NAS Patuxent River, A History VOL II-Robert Torville

Between 1943 and 1955, Naval Aviation evolved from propellers to jets, and the electronics within Navy and Marine Corps aircraft became vastly more sophisticated. The task of evaluating the new breeds of increasingly capable aircraft and their ever more complex systems fell to a test community that had been established at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, MD.

This book outlines every aircraft model that is known to have begun testing at Pax River between April of 1943, when the base was commissioned, and the end of 1955. Well over 100 aircraft models came to Pax River for testing in that period, during which America led the Allies to victory in WW II and then staked out its position in a chaotic and rapidly-changing world order. This book conveys a sense of the massive, and vitally important, workload that was taken on by Pax River’s test community.