Sherman Fairchild

Sherman Mills Fairchild (April 7, 1896 – March 28, 1971) was an American businessman and investor who started more than 70 companies, among them Fairchild Aviation, Fairchild Industries, and Fairchild Camera and Instrument. His work shaped the aviation industry, and the semiconductor division of Fairchild Camera was a key force in the rise of Silicon Valley. He owned more than 30 patents, covering inventions from the 8-mm home sound motion-picture camera to early semiconductor technology.

Fairchild was born in Oneonta, New York, the only child of George Winthrop Fairchild, a Republican congressman and co-founder and first chairman of IBM, and Josephine Mills Sherman. When his father died on December 31, 1924, Fairchild inherited a multimillion-dollar estate and his father’s IBM stock, making him the company’s largest individual shareholder until his own death in 1971.

A bright and curious child, Fairchild entered Harvard University in 1915. During his freshman year, he invented the first synchronized aerial camera shutter. He contracted tuberculosis in college, and on his doctor’s advice moved to Arizona for the dry climate. There he enrolled at the University of Arizona and grew interested in photography. He later transferred to the University of Arizona, attending from 1919 to 1920, but ongoing health problems kept him from earning a degree. Instead, he pursued entrepreneurship.

Rejected from military service in 1917 due to poor health, Fairchild sought another way to support the World War I effort. With his father, he went to Washington and secured a government contract to build a better aerial camera. The camera placed the shutter inside the lens, reducing image distortion caused by slow shutter speeds that couldn’t keep up with a plane’s motion. The government gave him a $7,000 budget, but the project cost $40,000; his father covered the difference. The military didn’t accept the camera until after the war, but it did buy two for training. Fairchild kept working on a more advanced model, and in February 1920 he founded the Fairchild Aerial Camera Corporation, the forerunner of Fairchild Camera and Instrument. Soon the U.S. Army ordered 20 more cameras and made it the standard for aerial photography. During World War II, over 90% of all aerial cameras used by Allied Forces were designed or built by Fairchild.