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For poor inventors there is always the question of how to raise funds to complete one's own projects.  Whitehead used some of the traditional methods of raising money such as taking money for work that he would never complete on contract and attempting to convince people of his impossible dreams. He had the common trait of a complete lack of financial skills and kept no books as far as can be learned.  He would construct engines or motors for others with no final knowledge as to whether he had actually made money or lost.

inancial Contributors

Stella Randolph writes about one of Whitehead's disappointed customers, a balloonist named Captain H.E. Honeywell who stated,  "I gave him (Whitehead) an order for two light specially constructed motors for aeronautical purposes according to his ads and claims.  After months of waiting and much corresponding, also many checks on account, finally made a trip to Bridgeport, Connecticut, to find them abandoned under his work bench; he could not make them work."  Other investors complained for sinking money into projects where no profits were realized.  Whitehead never patented any of his projects (due to significant lack of funds and organization) and so could never realize them to any commercial potential.  Many accounts of Whitehead pose him as putting every last cent into his inventions.  What money he earned from his variety of jobs or contracts went straight into his dreams.  When Gustave Whitehead passed away he had exactly $6 and forty-two cents to his name - a pauper to the last. Photo: Early two cylinder Whitehead motor.  Loops of copper wire furnished an air cooling system.