The largest manufacturers of naval aircraft on the East Coast were Grumman, Vought-Sikorsky¹, General Motors (GM Eastern Aircraft Division) and Martin. They built nearly every type of aircraft used by the U.S. Navy including carrier-borne fighters, bombers and patrol planes. Floyd Bennett Field became the operational hub for air ferry operations for these manufacturers as well as the command center for all naval air ferry operations in the United States. Ferry pilots were flown to the manufacturing plants where they picked up new planes and flew them to Floyd Bennett Field for testing and commissioning, and then delivered the planes to training bases and embarkation points across the country. In 1941 this process could take 10 days; by 1943 it had been reduced to 3 days insuring the expeditious delivery of aircraft. Over 46,000 new aircraft were commissioned into active service and delivered by two naval air ferry squadrons based at Floyd Bennett Field.
1. Using the scale in the bottom right hand corner of the map, answer the following questions:
2. What are at least three advantages that urban centers and cities might have offered to airplane manufacturers?
3. Why do you think the location of Naval Air Station New York (Floyd Bennett Field) contributed to its becoming the busiest naval air station in the United States during World War II?
¹ The Vought name was associated with two divisions of the United Aircraft Corporation located at the Stratford, Connecticut aircraft plant: the Chance-Vought Division and the Vought-Sikorsky Division. Both of these divisions are shown on Map 2. These two divisions were involved with the design and manufacture of the very important and successful Navy WWII fighter, the Vought F4U Corsair. This plane is often also referred to as the Chance-Vought F4U Corsair as well as the Vought F4U Corsair.
* The map on this screen has a resolution of 72 dots per inch (dpi), and therefore will print poorly. You can obtain a larger version of Map 2, but be aware that the file may take as much as 60 seconds to load with a 28.8K modem.