Can't go more than two years here without asking who knows FOR SURE what happened to the Moffett Field Hellcat normally identified as Bu79669, c/n A-10814? I used to play around it while my folks shopped and did business on base, this in 1964, as a 9-yr. old kid.
I have seen five photos of the airplane since. Bruce Blackwelder posted a January 1963 photo of it in the base green like I remember it near the BOQ dated January 1963. This photo could be seen on Hyperscale's Aircraft Scale Model Discussion Forum dated January 20, 2007. He said it was an F6F-3 displayed by the "Barn Owls" of VA-215.
Bill Larkins has two photos (one color) circa 1958 seen as a NACA TEST airplane and tail # 208. Those very photos are sometimes also labeled by researchers as a F6F-3 Bu42874 which adds to the confusion. I can read some of the BuAer # in Bill's b&w photo and it seems to be 79669. As Joe Baugher notes 42874 was operated by NACA as tail no. 158, and photos of it (158) in those markings can be google found. That airplane is displayed at San Diego Air Museum. It may be a composite restoration of the airplane recovered off the California Coast and the Moffett Field bird???
John Kerr posted here in November 2008 the photo below which he credited to Bill Larkins also. It was taken at NAS Miramar in September 1974. John also has posted a 35mm color slide of it in the same markings on the flightline at Miramar in October 1974 as seen from a 3/4 left rear view, wings again folded back.
One source says 79669 was c/n A-10842 delivered to Ames Research Center on 19 June 1950 and "wfu 9.9.1960"... The mystery gets funner and funner the more one digs...
Below: John Kerr's photo posted on WIX on Nov. 8, 2008...
The Bruce Blackwelder photo can be seen here:
http://www.network54.com/Forum/149674/t ... Campbell...
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