“Ward Tunte Van Orman (born September 2, 1894 in Lorain, Ohio – died March 11, 1978) was an American engineer, inventor and balloonist. A lifelong employee of Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company credited with invention of Goodyear’s inflatable life raft[2] and self-sealing fuel tank,[3] Van Orman set an unprecedented record of winning five annual National Balloon Races (including the first ever Litchfield Trophy issued by Goodyear’s Paul Litchfield in 1925), participating in ten and winning three International Gordon Bennett Races (1926, 1929, 1930)”
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Lorain High School’s class of 1928
choose to feature the life and hot air balloon race adventures of one
of their own: Ward T. Van Orman — who was a 1912 graduate of Lorain’s
high school on the shores of Lake Erie "where the coal and iron meet."
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Below are pages from the 1928 L.H.S. yearbook “The Scimitar” that spotlight this enterprising Lorainite:
