Biplane Fighters in Action
During the 1930s U.S. aircraft carriers operated a variety of fighter and fighter-bomber aircraft produced by Boeing, Curtiss, Grumman, and Vought, while several other aircraft firms produced prototype carrier fighters for Navy evaluation. But by 1939 all six Navy carriers and both Marine Corps fighter squadrons flew Grumman biplane fighters. 1 And, of course, with the coming of monoplane fighters, most U.S. carrier decks were soon filled with Grumman F4F Wildcats and then with the supreme World War II naval fighters, Grumman F6F Hellcats.