1943 North American AT-6C Texan

The North American T-6 family of aircraft is one of the most influential types ever developed. Known by many names, it served as the advanced training platform for the U.S. Army Air Forces (AT-6), then the U.S. Air Force after 1947 (T-6), as well as the U.S. Navy (SNJ), Royal Air Force, and Royal Canadian Air Force (Harvard). Today, it remains an icon of the modern warbird movement and is famous worldwide for its characteristic radial-engine roar and dynamic maneuvering capability.​

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North American Aviation of Los Angeles, CA began developing the T-6 family in 1935 for a U.S. military contract, and the first fully-configured T-6s entered service in 1938 with the British Commonwealth Forces, as the Harvard I, following the UK tradition of naming American-sourced aircraft after U.S. universities (our Fairchild PT-26 was known to the Commonwealth as the 'Cornell.')​

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By 1939, U.S. forces were operating the T-6, too, and they became the advanced trainer through which fighter pilots were qualified. Initially, pilots would begin training in a primary trainer (PT), like the Fairchild PT-26 or Boeing Stearman, then to a basic trainer (BT), like the Vultee BT-13 Valiant, and finally to the formidable advanced trainer (AT), the AT-6. By the end of World War II, pilots were bypassing the BT stage to proceed directly to the famously challenging AT-6.​

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The United States continued to use the T-6 family of aircraft for training until 1958, but other forces kept operating the venerable Texan until 1995, when the South African Air Force retired their final examples. Throughout the 20th century, the T-6 was also adapted to combat roles, mostly for light attack and counterinsurgency, in the 1941 Ecuadorian-Peruvian War, the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, the 1946-1949 Greek Civil War, the 1950-1953 Korean War, the 1952-1960 Mau Mau Rebellion, the 1954-1962 Algerian War, the 1955 Plaza de Mayo Bombing, the 1957-1958 Ifni War, the 1961-1975 Portuguese Colonial War, the 1963 Argentine Navy Revolt, the 1964-1973 Vietnam War, the 1966-1990 South African Border War, and the 1971 Indo-Pakistani War. In civilian hands, the T-6 was often converted to resembled the famous Japanese Mitsubishi A6M Zero, as in films and TV shows like Tora Tora Tora!, Baa Baa Black Sheep, and Pearl Harbor.

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Our airplane is a 1943 North American AT-6C Texan, one of 2,970 built. With a U.S. serial number of 41-33578, she was ordered for the Royal Air Force with serial number EX605, who shipped her directly from the U.S. to South Africa, where she served with distinction as 7385, including as the lead aircraft of the SAAF T-6 Demonstration Team, until the type's retirement in 1995. In 1997, she was acquired by Stephen J. Lindenmeyer of Marco Island, FL, then lived in Michigan from 2002 to 2018, when she was acquired by the Commemorative Air Force's Delta Blues Squadron in Memphis, TN, bearing civil registration N46SL.

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The Delta Blues Squadron chose to return the airplane to CAF Headquarters in 2025, and the New York Wing sprung into action to return N46SL to service after a multi-year hiatus. In March 2026, our team conducted a thorough inspection of the airplane, before returning her to the New York Wing base at Poughkeepsie.