Name that Bearcat

[Victor Archer]

My Dad shot a series of air to air photos of this Bearcat in the mid to late '50's. I was wondering if any one knows what ever became of this plane. On the tail is: F-8-F-1 Bearcat, the # is N3351, under the canopy looks like E. D. Weiner Los Angles.
I think he still has some color photos, I'll see what I can dig up.

[AAFO_WSagar]

Please Keep It Comin'!

I have no idea which airplane this is, or the history therein, but, PLEASE, keep it coming!

I eat this sort of stuff up and I'm sure most who visit here do also!

Great photo. I'd love to hear the story of this airplane and where it is now. PRAY that it did not become beer cans!

Wayne

[P51]

The Bearcat was owned by E.D.Weiner and based at Long Beach, CA in the late 60's. The plane was then sold and flown by Gunther Balz during the 70's and is now owned by the Kalamazoo Air Zoo in Kalamazoo, MI.

Currently registered as N9G, it suffered a gear up landing after an engine failure in 1995 and has been rebuilt. Maintained in airworthy condition none of the Air Zoo aircraft have flown for 2-3 years - citing high insurance costs.

[T. Adams]

Zoo Grounded??

Wow, I wondered what happened to all of their aircraft. They did some of the finest restorations I had ever seen. I used to go to the airshow held there just about every year. I wondered why there had not been a show the last few years. That's really to bad, all of their aircraft are outstanding.

[Leo]

BEARCAT

My photos, etc. are still packed so I can't look it up, but was'nt N9G at Reno in the early 80's, fielded by the Whittingtons?

Leo

[speeddemon]

N9G's last race was at Cape May, NJ in 1971. When Gunther purchased Miss RJ from Chuck Hall, the Bearcat was put away.

The Whittington's Bearcat was actually the one raced by Walt Olrich as Tom's Cat and Miss Priss, then as John Herlihy as "Sweet P". Whittingtons raced it under several guises for a few years, then it went into storage, made an 'appearance' at Reno '88, but didn't race. Got sold overseas, and then returned to the states. It is currently Bill Anders Wampus Cat.

[Leo]

Far away

I was'nt even close!
Thanks speeddemon.
Unpacking my race stuff just got notched up on the priority list....

[Victor Archer]

This is becoming very interesting. Thanks to everyone for all the info so far. After reading the posts I went digging. Looks like ED Weiner raced Mustangs but I could not find anything on him racing the Bearcat.
Gunther Balz raced an F8F-1 Bearcat at Reno in 1969 and 1970 fininishing 6th in '69 and 5th in '70, Gunther went on to win Reno in '72 in the Roto Finish Special P-51 and guess who was the crew chief and engine builder was, Dwight Thorn! This is cool, looks like Gunther built one of John Parkers Thunder Mustangs, oops sorry going in too many diffrent directions.
Does anyone have any photos of the Bearcat that Gunther raced in '69 and '70 ? and is it the same Bearcat in the origional post.
My Dad started taking photos in the late '40's. From the '50's through the 'early '70's he photographed lots of warbirds all over California and the mid west, any one interested in seeing more?

[speeddemon]

E.D. owned a lot of warbirds in the '60's....including the two Mustang racers, a T-6, the Bearcat shown in the picture, AND the P-39 N40A that later became Mr. Mennen, and is now in the Air Zoo collection.

But only the Mustangs ever raced.

[rpzo]

More!!!

My Dad started taking photos in the late '40's. From the '50's through the 'early '70's he photographed lots of warbirds all over California and the mid west, any one interested in seeing more?

Maurader,

I vote that you show us more.

Rick

[Reever]

Re: More!!!

Originally posted by rpzo
Maurader,

I vote that you show us more.

Rick

That's two votes!

Please please, show more!

Reever

[Victor Archer]

Here is the Bearcat in color. I got to look at some of my Dad's slides over Thanksgiving. All I can say is WOW!!! He has used some of his photos in some of the books he has writen: Edwards Air Force Base, Open House at the USAF Flight Test Center 1957-1966 (Shiffer pub). Airliners at LAX 1956-1976 (WTP) both are nothing but color photos. He let me borrow a few neet photos that I'll post real soon.

[Victor Archer]

Here's one more. The photos of the Bearcat were taken in July of 1959. A note for you So. Cal. folks thats Newport Beach in the background.

[RandyGoss75]

N9G

I keep trying to send pics of Gunther Balz Bearcat- but it says file to large- should I just email them to you Wayne? RG

[AAFO_WSagar]

Re: N9G

Originally posted by RandyGoss75
I keep trying to send pics of Gunther Balz Bearcat- but it says file to large- should I just email them to you Wayne? RG

Randy, have you resized it? Is it a .jpg? A 600 pixel wide image, saved at about 88 compression or 12 (whichever way your slider reads) which is on the high end of quality, should be fine. The file size limit in kilobytes is pretty large. I set the width to 600px so the page would not scroll side to side when images are uploaded.. unfortunately, even at that size, they do scroll at 800x which my laptop is stuck at...

Wayne