William Preston Mayfield

pdf biography: http://www.libraries.wright.edu/special/collection_guides/guide_files/ms271.pdf

William Preston Mayfield was born July 20, 1896, in Lexington, Kentucky. He took up photography in 1909 at the age of 12 and a year after, in 1910, began work for the Dayton Journal newspaper. He left later the same year to become a staff photographer for James M. Cox’s Dayton Daily News. One of his first assignments for the News was to photograph the activities of the Wright Brothers at Huffman Prairie. This assignment led to what he claimed was the first aerial photograph in America, an oblique shot of the Wright’s hanger at Huffman Prairie taken from an altitude of about 300 feet, while flying with Orville Wright as pilot of an “Exhibition B” Wright Flyer. Two years later, in 1912, Mayfield started his own studio to take advantage of a growing commercial photography sideline. In 1913, Mayfield was well placed to record the Dayton Flood, spending three days and nights trapped in Governor Cox’s office at the Dayton Newspapers building. Mayfield continued to take staff assignments with the Daily News until about 1930. Meanwhile, his commercial business grew as his interests in aviation and aerial photography led him to establish one of the first aerial photography studios in the country, shortly after World War I. Through the years, Mayfield’s contacts in aviation included speed demons Roscoe Turner, Barney Oldfield, and Eddie Rickenbacker, and stunt pilot J.C. “Slim” Gregory. He was also well placed to photograph military pilots and aviation “firsts” at airfields around the Dayton area. Bill Mayfield worked at various times as a newsreel cameraman for international distributors like Pathe, Kinogram, and Universal. He was also employed by Columbus-based Paragon Feature Films.

Mayfield was married to Cornelia Wortman of Dayton. They had one daughter, Marguerite Rogers, of St. Petersburg, Florida. Mayfield continued his Dayton-based business of aerial and commercial photography until the 1960’s. Cornelia, his wife died in 1967, and the same year, he decided to sell his studio and substantial (100,000+) negative archive to his assistant, photographer Marvin Christian. William Preston Mayfield died in 1974 at the age of

77.