Tales of the N-3N's

Harold Pabst

I have to add my story to the tales of the N-3N's. In 1938 my Dad earned his pilot's license. Flying ended in 1942 due to the gas shortage. He volunteered for the CAP program but didn't have enough hours to be accepted. What hours he did manage to fly was done at the Solberg Airport in Somerville, NJ. In 1946, Dad was told that Solberg bought "a bunch" of Navy trainers as surplus. Dad bought one for $560.00 and it came in 5 crates. It was the N-3N. The crates were 1) wings, 2) fuselage, 3)empennage, 4) engine, and 5) pack parts (landing gear, nuts and bolts, prop, controls, etc.) No assembly instructions were included but we were assured that all the parts were there. Dad, with me as his helper and go-fer settled in to put this airplane together. It took almost a year of weekends but the day finally arrived for the test flight. The only change that was mandated by the FAA was that a stainless steel firewall had to be installed. I remember Dad making this up in the garage out of a sheet of stainless. We flew this aircraft ( I as the passenger) until 1951...just about the time I left for the Academy. It was a ball. My Dad was fairly strict but also a little bit of a dare devil. The first time we really took the N-3N for a flight we flew up the Hudson River, right under the George Washington Bridge. It was a blast. I guess no one took our number because we never heard any thing about it. It was a great lot of fun. When we entered 2nd class summer to fly the N-3N, like everyone else, my instructor asked me to take over and fly it a bit. I remember lowering the nose to gain speed, pulling back and going into a roll. It really pissed the instructor off ....... I didn't think about the inertia of the pontoon versus the simple landing gear and damn near stalled us out. Needless to say, I just about flunked the course.

Just thought you'd like to know....