Chance Vought F4U Corsair in View

A Vought test pilot with a US Navy Vought F4U-1 Corsair BuNo 02172, parked at the Vought plant in Stratford, Connecticut, in 1942.

Vought-Sikorsky F4U-1 Corsair, 1942.

Vought-Sikorsky F4U-1 Corsair, 1942.

The F4U-1 Corsair "Ole 122" of VMF-111 Devil Dogs was the only individual U.S. warplane to be cited officially for "performance above and beyond the call of duty" during WWII. Over a 6 month period in 1944, "Ole 122" flew 80,000 miles in 100 combat missions and spent 400 hours in the air with never once having to turn back because of mechanical trouble. The citation also stated: "Were there blood in her fuel lines instead of one hundred octane, she would be wearing the Purple Heart." 

Captain Thomas M. “Tommy” Tomlinson, a former Wildcat fighter pilot, sits in the cockpit of his Chance Vought F4U-1 Corsair fighter on Guadalcanal.

Captain Bruce Porter in the cockpit of his F4U Corsair.

Rex Buren Beisel, designer of the F4U-1 Corsair, at left, with Corsair pilot Major Gregory Boyington, USMCR, circa 1942.

F4U Corsairs in flight on the West Coast, probably over Los Alamitos, California, March 1942.  (U.S. Navy photograph #80-G-425130)

Chance Vought F4U Corsair.

Chance Vought F4U-1 Corsair. The F4U was a single-seat single-engine shipboard interceptor and fighter-bomber developed for the U.S. Navy and first flown in May 1940. It was the first U.S. fighter to exceed 400 miles per hour in level flight. In the Pacific, Corsairs destroyed 2,140 Japanese aircraft at a loss of only 189.

A Goodyear-produced FG-1D Corsair, a license-built Vought F4U-1D.

F4U-1 Corsair #252 (possibly that of 1/Lt. William ‘Bill” Boshart) VMF 224, Marine Corps 4th Marines Aircraft Wing, Majuro Airstrip, Marshall Islands. Planes being readied for fighter patrol due to radar picking up Japanese bombers headed for the Palau Island group, Peleliu, September 19th 1944.

Chance Vought F4U Corsair.

Chance Vought F4U-1 Corsair.

A Marine fighter pilot climbs aboard his F4U-1 Corsair at Guadalcanal's Henderson Field.

Four of VMF-323’s Chance Vought F4U-1 Corsairs in echelon formation over southern California. They carry numbers K91, K87, K88, and K77 on their fuselage sides below the cockpit.

Chance Vought F4U Corsairs on patrol in the Pacific.

U.S. Navy Vought F4U-1 Corsairs of Fighter Squadron 17 (VF-17) "Jolly Rogers" in flight, in 1943.

Chance Vought F4U Corsair on catapult launch wing folds due to not being properly locked before take-off. Pilot 1st Lt. Loren Grover was killed.

Chance Vought F4U-1D Corsair.

Attaching an R-2800 Double Wasp engine to an F4U Corsair at the Vought factory in Stratford Connecticut, 1943.

Chance Vought F4U Corsair.

Chance Vought F4U Corsair with pilot in cockpit with at least 35 dive bombing mission markings.

Chance Vought F4U Corsairs of VP-17 over the South Pacific, 1943.

A Marine F4U Corsair ready for takeoff from an Essex-class carrier on February 27, 1945.

F4U Corsair testing rocket-assisted takeoff from an aircraft carrier in September 1944.

F4U-4 Corsair in flight over the US in July 1945.

F4U-1 Corsair at Naval Air Station Patuxent River in Maryland.

Marine F4U Corsair firing a full load of rockets at Japanese positions on Okinawa.

Vought F4U Corsair in the South Pacific.

F4U Corsair in 1944.

F4U Corsair landing on an aircraft carrier.

F4U Corsair.

F4U Corsairs, F6F Hellcats, SBD Dauntlesses and TBM Avengers on an aircraft carrier preparing for launching.

Vought XF4U-1.

Goodyear FG-1 Corsairs at the company’s Akron, Ohio, plant.

Goodyear built Corsair FG-1D cn 3305 at Wings Over Wairarapa show. Notice the clipped wing tips, a characteristic of the British Corsairs flown off aircraft carriers.

Shown is a Pratt & Whitney R-2800-8 engine in a Goodyear FG-1 Corsair. Shot June 2005 at "Corsairs Over Connecticut" airshow. Rated at 2,000hp 417mph @ 19,900ft.

Goodyear F2G-1 Corsair.

Royal Navy Vought Corsair Mk. I fighters at Naval Air Station Brunswick, Maine, where Royal Navy pilots were trained on the Corsair, in 1943.

Vought F4U-1 Corsair. Eloquent head-on view of Rex Beisel’s team handiwork. How they handled the complication of how to accommodate a huge prop without using a long undercarriage. The unmistakable beauty of the inverted gull-wing of this early Corsair.

2nd Lt Alton Frazer somehow got his Corsair back to base.

Goodyear FG-1 Corsairs. The large white buzz numbers on the nose probably indicate these are being flown in the U.S. for training purposes.

Goodyear FG-1D Corsair, 2nd Marine Air Division.

VMF-121 on 11 May 1943: First Row (left to right): Leeds, Klas, Pierce, McPherson, Rodes, Harlan. Second row: Snee, Schmitt, McCardy, Gordon, Porter, Morace. Third row: McEvoy, Trenchard, Barron, Baker, Wilcox, Schneider, Bryson. Fourth row (standing): Andre, Linde, Vroome, Hay, Whittiker, Shuman, Ford.

Vought V-166B XF4U-1 (1443) US Navy.

Vought V-166B XF4U-1 (1443) US Navy.

Fleet Air Arm Corsair fighters & Barracuda torpedo bombers on the flight deck of HMS Formidable off Norway, July 1944.