History
Aero was formed in Culver City, California in 1944 to design and manufacture a light twin-engined transport aircraft. Ted Smith, a former project engineer at Douglas Aircraft Company, assembled a team of 14 engineers to design what would be the Aero Commander. Preliminary design was completed in 1946. The first prototype took flight on April 23, 1948, and was certified by the Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) in June, 1950. Three men funded the company's early efforts: Philadelphia attorney George Pew and Oklahoma City brothers William and Rufus Travis Amis.
In September 1950 it became the "Aero Design and Engineering Company" of Oklahoma. Its facilities consisted of an aircraft hangar and 26,000 sq ft (2,400 m2) manufacturing facility located at what is now Wiley Post Airport near Oklahoma City. In August 1951, the first production Aero Commander, the piston-powered model 520, rolled off the assembly line. In 1954, the 520 was replaced by the 560 and 560A featuring a larger cabin and more powerful Lycoming piston engines. In 1955, the U.S. Air Force selected the Aero Commander as the personal transport for President Dwight D. Eisenhower, ordering 15 aircraft, two of which were used by The White House. In 1958, the Company introduced the first pressurized business aircraft in the form of the model 720 Alti-Cruiser.
The company was acquired by Rockwell-Standard in 1958. The aircraft added fuel injection engines and other modifications to increase performance, resulting in the 1960 introduction of the Twin Commander. With the advent of the small gas turbine engine, the 680 T model was released in 1964, followed by the 690 series in 1971, and the JetProp series in 1979.
The company later incorporated other aircraft types developed at smaller companies and marketed them as components of the Aero Commander line. It also developed a two-engined business jet, the 1121 Jet Commander, but sold the manufacturing rights to Israel Aircraft Industries (IAI), who produced it as the Westwind.
In February 1981, Rockwell International sold the Aero Commander division to Gulfstream Aerospace. The final Twin Commander model 1000, released in the early 1980s, was powered by Dash 10 engines. In December 1985, Gulfstream Aerospace was acquired by Chrysler Corp. With a new focus on the business jet market, production of the Twin Commander ended in 1986.
In 1989 the Twin Commander Aircraft subsidiary of Gulfstream was acquired by Precision Aerospace Corporation. With this acquisition, the company transformed from an aircraft manufacturer to an OEM parts, service and support provider. In 2003, the company was reincorporated as Twin Commander Aircraft, LLC. In 2005 the company was acquired from Precision in a management buyout.
Read more about this topic: Aero Commander
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“In nature, all is useful, all is beautiful. It is therefore beautiful, because it is alive, moving, reproductive; it is therefore useful, because it is symmetrical and fair. Beauty will not come at the call of a legislature, nor will it repeat in England or America its history in Greece. It will come, as always, unannounced, and spring up between the feet of brave and earnest men.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“English history is all about men liking their fathers, and American history is all about men hating their fathers and trying to burn down everything they ever did.”
—Malcolm Bradbury (b. 1932)
“For a transitory enchanted moment man must have held his breath in the presence of this continent, compelled into an aesthetic contemplation he neither understood nor desired, face to face for the last time in history with something commensurate to his capacity for wonder.”
—F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940)