Gregor Michael

Gregor Michael (Grigorashvili Mikheil) (1888-1953), Aircraft designer, pioneer of Russian aviation and one of the founders of aviation industry in the USA and Canada. He was born in Derbent (South Russia), was educated in St. Petersburg and in 1911 he underwent the practical training of a pilot in France. Later he worked in Russia in the capacity of a flight trainer and participated in WW I. In 1921 he left for the USA and in 1926 he acquired the American citizenship. There Michael Gregor worked at the Rode Island aviation works as well as at the Dayton-Wright Company. In 1928 he was employed at the Curtiss-Wright plant. In 1934 he founded his own firm ‘Gregor Aircraft’ and produced a smallsize plane GR-1. In 1936 Michael Gregor was invited to the ‘Canadian Car and Foundry’ works in Canada, where he built an FDB-1 biplane, a technically sophisticated model of the new design. In 1940s he was a leading specialist of ‘Chase Aircraft Company’.

M. Gregor died in Trenton, New Jersey.