North American Aviation and GM
Clement Melville Keys founded North American on December 6, 1928, as a holding company that bought and sold interests in various airlines and aviation related companies. However, the Air Mail Act of 1934 forced the breakup of such holding companies. The upshot was that North American became a manufacturing company run by James H. “Dutch” Kindelberger (who had been recruited from Douglas Aircraft Company), although it retained Eastern Air Lines until 1938.
General Motors Corporation took a controlling interest in North American Aviation and merged it with its General Aviation division in 1933, but retaining the name North American Aviation.
Kindelberger moved the company’s operations to southern California, which allowed flying year-round, and decided to focus on training aircrafts, on the theory that it would be easier than trying to compete with established companies. Its first planes were the GA-15 observation plane and the GA-16 trainer, followed by the O-47 and BT-9. The BC-1 was North Americans first combat aircraft.
Like other manufactures, North American started gearing up for war in 1940, opening factories in Columbus, Ohio, Dallas, Texas, and Kansas City, Kansas.
North American’s follow-on to the BT-9 was the T-6 Texan trainer, of which 17,000 were built, making it the most widely used trainer ever. The twin engine B-25 Mitchell bomber achieved fame in the Doolittle Raid and was used in all theaters. The A-36 Apache was developed as a ground attack aircraft and dive bomber. Originally powered by an Allison engine, a suggestion by the RAF (Royal Air Force) that North American switch to the Rolls-Royce Merlin may have been one if the most significant events in WWII aviation, as it produced the P-51 Mustang, considered by many to be the best American fighter of the war.
Post-war, North American employment dropped from a high of 91,000 to 5,000 in 1946. Two years later in 1948, General Motors divested North American Aviation as a public company.
Through a series of mergers and sales, in 1996 North American Aviation became a part of Boeing.
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