Unique Aircraft In Storage For Six Years Needs A Home

An antique American Eaglet (file photo of type below) on display in Kansas City's Charles B. Wheeler Downtown during the 1990's now sits moldering in a garage since 2000. The city disassembled it for storage to make room for expansion of one of the airport's tenants.

After six years, city Councilman Bill Skaggs (also chairman of the council's Aviation Committee) is pushing an initiative to find the old flyer a new home.

Skaggs told the Columbia Daily Tribune, "It is part of Kansas City history. It was manufactured here, and it needs to be brought out and put on display."

Originally designed by American Eagle Airplane Corporation in the late '20s, the two-seat Eaglet was intended to be "everyman's" airplane. The plane's designers, Douglas Webber and Noel Hockaday, used a 25-horsepower two-stroke engine in the prototype, which was damaged during a crash landing. The aircraft was refitted with a 30-horsepower Szekely three-cylinder radial engine and became the Model 230. Other models of the aircraft used a 45-horsepower Szekely, and a 40-horsepower Salmson.

American Eagle Airplane Corporation closed its doors during the great depression. It's rumored the Eaglet's type certificate was purchased by another company intending to bring it back into production, but so far that hasn't happened

Kansas City's example was built in 1930 at American Eagle Airplane's factory at the now closed Fairfax Airport across the river from Wheeler Downtown. The airport languished during the depression years before it was bought by the US Army during WWII. Eventually, the airport closed in 1985 when GM bought it and built an assembly plant on it.

According to its last owner, retired American Airlines captain Gene Morris, the Eaglet now in a storage garage in Kansas City crashed shortly after it was originally purchased in Syracuse, NY back in 1930. Morris saw it years later rotting on the roof of a chicken coop in Montana. He bought it, restored it and flew it for a number of years before giving it to the city in 1991.

Wheeler Downtown airport director Mike Roper says Morris asked only that the aircraft be displayed publicly indoors.

Now, says Roper, "We have no" public "facility here that is large enough to hold it."

Because the aircraft is no longer on display, Morris, now 77 and living in Roanoke, TX, is considering taking the aircraft back.

"A museum is where it belongs," Morris said.

The city is considering displaying the aircraft in Union Station, an option that Morris says would make him happy. But, engineers must determine if there is room enough and if the structure can support the aircraft's weight.

Photo courtesy of Denis Arbeau.

FMI: www.kcmo.org/council.nsf/council/home