Curtiss-Wright Corporation

  July 1929 to present

  United States of America

TYPE: Aircraft manufacturer

IATA/ICAO CODES: Nil

HEADQUARTERS: Buffalo, NY

FORMER NAME: Curtiss Aeroplane and Motor Company & Wright Aeronautical (merger)

SUBSEQUENT NAME: Nil

The Curtiss-Wright Corporation came into existence on 5 July 1929 as the result of a merger of 12 companies associated with Curtiss Aeroplane and Motor Company of Buffalo, New York, and Wright Aeronautical of Dayton, Ohio. With $75 million in capital (equivalent to 10.94 billion in 2018), it was the largest aviation company in the country. The corporation was a horizontally and vertically integrated holding made up of the following companies:

• Wright Aeronautical Corporation - engines manufacturer;
• Curtiss Aeroplane & Motor Company - aircraft manufacturer;
• Curtiss Airports Corporation - airport operator;
• Curtiss Flying Service - flight school & airline;
• Curtiss Aeroplane Export Company - aircraft broker;
• Curtiss-Caproni Corporation - aircraft manufacturer;
• Curtiss-Robertson Airplane Manufacturing Company - aircraft manufacturer;
• New York Air Terminals - airport operator;
• N.Y. & Suburban Airlines - airline;
• Keystone Aircraft Corporation - aircraft manufacturer.

There were three main divisions: the Curtiss-Wright Airplane Division, which manufactured airframes; the Wright Aeronautical Corporation, which produced aircraft engines; and the Curtiss-Wright Propeller Division, which manufactured propellers. After 1929, most engines produced by the new company were known as Wrights, while most aircraft were given the Curtiss name, with a few exceptions.

Throughout the 1930s', Curtiss-Wright designed and built aircraft for military, commercial, and private markets. But it was the Wright engine division and the longstanding relationship with the US military that would help the company through the difficult years of the Great Depression. In 1937, the company developed the P-36 fighter aircraft, resulting in the largest peacetime aircraft order ever given by the US Army Air Corps. Curtiss-Wright also sold the P-36 abroad, where they were used in the early days of World War II.

During World War II, Curtiss-Wright produced 142,840 aircraft engines, 146,468 electric propellers and 29,269 airplanes. Curtiss-Wright employed 180,000 workers, and ranked second among United States corporations in the value of wartime production contracts (behind only General Motors). Aircraft production included almost 14,000 P-40 fighters, over 3,000 Commandos, and later in the war over 7,000 SB2C Helldivers. Its most visible success came with the P-40, variously known as the Tomahawk, Kittyhawk, and Warhawk, which were built between 1940 and 1944 at the main production facilities in Buffalo, NY. During the war, a second large plant was added at Buffalo, followed by new plants at Columbus, OH, Saint Louis, MO and Louisville, KY. Engine and propeller production took place at plants in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Ohio.

In May 1942, the US government assigned Curtiss-Wright a defense production factory for wartime aircraft construction at Louisville, KY to produce the C-76 Caravan cargo plane, which was constructed mostly of wood, a non-priority war material. However, after difficulties with the C-76 (including a crash of a production model in mid-1943), as well as the realization that sufficient quantities of aluminum aircraft alloys would be available for war production, plans for large-scale C-76 production were rejected. The Louisville plant was converted to Commando production, eventually delivering 438 Commandos to supplement the roughly 2,500 Commandos produced at Buffalo.

From 1941 to 1943, the Curtiss Aeronautical plant in Lockland, OH produced aircraft engines under wartime contract destined for installation in USAAF aircraft. Wright officials at Lockland insisted on high engine production levels, resulting in a significant percentage of engines that did not meet Army Air Forces inspection standards. These defective engines were nevertheless approved by inspectors for shipment and installation in US military aircraft. After investigation, it was later revealed that Wright company officials at Lockland had conspired with civilian technical advisers and Army inspection officers to approve substandard or defective aircraft engines for military use. USAAF technical adviser Charles W. Bond was dismissed by the Army in 1943 for "gross irregularities in inspection procedure." Bond would later testify that he had been "wined and dined" by Wright company officials; one of those occasions was the night before Bond fired four USAAF engine inspectors that another inspector had described as "troublemakers." In 1944, three Army officers, Lt. Col. Frank Constantine Greulich of Detroit, former chief inspection officer for the Air Materiel Command, Major Walter A. Ryan of Detroit, former central states inspection officer, and Major William Bruckmann, a former Cincinnati brewer and resident Army inspections officer at the Wright plant in Lockland were charged with neglect of duty, conspiracy, and giving false testimony in a general court martial. All three men were later convicted of neglect of duty. The story of defective engines had reached investigators working for Senator Harry Truman's congressional investigative board, the Truman Commission, after several Wright aircraft assembly workers informed on the company; they would later testify under oath before Congress.

After the war, Curtiss-Wright failed to make the transition to design and production of jet aircraft, despite several attempts. During the war, the company had expended only small amounts on aircraft research and development, instead concentrating on incremental improvements in conventional aircraft already in wartime production. This was especially true in the first two years of the war. Curtiss' failure to research and develop more advanced wing and airframe designs provided an opening for North American, Bell, Lockheed, Northrop, and other US aircraft manufacturers to submit newer and more advanced aircraft designs. The P-60, the firm's last prop-driven fighter design, was merely an extrapolation of its 1930's P-36 Hawk, offering no advantage over other designs already in service. With the rapid development of jet engine technology and near-supersonic flight, this technological lag resulted in Curtiss losing a number of critical postwar military aircraft orders. The final nail in the coffin was the choice of the Northrop F-89 Scorpion over the XF-87 Blackhawk. After the F-87 was cancelled on 10 October 1948, Curtiss-Wright shut down its entire Aeroplane Division and sold the assets to North American Aviation.

Throughout the years, Curtiss-Wright has evolved away from the final assembly of finished aircraft, becoming a component manufacturer specialized in actuators, aircraft controls, valves, and surface treatment services. It is also a supplier to commercial nuclear power, nuclear navy systems and industrial vehicles for the oil and gas industries.

1943 to December 1959*

• Curtiss C-46A-50-CU Commando: 42-96805
• Curtiss C-46D-15-CU Commando: 44-77991 (NTU)
• Curtiss C-46D-20-CU Commando: 44-78517 (NTU)
• Curtiss C-46E-1-CS Commando: 43-47403 / N39636 (test aircraft then executive transport)