Benoist Aircraft

In 1908 Benoist founded the Aeronautic Supply Co, the first supplier of aircraft parts. On 20 October 1911, the company's factory, along with all of its records, was destroyed by fire.{{cite magazine |title=Notice |magazine=Aero |date=28 October 1911 |volume=3 |issue=4 |page=86 |url=http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=osu.32435057646713&seq=106 |accessdate=22 July 2021}}

In 1913, Benoist moved production into the St. Louis Car Company factory run by E. B. Meissner. After Benoist's death, Meissner continued to build aircraft on contract to the government as the St. Louis Aircraft Corporation{{cite web|title=Welcome to Flight City|url=http://www.mohistory.org/Flight_City/HTML/Collectionbenoist.html|accessdate=19 September 2011|url-status=dead|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20111121140020/http://www.mohistory.org/Flight_City/HTML/Collectionbenoist.html|archivedate=21 November 2011}}

Promoter Bill Pickens and Benoist's earlier business partner, publisher {{illm|E. Percy Noel|ja|パーシー・ノエル}}, sponsored the 1913 "Great Lakes Reliability Tour" to promote the new seaplanes with Benoist aircraft as the featured manufacturer. Benoist originally was going to compete with three aircraft. "The Ark of Duluth" was to be flown by Hugh Robinson, but wrecked prior to the race. Tony Jannus flew a Benoist XIV that suffered a broken propeller, and sunk while being towed to shore.{{cite book|title=Jannus, an American flier|author=Thomas Reilly|page=102}}

Benoist built the type XV twin-engine flying boat with hopes to market it as an anti-submarine patrol aircraft for the British government. A round-the-world publicity tour was scheduled and a merger with the Meissner's company to make a thousand examples were in the works when World War I tensions cancelled the efforts. In 1917 Benoist Aircraft moved operations to Sandusky, Ohio.{{cite book|title=American flying boats and amphibious aircraft: an illustrated history|author=E. R. Johnson}}

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• {{cite book |last= Gunston |first= Bill |title=World Encyclopedia of Aircraft Manufacturers |year=1993 |publisher=Naval Institute Press |location= Annapolis |pages=44 }}
• [http://www.aerofiles.com/_ba.html aerofiles.com]

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{{Benoist aircraft}}

Category:Defunct aircraft manufacturers of the United States

Category:Defunct manufacturing companies based in Missouri