Cessna became the first planemaker-aviator of the Great Plains in the year Dwane was born, and gave the brothers their first airplane ride in an OX-5 Swallow in 1924.
[8] In his early adulthood, Wallace entered the aeronautical engineering program at the Municipal University of Wichita, in Wichita, Kansas (one of the nation's first three such programs), and graduated in May/June 1933 (historian Ed Phillips says June 1932), the first (of many) to graduate that university with a bachelor's degree in aeronautical engineering.
[1][6][7][9][10] Traveling the country to meet and persuade investors, and committing to them that the three family leaders would work with little or no pay, the Wallace brothers won the proxy fight.
[1][4][5][6][9][10][12] Clyde's son, Eldon (also an aeronautical engineer), remained at the company until a disagreement with Wallace over salary led to his departure in summer 1935.
In December 1935, tired of aviation and longing for his old farm, Clyde sold his stock in the company to the Wallace brothers, though remained the figurehead president.
Despite his achievements, and the scope of his wealth, power and influence, Wallace had a reputation for shyness and humility, and was known to humbly mingle and dine with factory workers.
In his early years as company president, he also test-flew, raced and sold planes, painted them, pitched for the lunchtime softball team, fetched water for factory workers, and swept floors.
[1][7][10] Shyness notwithstanding, according to his long-time second-in-command, Del Roskam, Wallace was a "hands-on" manager, "a good people-person," who would tour the factory, meeting foremen and workers, and talking through problems with them personally.
[1][4][6][8][9][10] In addition to advancing the Cessna airplanes' reputation, and sales, exhibition flying at county fairs and major events, and trophy racing, also brought prize money, which helped keep the company solvent—making exhibition flying and racing necessary duties of Wallace's early Cessna career.
(Eventually the couple had four daughters: Linda, Karen, Diana and Sarah; the New York Times obituary calls the latter "Farah".
[7][9] Under Wallace, the Cessna Aircraft Company survived until the early years of World War II, before American involvement, when Wallace was able to secure contracts with the U.S. and Canadian government to build training plane variants of the Bobcat for the Royal Canadian Air Force (which was already aiding Great Britain in the war), and, as the Cessna AT-8 advanced trainer, it was acquired by the thousands by the U.S. Army Air Corps, to train most U.S. transport and bomber pilots for the war, and for use as a light transport.
[1][4][8][9][10] Additional wartime contracts—making parts of other manufacturers' military planes, and assembling Waco CG-4A combat transport gliders—helped Wallace's company grow.
The government funding supporting Cessna's manufacture of sections of advanced all-metal aircraft, such as engine cowls for the Douglas A-26 and tails for the Boeing B-29, enabled Cessna to leap ahead of other pre-war light plane makers (most of whom were largely relegated to producing their original frame-and-fabric aircraft, or similar planes, soon made obsolete by the technological leaps of the Second World War).
[1][7][8][9][10][12] When the postwar recession of the late 1940s and early 1950s wiped out most general aviation planemakers, Wallace diversified and survived adding an industrial division producing furniture and hydraulic equipment at a factory in Hutchinson, Kansas, He expanded the company's dealer network globally, and added a customer-finance division to the company, boosting sales substantially.
He expanded Cessna's Fluid Power Division (producing hydraulic cylinders for a wide range of industrial uses) in Hutchinson, Kansas, and opened Cessna parts or aircraft factories in Glenrothes, Scotland, Reims, France, and later in Mendoza, Argentina—along with marketing and servicing centers at other places around the world.
[9][10] In 1964, to honor Cessna's international trade development, U.S. President Lyndon Johnson, at a White House ceremony, presented Wallace with the Presidential "E" for Export Award.
Wallace then retired, in 1975, from the role of Cessna's chairman of the board—handing over the company to Meyer, and stepping down to become a regular member of the board of directors.
His obituary in the New York Times reports that Wallace "severed his ties" with Cessna in 1983, following a dispute with his hand-picked successor, Meyer.
[1][4] Wallace had been a member of the Aviation Pioneers Hall of Fame, the Society of Experimental Test Pilots and the Quiet Birdmen.
[4][7][9][10] Additionally, in 1979, the new main building of the College of Engineering at Wichita State University—his alma mater, which he had richly endowed—was named Wallace Hall for him.