Piper - Cub

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The Piper J-3 ‘Cub’ was a small, light, and simple aircraft built between 1938 and 1947. With tandem (fore and aft) seating, it was intended for flight training but became one of the most popular and best-known light aircraft of all time. The Cub\'s simplicity, affordability, and popularity invoked comparisons to the Ford Model T automobile. Its standard yellow paint came to be known as “Cub Yellow” or "Lock Haven Yellow."

Pre-war

The Taylor E-2 Cub first appeared in 1930, built by Taylor Aircraft in Bradford, Pennsylvania. Sponsored by William T. Piper, a Bradford industrialist who had invested in the company, the E-2 was meant to be an affordable airplane that would encourage interest in aviation. Later in 1930, the company went bankrupt, with Piper buying the assets but keeping Taylor on as president. In 1936 an earlier Cub was altered by employee Walter Jamouneau to become the J-2 – hence the J[1] – while C. Gilbert Taylor was on sick leave; when he saw the redesign, Taylor was so incensed that he fired Jamouneau. Piper, however, had encouraged Jamouneau\'s changes, and promptly hired him back. Piper then bought Taylor\'s share in the company, paying him $250 per month for three years.

Although sales were initially slow, about 1,200 J-2s were produced before a fire in the Piper factory ended its production in 1938. After Piper moved his company from Bradford to Lock Haven the J-3, which featured further changes by Jamouneau, replaced the J-2. Powered by a 40 horsepower (30 kW) engine, in 1938 it sold for just over $1,000.

The outbreak of hostilities in Europe in 1939, coupled with the growing realization that the United States might soon be drawn into World War II, resulted in the formation of the Civilian Pilot Training Program (CPTP). The Piper J-3 Cub would play an integral role in the success of the CPTP, achieving legendary status in the process.

The Piper J-3 Cub became the primary trainer aircraft of the CPTP — 75 percent of all new pilots in the CPTP (from a total of 435,165 graduates) were trained in Cubs. By war\'s end, 80 percent of all United States military pilots received their initial flight training in Piper Cubs. The need for new pilots created an insatiable appetite for Piper Cubs. In 1940, the year before the United States\' entry into the war, 3,016 Cubs were built; soon, wartime demands would increase that production rate to one Piper J-3 Cub being built every 20 minutes.

World War II service

The Piper Cub was quickly becoming a familiar sight to the average citizen. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt took a flight in a J-3 Cub, posing for a series of publicity photos to help promote the CPTP. Newsreels and newspapers of the era often featured images of wartime leaders, such as Generals Dwight Eisenhower, George Patton and George Marshall, flying around the battlefields of Europe in Piper Cubs. Civilian-owned Cubs quickly joined the war effort, patrolling the Eastern Seaboard and Gulf Coasts in a constant search for German U-boats and survivors of U-boat attacks, as part of the newly formed Civil Air Patrol (CAP).

Piper developed a military variant ("All we had to do," Bill Jr. is quoted as saying, "was paint the Cub olive drab to produce a military airplane"),[2] variously designated as the L-4, O-59 and NE-1. The variety of models were collectively nicknamed “Grasshoppers” and were used extensively in World War II for reconnaissance, transporting supplies and medical evacuation.[3] L-4s were also sometimes equipped with lashed-on infantry bazookas for ground attack. Mechanically identical to the J-3, the military versions were equipped with large Plexiglas windows extending over the top of the wing and behind the rear-seat passenger, and the side windows were enlarged as well. The Grasshopper was so influential to ground battles and the war that the Luftwaffe awarded twice as many \'points\' towards combat medals for Cub kills as they did for Allied fighter aircraft.[2]

After the war, most L-4s were destroyed or sold as surplus, but a few saw service in the Korean War. The Grasshoppers sold as surplus in the U.S. were redesignated as J-3s, but often retained their wartime glazing and paint.