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FRANK ALLEN CLEVELAND
1923-1983
ANONYMOUS
TO CHRONICLE ADEQUATELY the contributions Frank Allen
Cleveland has made to the nation and to his profession one
immecliately recognizes the necessity to talk to many people.
Al, as he was known to his associates, brought to each new
engineering responsibility a talent that is all too rare in oth-
erwise accomplished engineers he listened well. Using this
ability in his fielcI of aeronautical research and design clevel-
opment, he sought and made welcome the contributions of a
growing host of specialists as each new system concept came
. ~
Into being.
In today's florid of ever more extensive systems, his asso-
ciates miss Al Cleveland most sorely. All remember his con-
tinually eager approach to each new challenge and the life
full of accomplishments that they shared with him.
At his cleath on August 12, 1983, which was attributed to
complications stemming from open-heart surgery, Al was
sixty years old ant! appeared to be still ascending to the peak
of his high-performance potential. He began his career by
attending Stanford University where he earned an A.B. in
mechanical engineering in 1943 and a master's degree in
aeronautical engineering a year later. His outstanding record
at Stanford was recognized by his election to Tau Beta Pi.
Although he was born in Dayton, Ohio, on January 3l,
1923, Al spent a good part of his "growing up" in Ma(lera,
81
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82
MEMORIAL TRIBUTES
California; thus it was somewhat surprising that he selected
the Lewis Research Center of the National Advisory Com-
mittee for Aeronautics (now the National Aeronautics and
Space Administration) as his first technical home. It is likely
that the facilities and remarkable reputation of this labora-
tory attracted him, as did the challenge of studying and par-
ticipating in the emerging development of turbine engines
for aircraft. (One of his first papers dealt with the use of
afterburners for turbojets in the years when even the engines
themselves were novelties.)
Following approximately two years at the Lewis Research
Center, Al joined Lockheed as an aerodynamicist with early
assignments in the advanced design department. He imme-
diately demonstrated his eager, almost compulsive dectica-
tion to the use of the most advanced state-of-the-art tech-
niques, whether they anoliec! to the products themselves or
J --Al- - 1-
to the techniques for analyzing product capabilities.
During this period at Lockheed, Cleveland was the only
aerodynamicist assigned to one of its proposal programs
whose particular requirement was to provide a recoverable
pilotless flying test bed for the ramjet being developed for
the Bomarc missile. The ramjet concept fit well with Al's ex-
perience at Lewis, but the airframe design and the optimi-
zation of the airframe elements intrigued him even more.
They gave him a chance to try out several relatively primitive
analytical techniques, many of them his own, involving the
use of early computers for aid in optimization.
He was undaunted by his first "computer" conclusion that
his small test vehicle should have 7,000 external fuel tanks!
Once his tentative programming was properly sorted out
and he had survived the joshing of his associates, his concep-
tual contributions proved to be solid, and the test vehicle be-
came an outstanding success. The program flew 100 test
flights using approximately a dozen vehicles all of which
obtained ramjet data near Mach 3. One of the flights actually
exceeded Mach 4 at approximately 100,000 feet of altitude
and properly recovered itself no small feat, considering all
of these flights occurred before the end of 1951.
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FRANK ALLEN CLEVELAND
83
Al Cleveland's growing systems consciousness and concep-
tual acumen lee! to his assignment as program manager of
the successful competition and following studies for the Air
Force to explore nuclear power for bombardment aircraft.
These studies were initially carried on in Lockheed's Bur-
bank facilities; they were later transferred to the new division
established in Marietta, Georgia. Cleveland transferred to
the Georgia plant in 1956 to be the pioneering chief of ad-
vanced design, and the Air Force nuclear-powered aircraft
study transferred with him.
At the Georgia plant, Al initiated the buildup of an excep-
tionally creative advanced aircraft design and technical team,
a team that won almost every major competitive proposal ef-
fort it engaged in during the late 1950s through the 1960s.
Under his stewardship, the Lockheed-Georgia Company won
design, development, manufacturing, and test programs for
the following:
· Utility Four-engine let Aircraft Program, U.S. Air
Force This program was later converted to the develop-
ment of the commercial TetStar based on an original twin-
engine prototype cleveloped in Burbank.
· C- 14 ~ Logistic Transport Program This aircraft was the
first all-Georgia design. To maintain continuity and the
proper technical attention, Cleveland was asked to assume
responsibility as assistant chief engineer of the company and
engineering program manager. By almost any exacting stan-
clards, the management of the program and the successful
fulfillment of all its technical requirements attest to the ex-
cellence of Al's meticulous attention to the total system. The
still growing and increasingly outstanding record of the C-
141 in its service to the Air Force reinforces the conviction
that Al did his part extremely well. All agree that it was his
airplane.
· XV4A VIOL Hummingbird Research Program This
test vehicle demonstrated the feasibility of an augmented
thrust, vertical-rising jet aircraft before the successful direct-
lift Harrier was demonstrated in England.
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MEMORIAL TRIBUTES
· C-5A Heavy Logistic Transport Program The C-5A,
despite its impenetrable problems with the procurement sys-
tem, was a nearly perfect technical solution for the massive
collection of requirements it was supposed to meet. This air-
plane was also the product of Clevelancl's advanced design
activities. As a result of its new reincarnation for the Air
Force, it will finally serve the nation at the performance level
made possible by his original design.
Yet perhaps Clevelancl's greatest talent, which was fully
demonstrates! cluring the Georgia period of his career and
certainly recognized by many who continue in the aerospace
field today, was his ability to select, inspire, and train key sub-
ordinates, many of whom have moved on to substantial ca-
reers of their own.
Based on his contributions at the Georgia plant, Al Cleve-
land was promoted to the corporate position of vice-
president of engineering to oversee the quality of effort and
enhance the creativity of all Lockheed engineers and scien-
tists involves! in corporate-wide development programs. In
addition, it was his task to evaluate the total engineering tem-
per ant! capability of the staff. By his own volition, he ex-
tended this responsibility to inclucle an assessment of the
contributions that the corporation and its technical execu-
tives were making in support of the educational institutions
that were producing the next generation of practitioners.
All of this fit well with Al's almost constant attention to the
vitality of the profession through the American Institute of
Aeronautics and Astronautics (AlAA). There was hardly a
time in his whole career that he did not actively support
this association—with particular emphasis on its student
branches. He served as chairman of the Los Angeles section
of the Institute of Aeronautical Sciences (a predecessor of
AlAA) in 1954. He was honored in 1970 by the invitation to
deliver the Wright Brothers Lecture to AlAA members. He
served as director-at-large, as chairman of the Honors anct
Awards Committee (spearheading a complete awards pro-
gram overhaul), and as vice-president for technical activities.
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FRANK ALLEN CLEVELAND
85
These contributions resulted in his election to the national
board of governors, and, in 1978, he became president of
AlAA. During his tenure as president, he became even more
active with the student branches (a policy determiner! by his
own instincts rather than by the normal presiclential respon-
sibilities of the institute), anct he expanded substantially the
group's activities with international associations having simi-
lar goals of technical excellence.
Of the many important contributions Al Cleveland macle
to Lockheed while vice-presiclent of engineering, the one
that will probably have the most lasting impact was his crea-
tion of an annual awards program for those engineers
throughout the corporation who had made the most notable
contribution of icleas, specific tasks well clone, procedures or
techniques improved, or dollars saved by some technical ad-
vance. Uncler the program, the recipients of the awards from
each of Lockheed's divisions are brought to Lockheec! head-
quarters as a part of the corporate annual meeting and are
introduced to the directors and the stockholders who attend.
The effects on the individual who receives the award, the
management of the division selecting him, and the corporate
management and board are impressive, and they serve as a
constant positive reminder to the rest of the organization of
its (lepenclence on innovative, alert engineering. Al passed
away while serving as Lockheed's corporate vice-president of
· .
engineering.
Al Cleveland was elected to the National Academy of En-
gineering in 1980 and almost immediately began to partici-
pate in academy activities through the Aeronautics and
Space Engineering Board (ASEB) of the National Research
Council. He served as chairman of the Military Aviation
Pane} cluring the ASEB workshop of 1980, which acictressed
NASAs role in aeronautics. He was a member of ASEB from
the summer of 198 ~ until his illness prevented him from par-
ticipating further in the board's activities.
In reliving Clevelan(l's approach to each new task with
those who were closely involved with him, one senses a uni-
versal awe of his enthusiastic immersion in the problem at
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MEMORIAL TRIBUTES
hand. Yet this quality was not only a technical drive; it also
included many social endeavors. He sang in his church choir
and debated his divergent views of the church creed with his
minister. His wife Freddie, a small-boat sailor of national cal-
iber, involved him in racing. The yacht club has yet to find a
peer for planning, schecluling, and operating a weekend rac-
ing schedule.
The universal description of his approach contains such
words as complete dedication, penetration in depth, objectiv-
ity, ability to listen, fair but not precipitous judgment, initia-
tive in giving credit where it was deserved, and an apparently
infinite capability for accepting and understanding details.
Impressive as this was, it was not an overbearing talent; his
humor, consideration, and, above all, objective listening
brought out the very best in all who had tasks to perform
with him.
Al Clevelanc] was an engineer in the broadest sense; he
showed the technical community and the world how to im-
plement concepts that required technical talents from a mul-
titude of disciplines. He left the aerospace world with a leg-
acy of how to get the job done that will stand as a brilliant
goal for all those who follow. People who have known and
worked with Al Cleveland are grateful beyond measure for
the experience.
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Representative terms from entire chapter:
allen cleveland
