

Edmund Loesch held the position of Senior Machinist at the Aircraft Specialties Company in Bethpage, New York from approximately 1939 to 1949. During the Second World War this small firm provided extreme-precision machined parts to aviation manufacturers including Grumman Aircraft Engineering Corporation, Sperry Gyroscope Company, Fairchild Aviation Corporation, Carl L. Norden Inc., and others. Mr. Loesch's specialty was close-tolerance machining of plastic insulating parts including precision components for rotating electrical commutators used in bomb sights, aerial cameras, gun turrets and the like. He was able to machine parts from troublesome early plastic materials (laminated phenolics, similar to Bakelite) to extraordinary tolerances, as small as 1/10,000 of an inch.

Such tolerances, essential to the precision of equipment like bombsights, were difficult to maintain due to the uneven thermal expansion the material underwent during the machining. Mr. Loesch had a unique feeling for the material and process that allowed him to compensate for these thermal movements occurring on a microscopic level and produce numerous parts that met specifications considered 'impossible' at the time. His performance made a vital contribution to America's defense and earned the company Army-Navy "E" Awards for excellence in war production.

After the war, Mr. Loesch pursued careers as a farmer and later distributor of agricultural chemicals and products.

He was born in 1915, died in 1990, and is survived by his son and two grandchildren who have all shared a lifelong enthusiasm for aviation and technology. His family has preserved samples of his work form Aircraft Specialties.