Tennessee native Terah Thomas Maroney (1880-1929), shown here at Great Falls in 1911, was an early aerial performer and promoter of aviation in the West. It was a July 4, 1914 Seattle seaplane ride with Maroney that convinced William Boeing and his partner George C. Westervelt to go into the airplane manufacturing business.

This series of 13 rare, never-before-published photos were taken by Helena merchant Raymond C. Grant, who was likely on a business trip to Great Falls in 1911. Grant was a traveling sales representative in the paint and store-fixture business, so it seems probable that he was visiting the McRae & Cluston Planing Mill, which was directly across 9th St. from where Maroney's aircraft was tented; the mill is shown in two of the photos.

"T. T." Maroney, a skilled carpenter and cabinet-maker by trade, had wood-working for his plane done in the mill. Two photos taken inside the tent show tools, wood and spare parts.

According to a newspaper account given by Maroney in 1913, this plane flew eight or nine times before breaking apart. Newspaper archive searches indicate that, due to an insufficient engine, it really only flew three times on one occasion, with maximums of 15 feet off the ground and a distance of 300 feet.. The plane was apparently sold a sheriff's auction at Great Falls in November of 1911.

Maroney was present at the State Fairgorunds in Helena on September 30, 1911, when Cromwell Dixon flew from the Fairgrounds to Blossburg and back, making the first flight over the continental divide.

Following the Great Falls photos is a brief history of Maroney, Montana's premier aviator.

Maroney at the controls of his first hand-built aeroplane at the intersection of Central Avenue and 9th Street in Great Falls, Montana. The tent sheltering the plane was on the northwest corner, where the 1915 Masonic Hall stands today.

According to former Boeing corporate historian Paul G. Spitzer, the end of World War I brought big changes to Maroney's career. In an article for the Winter 2010/2011 Eastlake News, Mr. Spitzer wrote:

"After the war and his discharge, Maroney returned to Seattle. The planes he left behind were so obsolete and damaged that they were unusable. He went to work for a for a flying service on Puget Sound in a Boeing Model C, but business remained bad. Still worse, the thousands of students trained during the war returned home wanting jobs in aviation. The future, even in the rapidly expanding field of aviation, was as bleak for them as it was for Maroney.

One day driving in California, Maroney broke the axle in his car and he stayed there to build cabinets and houses. The craftsmanship that once had made his airplane stronger than
engineers expected now served him in the building trade. However, his several attempts to
re­enter aviation never worked out. Opportunities were scarce, airplanes costly, and the complexity of new designs put them out of reach of even people with good carpentry skills such as him."

It is known that Maroney, then a building contractor, and a spouse lived in Reno, Nevavda and near Sacramento, California in the 1920s.