American Airlines Vultee V1, mid-1930s

Gerard Vultee was one of the co-founders of this aviation manufacturer which began as the Airplane Development Corporation in early 1932 and in 1939 became the Vultee Aircraft Corporation which merged with the Consolidated Aircraft Corporation in 1943 to form the Consolidated Vultee Aircraft Corporation, or Convair.

The V1 from 1934 was refined for production purposes into the V-1A, a two crew 8 passenger plane powered with a 735 hp (548 kW) Wright Cyclone R-1820-F2 radial engine. A total of 18 were built and one converted from the prototype - most were bought by American Airlines.