A 1917 Curtiss JN-4D is the centerpiece of an Oregon museum’s collection of flying antiques.
Visitors to the Columbia River Gorge area might be surprised to find a vast 95,000-square-foot aviation museum tucked away on the outskirts of the bustling little town of Hood River, Ore. With 75 beautifully restored aircraft, not to mention more than 100 classic cars, there’s enough vintage hardware at the Western Antique Aeroplane and Automobile Museum to keep aviation buffs captivated for hours.
This remarkable collection is the longtime project of president and founder Terry Brandt. “I spent 50 years gathering up the airplanes that are in the museum,” he explained. “I donated and restored 42 of them, and the rest have been donated by other people.” Among the collection’s highlights is one of the world’s largest fleets of flyable aircraft using 3-cylinder radial engines and Curtiss OX-5s. Most of the museum’s airplanes date from between 1917 and the end of World War II, including such rarities as a 1928 American Eagle, a 1931 Curtiss Wright 12W and a 1937 Aeronca LC. For many aviation aficionados, however, the museum’s flagship, a 1917 Cur – tiss JN-4D Jenny, is the sentimental favorite. Only seven Jennys are still airworthy, but what makes this a truly rare bird is its serial number: It’s D Model number 1, and one of only two JN-4Ds actively flying today.
Built by the Curtiss Aeroplane Company, the JN series was intended primarily for use as trainers by the U.S. Army and Navy. Fully 95 percent of all American and Canadian World War I pilots learned to fly in the Jenny during eight-week training sessions, logging about 50 hours of flying time.
The JN series was the first mass-produced warplane in the United States, with 6,813 built. Jennys began rolling off the production line in 1916, only 13 years after the Wright brothers’ first powered flight. Fitted with a 90-hp Curtiss OX-5 liquid-cooled V8 engine, the JN-4 had a top speed of 75 mph—slow even for its day.
With a stall speed of 35 mph, there wasn’t much room for error. In fact, about 20 percent of all Jennys built were destroyed during flight training. But given the speeds at which they crashed, many pilots were in good enough shape to walk back to base after their mishaps. Despite these difficulties, the bi – plane’s excellent combination of stability and maneuverability made it ideal for combat training. Although the Jenny never saw active service in Europe, it is still fondly remembered as North America’s most famous World War I airplane.
When that war ended, Curtiss’ JN series became the backbone of American postwar aviation. The U.S. Postal Service used many Jennys for mail delivery, and they were still flying for the Forest Service and surveying companies into the 1930s. The biplane was also in great demand for barnstorming and stunt flying during that period. Many blackand-white movies from the time featuring wing-walkers and trapeze artists were filmed using Jennys.
The museum’s 1917 Jenny, N1282, was acquired in 2005 from a friend of Ray Wat – kins, a lifelong aviation enthusiast who grew up near Dayton, Ohio, and knew many early aviators. Watkins’ friend inherited the aircraft after his death. The plane had been stored in a barn in East Liberty, Ohio, since 1926, which explains its excellent condition. It had been stripped and disassembled, but according to chief restorer Tom Murphy, “She was in amazingly good condition, especially the wood fittings.” Terry Brandt recalled: “There wasn’t any great difficulty restoring the Jenny. There was a lot of resanding, renailing, regluing, re – pairing and refabricing, all done by hand. Because the airplane was so original it was important that we did it that way.”
Some missing parts had to be fabricated, such as the nose blocks, the leading edges and gusset blocks in the horizontal stabilizer and the trailing edges of the elevator and wings. Incredibly, however, the Jenny was restored using 98 percent original materials, including wood, bracing wires, OX-5 engine, propeller and wheels. It is covered in Irish linen, part of a stock of aircraft parts that had been owned by the grandfather of Jeremy Young, the museum’s first director. The restoration, which cost $400,000, took two years and three months, finishing up in September 2007, just in time for the museum’s grand opening. Of the dozens of planes he’s worked on, Murphy said the Jenny was his favorite project.
At the museum’s opening day celebration, Brandt marked the occasion by taking the Jenny’s controls during its return to the air. Looking back on that 10-minute flight, he enthused: “It flew better than I expected! Climbed out at a solid 1,400 rpm and handled like the trainer it is.”
Almost all of the 75 aircraft currently on display at the Oregon museum are flightworthy (another 20 or so are in various stages of restoration). Planes are flown on a rotating basis, with flights usually taking place on the second Saturday of each month, when visitors can also watch some of the antique automobiles being taken through their paces. For information on special events, operating hours and directions to the Western Antique Aeroplane and Automobile Museum, visit waaamuseum.org.
If you’re in the Hood River area, also note that just 20 miles away there’s another 1917 Jenny on display. This one is hanging from the ceiling of the Columbia Gorge Interpretive Center Museum in Stevenson, Wash. It was found in pieces in Spokane and rebuilt by Wally Olson. For information on that museum, go to columbiagorge.org.
Originally published in the September 2010 issue of Aviation History. To subscribe, click here.
