Beech Aircraft, Wichita

Beech Aircraft (original name: Beechcraft) was founded in Wichita, Kansas in April, 1932 by Walter H. Beech and his wife Olive Ann Mellor Beech. Working out of leased space in the shuttered Cessna factory, Beech and his team of workers, including famous designer Ted Wells, built a 5-seat luxury sedan biplane with an enclosed cabin, a recessed upper wing, and a top speed of 240 mph using Wright engines, called the Model 17. Its first flight was on November 4, 1932. It was called the Staggerwing because the top wing was staggered behind the bottom wing. This plane set the standard for private passenger airplanes for many years. After receiving orders for several dozen of this biplane, Beech leased his original Travel Air factory from Curtiss-Wright and moved his operation to the larger building. The financial success of the Model 17 enabled Beech to begin work on his second design, a radically different twin-engine monoplane called the Model 18. The seven-seat Model 18, or Twin Beech, had a more impressive duration and payload characteristics than the Model 17. The military ordered the Model 17 as the C-43 and the Model 18 as the C-45 for use as cargo transports and bomber, navigator, and gunnery trainers beginning in 1939 and throughout the war. ^Funding

Employment at the Beech factory rose from 235 employees to more than 2,000 during World War II.In addition to the C-45, Beech turned out a wood-frame training plane to conserve aluminum for combat aircraft, called the AT-10. By the end of the war in 1945, Beech had turned out 7,400 military aircraft and its employment stood at 14,000. The company was awarded 5 Army/Navy "E" citations for excellence in efficiency by the War Production Board. As many as 90% of all American war pilots were trained in Beech-built aircraft. ^Funding