STEARMAN C-3B NC6481

This airplane, S/N 181, was manufactured November 3, 1928 by the Stearman Aircraft Company, Wichita, KS. It left the factory with a single Wright J-5 engine of 200HP, S/N 9307. It was a three-place airplane that weighed 2,650 pounds. It sold on November 6, 1928 to Rogers Aircraft, Inc., Los Angeles, CA. Its price was $9,400.

Rogers, a distributor, sold NC6481 to the Casco Development Company, Butte, MT on December 29, 1928. Casco flew it stock for three years. On April 23, 1931, a hood was fashioned over the rear cockpit to facilitate instruction in blind flying. It was operated like this at least until March, 1932. At that time the airplane had accumulated 597 flight hours, averaging over 100 hours per year.

NC6481 is signed in the Santa Monica Register once, on Friday, May 22, 1929 at 9:00AM. It was flown by Jack Lynch carrying two unidentified passengers. They arrived from Los Angeles,CA which could have meant any of the airfields in the greater Los Angeles area during the Golden Age. The airplane owner was identified as W.A. Clark who was one of the principals of the Casco Development Company. Lynch was later killed in an airplane crash April 15,1932 north of Cottonwood, AZ.

NC6481 also shows up twice in the Register of the Grand Central Air Terminal (GCAT). As with most of the landings at GCAT, the tower operator did not enter the name of the pilot. The dates of arrival (3/27 and 4/10/32) were within a month of Lynch bringing NC6481 to Clover Field, so chances are high that Lynch might have been the pilot. If so, at his second visit he would have had less than a week to live.

On May 14, 1932 the airplane suffered an accident near Cottonwood, AZ. It was "washed out." Details of the circumstances around the accident, photographs and deaths of pilot and passenger, are presented at Jack Lynch's link, above. Its registration was cancelled on May 31, 1932 after about 3.5 years of useful life.

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