The aviation magnate who invented the first car radio

In the seventies and eighties, the UFO craze took a leap in dimension with the release of films such as Close Encounters of the Third Kind and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, both directed by Steven Spielberg. Amidst this wave, an aviator with ties to the CIA named John Lear appeared in the public eye, who in 1987 claimed that the United States government maintained relations with extraterrestrial beings and that a secret committee called Majestic-12 existed that had unspeakable pacts with the visitors. From that moment on, Lear's figure became a central character of the American UFO conspiracy theory, but over the years he was gradually forgotten and his theses were considered mere fantasy. What surprised the United States the most about Lear's emergence as a great propagator of these theories about aliens is that he was not just any citizen, but was the son of one of the main aviation magnates, the businessman and inventor Bill Lear, founder of companies that still bear his name today.

Coming into the world within a family that was falling apart –his parents separated when he was small and he was raised initially by his aunt and later by his mother's husband– inoculated Bill Lear with a deep desire to do important things in life and to try to earn a lot of money. From a very young age, it was noted that Lear had a great knack for repairing electrical appliances and, in fact, while still a teenager, he built his own radio, based on knowledge acquired autodidactically. It must be taken into account that he had abandoned formal education before going to high school. During the First World War, he enlisted in the navy, where he was in direct contact with the world of radio transmissions (albeit by lying about his age to be able to enter the army). Shortly after the war, he set up a small company with another partner that manufactured car radios, an invention of his own and the first to come onto the market. Some investors, the Galvin brothers, thought the product had a future and bought the patents from him. They christened the device Motorola, a name that years later would give its name to the company itself.

At the beginning of the thirties, he founded Lear Developments, with which he would end up focusing on the aeronautical world. He created the multiband radio, which he sold to the giant RCA, the radio beacon for air navigation, the autopilot, and an autonomous landing system. During the Second World War, he collaborated closely with the Allied aviation, contributing his model of flaps electric. And from producing components for airplanes, he made the leap to manufacturing entire planes: in 1963, the Lear-Jet was the first private-use jet to be mass-produced and which had great success among the businessmen of the time, attracted by the comparatively affordable price compared to other similar aircraft. This adventure was not simple at all, because to carry it out he had to set up a brand new company, because his partners in the original company did not approve the project. The solution to the conflict consisted of selling his stake and, with the money raised, founding the new firm.

In another area, in the mid-sixties he also devised the first eight-track cartridge for audio recordings, which worked on a magnetic tape. Thanks to the RCA catalog it became a very popular system both in homes and in automobiles, and did not decline until the arrival and consolidation of the Philips compact cassette. Another of Lear's inventions during the sixties was the engine based on a closed-circuit steam system that powered a turbine. Some tests were carried out with cars, but the development did not prosper.

The Lear Corporation firm that is established in Catalonia (in the Alt Camp, with 75 years of history) belongs to the automotive industry –not the aviation one– but it has a direct relationship with our protagonist, because in 1962 his company merged with the seat giant Siegler Corporation and the inventor's surname ended up predominating, which is maintained to this day, even though he dissociated himself from it very soon. The John Lear with whom we opened this piece was the fruit of his fourth marriage, celebrated with Moya Marie Olsen, daughter of the comedian John Sigvard "Ole" Olsen, very popular during the Great Depression. In total, Lear had four marriages, seven children and a character that was difficult to manage.