Veronico - Hidden warbirds : the epic stories of finding, recovering, and rebuilding WWIIs lost aircraft

The United States had built more than three hundred thousand planes between 1941 and 1945. At the close of World War II, the military had more than twenty-five thousand aircraft that were surplus to its postwar needs. The planes were parked on fields across the United States, Europe, and islands in the Pacific. Learning from its mistakes after World War I, the U.S. government was careful not to flood the market with surplus aircraft and sold a relatively few tactical aircraft types to civilian operators. It did, however, release huge amounts of single- and multi-engine trainers. The remaining tactical aircraft were scrapped, including more than twenty-one thousand sold in a bulk sale in June 1946. These aircraft were parked at Kingman, Arizona; Walnut Ridge, Arkansas; Ontario, California; Albuquerque, New Mexico; and Clinton, Oklahoma. Once the sale had concluded, the scrapping contractors were given from eighteen to twenty-four months to clear the fields. Americas aerial armada, the likes of which the world has not seen since 1945, was reduced to aluminum ingots to feed the demands of the postwar economy.

A number of warbirds sat unnoticed into the late 1950s and early 1960s at trade schools such as the Northrop Technical Institute near Los Angeles Mines Field (todays Los Angeles International Airport). There is a B-24M, B-25H, and P-61 in the foreground with a training glider, C-78, and BT-13 facing the hangar. In between the hangars can be seen a P-61 fuselage and center section and an AT-6. Gerald Balzer Collection

Ed Maloney from The Air Museum-Planes of Fame rescued B-17F 42-3374 from the MGM film studio when it was divesting itself of everything on Backlot Number Five.

Of the World War II fighters that escaped the scrappers torch, most were sold to pilots interested in competing in the National Air Races at Cleveland, Ohio. The races had been held Labor Day weekend in the years leading up to World War II. The last prewar race was held in 1939, as conflict in Europe canceled the 1940 air races and those for the duration of the war.

While the United States demobilized from World War II, the announcement was made that the National Air Races would resume in 1946. Pilots with the financial wherewithal could purchase a surplus P-38, P-39 or P-40 for $1,250, and a P-51 for $3,500. Once title was acquired, the fighters were flown home and stripped of all military equipment.

Former World War II fighters were involved in two different types of competition at the 1946 National Air Racescross-country and closed-course. The cross-country race, sponsored by the Bendix Company and known as the Bendix Trophy Race, started at Van Nuys, California (a Los Angeles suburb), and ended at the race site in Cleveland. Twenty-two aircraft showed up to race in the cross-country dash, including fourteen Lockheed P-38s, four North American P-51s, a pair of Bell P-63s, one Goodyear FG-1D Corsair, and a Douglas A-26. Paul Mantz won the race in a P-51C Mustang with an average speed of 435.50 mphan unheard of speed when compared to those of the prewar racers.

The closed-course race consisted of ten laps of a thirty-mile course laid out over the suburbs of Cleveland. The field for the 1946 race consisted of one P-38 and one P-39, four P-51s, four P-63s, and a lone FG-1D Corsair. Alvin Tex Johnston took the checkered flag with an average speed of 373.908 mph.