The pearl of the northern skies

To the US Marines at Midway in June 1942, the Brewster F2A-3 was a flying coffin. To the Finns it was the pearl of the northern skies. In the Continuation War, Finland’s 44 Model 239s, de-navalised export F2A-1s, claimed 32 Soviet aircraft for every one lost in the first phase and produced 36 aces. Hans Wind scored 39 victories in the type, and one airframe, BW-364, carried its pilots to 42 and a half kills, possibly the highest-scoring fighter airframe in history. The Finns never called it the Buffalo; it was simply the Brewster.

Carriages, floats and fighters

Brewster & Co. was a carriage builder that, after the First World War, made hulls for Loening amphibians and floats for Vought. In 1932 the engineer James Work bought the aviation division for 30,000 dollars and formed the Brewster Aeronautical Corporation. Chief engineer Dayton Brown designed the SBA scout bomber and then the F2A, which beat an early Grumman design to become the Navy’s first monoplane fighter. It first flew on 2 December 1937, but the cramped factory in the Brewster Building in Queens delivered only 11 F2A-1s to the Navy. Britain, the Netherlands, Belgium and Finland bought export versions.

Seized by the Navy

Growth exposed everything. Brewster’s salesmen, the Miranda brothers, had served prison time for illicit arms sales to Bolivia and over-promised to customers; the swollen workforce was hit by strikes and suspected sabotage. Work was sued for 10 million dollars, and on 18 April 1942 the Navy seized the company outright. The SB2A Buccaneer scout bomber that followed is counted among the worst aircraft of the war. When the Navy cancelled Brewster’s Corsair contract on 1 July 1944 the end came quickly, and shareholders dissolved the company on 5 April 1946.

Fabrieken

• Brewster Building · Long Island City, New York — Inefficient factory blamed for slow F2A output
• Newark plant · Newark, New Jersey
• Johnsville plant · Warminster Township, Pennsylvania — Opened 1941; later NAS Johnsville

Mensen

• James (Jimmy) Work · founder and president — Eased out by the Navy, briefly regained control in 1942
• Dayton T. Brown · chief engineer — Designed the SBA and F2A
• George Conrad Westervelt · Navy-appointed head — Former head of the Naval Aircraft Factory, put in charge in April 1942

Records en primeurs

• F2A Buffalo: first monoplane fighter of the US Navy
• Finnish Brewster BW-364: 42.5 kills by all its pilots, possibly the highest-scoring fighter airframe ever