Fairchild FC-2
The Fairchild FC-2 was an American single-engine, high-wing cabin monoplane of the late 1920s, the production version of the FC-1 that Sherman Fairchild had designed in-house because no existing aircraft suited his aerial photography and survey business. Its enclosed, extensively glazed cabin, folding wings and choice of wheel, ski or float undercarriages made it a versatile utility aircraft: it flew airmail, passengers and freight, and Fairchild FC-2s, 2Ws and 2W2s did much of the flying that opened up the Canadian North. The family was developed into the Models 51 and 61 and, through them, the Model 71.
Why It Mattered
The FC-2 began as a camera platform: Sherman Fairchild, finding that no aircraft then available met the requirements of his aerial-survey work, had a purpose-built aeroplane designed and built in-house at Farmingdale, New York. The prototype FC-1 first flew on 14 June 1926, and the design was put into production in 1927 in slightly revised form as the FC-2. Its enclosed cabin protected crew and camera equipment on long, high flights, and the qualities that made a good survey aircraft soon carried the type into bush flying, airmail delivery, passenger flights and freight hauling. In Canada, Fairchild FC-2s, 2Ws and 2W2s performed much of the work of opening up the North in the 1920s and 1930s.
Design Notes
The FC-2 was a strut-braced, high-wing monoplane whose fully enclosed cabin was extensively glazed, giving the pilot and photographer the wide field of view and the stability that high-altitude camera work demanded. The cabin was closed and heated, which the Smithsonian notes was unusual for the time, and the fuselage narrowed at the pilot's window. Its wooden wings folded back against the tail: two men could fold the 44-foot span down to a 13-foot package in about two minutes, and in the Arctic the folded aircraft could be sheltered under a small snow fence and a tarpaulin. Early production aircraft, built with an unusual three-longeron rear fuselage, gained the nickname "Razorback"; a more conventional four-longeron structure followed in later machines. Buyers could choose among several powerplants, and among wheeled, ski or float undercarriages, and the Wasp-engined FC-2W line added span and power for cargo work. The basic design was later evolved into the Models 51 and 61, and the 61's redesigned cabin was retained in the better-known Model 71.
Operational History
The FC-2 series entered production on 1 June 1927, and the first production example was procured by the U.S. Department of Commerce to accompany Lindbergh on his goodwill tour of the United States. On 19 October 1927 the float-equipped FC-2 La Niña, piloted by Cy Caldwell, flew Pan American's first contract airmail between Key West and Havana, standing in by proxy for the airline's own aircraft. Another FC-2 made the first New York–Miami nonstop flight in January 1928, and that year Charles Collyer and John Mears flew City of New York around the world over the route's land portions, shipping the aircraft across the oceans. In South America, an FC-2 flown for Pan American-Grace Airways made the first scheduled passenger flight in Peru, from Lima to Talara on 13 September 1928, carrying five people including the pilot. In Canada, two FC-2W2s were the first to reach the Junkers Bremen after it came down in the Strait of Belle Isle in 1928, and FC-2W-2s flew Canada's first international passenger service, between Montreal and New York. The Royal Canadian Air Force used its Fairchilds chiefly for photographic surveys and communication, standardising on the Lynx-engined FC-2L for its northern work. The Smithsonian calls the most famous individual Fairchild the FC-2W Stars and Stripes, the first aeroplane to fly on the continent of Antarctica, with Byrd's 1928 expedition; left in the ice, it was recovered, refurbished and flown again by the second expedition four years later. Production is best given by variant, and the accountings stay separate: Wikipedia lists 118 FC-2s, plus twelve built by Canadian Vickers under licence, fourteen FC-2Ws and thirty-one Model 51s, while Ingenium records around thirty FC-2W2s produced in 1928.
Afterlife
The National Air and Space Museum displays its Pan American-Grace Airways FC-2 in the America by Air exhibition in Washington, D.C.; the airline sent the aircraft to the museum from Lima in 1949. Portions of Stars and Stripes also survive in the Smithsonian's collection, much of that airframe later supplying parts to other FC-2s, and the aircraft is reported on display at the Udvar-Hazy Center in Virginia. The Canada Aviation and Space Museum's FC-2W2, used for aerial surveys until the early 1940s and donated to the museum in 1962, is displayed in the markings of a Canadian Transcontinental Airways aircraft in the museum's Northern and Bush Flight exhibition. The type's place in Canadian memory is such that volunteers at the Montreal Aviation Museum built a nearly exact replica FC-2 from original drawings as their first completed aircraft, described by Vintage Aviation News as a symbol of early bush flying.