History of the Plane

DC-3
N943DJ
The Spirit of Benovia

History:

Built as a C-53-DO by the Douglas Aircraft Company in Santa Monica, California
Delivered to the U.S. Army Air Force on June 29, 1942
Douglas construction number: 7313, U.S.A.A.F Serial number: 42-47371

July 1942: Flown locally in Santa Monica by the Air Transport Command

August 1942: Flown to West Palm Beach, Florida, then ferried to Karachi, India

September 1942: Transferred to Royal Air Force (RAF) custody in India

December 1942: Returned to U.S.A.A.F custody, assigned to 1st Troop Carrier Squadron of the 10th Air Force.

February 5, 1946: Purchased by the Central Air Transport Corp, Bejing China. Reportedly used by Chinese Nationalist President Chiang Kai-shek as his personal transport. It possibly carried him and his family from the mainland to Taiwan on December 10, 1949, when the communists took over China.

December 19, 1949: Sold to the Civil Air Transport (CAT), Taipei, Taiwan. Registered as N8336C and transferred to Hong Kong. Registered as N1794B in July, 1953

December 9, 1953: Sold to TEMCO Aircraft Corp, Dallas, Texas. Registered as N67K, then N47L

May 22, 1958: Sold to Union Chemical and Materials Corp, Dallas, Texas.

June 22, 1958: Sold to Southern Airways, Atlanta, Georgia. Registered as N147M.

Possibly used in airline service in the South- Southern operated 13 DC-3s in 1958.

July 23, 1962: Sold to the Mead Corporation, Dayton Ohio.

April, 18, 1969: Purchased by Tecumseh Products, Tecumseh, Michigan.

December 3, 1982: Donated to the Kalamazoo Aviation History Museum. Modified to DC-3A standards.

October 18, 1993: Acquired by Warren Basler, Oshkosh, Wisconsin, in trade for a C-47 military aircraft.

1994: Used in the production of the Warner Brothers film, "Richie Rich."

July 5, 1999: Purchased by businessman Donald Jones, Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. Registered as N943DJ and named "Spirit of Enterprise."

September, 2009: Purchased by Joe Anderson, Santa Rosa, California. Renamed "Spirit of Benovia."