THE GOONEY TURNS 90

Still one of the most important transport aircraft of all time

- BY GEOFF JONES

This C-47 Sky Train has a unique Mediterranean theater paint scheme and operated out of U.S. air bases in North Africa, Sicily, and Italy. It might have the most service of all the Commemorative Air Force's veteran WW II aircraft! Its history includes flying special ops units during the war to flying food to orphans. You can find it today flying at the Arizona Air Base of the CAF, with the bullet holes that prove its combat pedigree. (Photo by Jim Hazeltine)

Most iconic air transport of all time? The Concorde, Boeing 747, and DeHavilland Comet are all candidates, but the hands-down winner has to be the Douglas DC-3. Briefly: more built than any other air transport (16,079), longevity (80 years since first flight in 1935 and still flying), design innovation (combination of engines and airframe) and, probably more important than anything else, its public perception and appeal. Because of the DC-3, air transport was suddenly acceptable to the masses and became what it is today.

A COMPLICATED GENEALOGY is to be expected with such a huge production, including construction in Russia and Japan, with its adoption as a military transport during World War II as the C-47, the main reason for the production number. Then there were the names, mainly adopted during its military career: Skytrain, Skytrooper, Dakota, Gooney Bird, Spooky, Charlie Forty Seven, etc., an immediate mark of the affection in which the aircraft was held by airmen and troops. General Dwight D. Eisenhower encapsulated the importance of the Douglas C-47, “...one of the four pieces of equipment most vital to the Allies’ success in Africa and Europe in WWII.” But like all good stories it was a twist of fate that helped secure this iconic status and a good old raft of commercial one-upmanship.

At the beginning