Glenn L. Martin Company
5 types · 0 airframes
Pre-1950 Narrative
Narrative coming soon.
Aircraft Types
Martin B-10
The Martin B-10 was an all-metal monoplane bomber built by the Glenn L. Martin Company of Baltimore and first flown in 1932. Funded by the company as a private venture, the prototype outpaced the Army Air Corps' biplane fighters at its trials and earned Glenn L. Martin the 1932 Collier Trophy; the type became the Air Corps' standard bomber of the mid-1930s. Exported as the Model 139, it saw combat in Chinese and Dutch service against Japan. One intact example survives, an ex-Argentine Navy aircraft on display at the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force.
Martin B-26 Marauder
The Martin B-26 Marauder was a twin-engine medium bomber built by the Glenn L. Martin Company, first flown in 1940. Designed for speed around a small, heavily loaded wing, it demanded fast takeoffs and landings and suffered many training accidents early on, earning a grim reputation and Congressional scrutiny. Retraining and design changes made it an effective tactical bomber: Marauder crews flew more than 100,000 sorties, mainly against Germany, and the type ended the war with the lowest loss rate of any Allied bomber the Army Air Forces flew. Martin built 5,266, and few survive; the best known is the Smithsonian's Flak-Bait.
Martin P3M
The Martin P3M was a twin-engined parasol-monoplane patrol flying boat built by the Glenn L. Martin Company for the U.S. Navy. It was the production version of Consolidated's XPY-1, the Navy's first monoplane flying boat: Consolidated built and flew the prototype, but Martin won the contract to build it in quantity by underbidding its creator. Only nine were built, three P3M-1s and six P3M-2s, and after a short front-line life the improved Consolidated P2Y displaced the type into training and utility duties.
Martin PBM Mariner
The Martin PBM Mariner was a twin-engined patrol flying boat built by the Glenn L. Martin Company for the United States Navy. First flown in February 1939 and in squadron service from October 1940, it was larger and faster than the Consolidated Catalina it supplemented, and by the end of the Second World War it had taken over many of the older boat's duties. Mariners hunted U-boats in the Atlantic, flew patrol, bombing and rescue missions across the Pacific, and served on into the Korean War; the last operational Mariner retired from the Coast Guard in 1958. Martin built 1,366, and a single PBM-5A survives, displayed at Tucson on loan from the Smithsonian.
Martin XB-48
Six-jet medium bomber prototype from the Glenn L. Martin Company, first flown on 22 June 1947. The XB-48 was one of the "Class of '45" designs drawn from the War Department's 1944 requirement: it paired six early, low-thrust J35 turbojets — three in each of two wide nacelles — with a straight-wing airframe in the B-26 Marauder tradition, and it was the first aircraft designed with bicycle-type tandem landing gear. Boeing's swept-wing B-47 outperformed it, development continued only as a backup, and the type was canceled in 1948 with two prototypes built and no production. Its landing-gear arrangement passed on to the B-47 and B-52.