Vultee

Vultee Aircraft, Inc. began life in the early 1930s as the Airplane Development Corporation, founded by Jerry Vultee and Vance Breese. Their first major design, the sleek single-engine V-1 airliner, demonstrated what a metal-monoplane could achieve in performance and efficiency — years ahead of its time. In January 1938, Jerry and his wife tragically perished when their private plane crashed in a blizzard over Arizona, cutting short the life of one of America’s most promising aviation engineers.

Despite the loss, Vultee Aircraft continued to grow. Reorganized as an independent company in 1939, it became a pioneer in modern aircraft production methods, introducing assembly-line techniques that greatly increased manufacturing speed and precision.

During World War II, Vultee was among the major American aircraft producers. Its designs ranged from the A-31 Vengeance dive-bomber — used extensively by Allied forces in Southeast Asia — to the BT-13 Valiant, a rugged basic trainer known as the “Vultee Vibrator.” More than eleven thousand of these trainers were built, serving as the classroom of the sky for countless U.S. Army Air Forces pilots learning to master the fundamentals of flight.

In 1943, Vultee merged with Consolidated Aircraft to form Consolidated Vultee Aircraft Corporation, or Convair, which went on to design legendary aircraft such as the B-36 Peacemaker and the F-102 Delta Dagger. From Jerry Vultee’s early innovations to Convair’s Cold War milestones, the Vultee story is one of vision, resilience, and enduring influence on aviation history.