The daily monitor leader. [volume] (Mount Clemens, Mich.) 1942-19??, 1945-09-14
Department Stores to Display Planes
for Private Sale Within Few Months

family flying.
by s. BURTON HEATH
NEA Staff Writer
In about a couple of months
YOU can drop into your favorite
department store, buy book, a
tube of shaving cream and some
sox-then drift up to the ump-
teenth floor and pick out your
new plane for delivery after
New Years.
How long after New Years
will depend upon how many
others. like you. have just been
waiting for wars end to buy a
fool-proof two-placer for week
ends in the country.
It is the Ercoupe that now Is
preparing to display samples in
department stores by about Oc-
tober, with deliveries tentatively
iset to begin early in 1946. But
there are some half dozen other
personal - or family-type -
planes readying to compete for
your favor-and your dollars
and some are further along with
reconversion than the Ercoupe
Is.
William A. Burden, Assistant
Secretary of Commerce, predicts
in the Harvard Business Review
that within the next five years
there will be an annual output OF
$4,000 personal planes contrast
ed with a total, when war began
in l94l, of only $4,000.
ROSY FUTURE
Mr.. Burden, the opthnist OF
the predicters in this field,
thinks that within five or ten
years there will be 100000 per-
sonal planes cruising the skies
all over this country. The Nat
ional Resources Planning Board
estimates $4,000. Other guesses
range. between these two abb
surdly disparate figures. An
average of the seven most en-
titled to consideration, Depart
ment of Commerce statements
says, figures 210.700.
All Of these figures pale beside
the statement of American Press,
based upon a poll of weekly
newspaper editors, that in the
next five years 100000 personal
planes will be sold in rural and
small-town (under 10000 popu-
lation) America alone.
Secretary Burden, in his pre-
diction, talks of personal planes
having an average price OF
around $4,000. That price con-
sideration may be assumed to be
a factor in his optimism Is
by no means impossible Of
course. But in dreaming about
the family plane you will pick
out in October for delivery in
January, don't think too irrev-
ocably in $4,000 terms. The air.
plane has, truly, attained the
automobile price class-but not
the popular priced level.
The Ercoupe is in the $4,000
class-stripped. BY the time
you get it equipped, it will set
you back, including tax. closer
to $4,000.
Most Of the firms rushing per-
sonal planes aren't talking much
yet about price. 1t is doubtful
if any will get much under the
Ercoupe right away, though sew
eral may challenge it.
Aviation enthusiasts suggest
that you should not look at your
1946 flivver plane as you do at
your motor car-as something
that will be worn down for turn
in in two or three years at most.
Except as you feel forced to keep
up with the Joneses, your plane
might we'll last lifetime bar
ring accident.
The American Press survey of
country editors indicated that 70
per cent consider safety the
prime factor in the anticipated
popularity Of personal planes.
This the manufacturers are
stressing heavily. The Ercoupe
people claim that it is all but
impossible to hurt yourself In
one of their machines The Pr
per Cubs have been demonstrate
ing in front line observation
flights, their versatility and
! safety, as have others less pub
licized in military use.
EASY TO OPERATE
Ease of operation, operating
cost and landing facility, each is
rated as a prime consideration
by 80 per cent of the editors.
These, too, are featured by man
ufacturers.
The Ercoupe has a 75-horse-
power engine that travels %
miles on a gallon of gasoline.
Does your car do that? The
Taylor BC-12, now in limited
production, has only a 65-horse-
power engine; the Luscombe Sill
vaire is stepping up its power
from rs to IS horsepower, which
is the same as the Culver two
placer due for production in
February. The Stinson Voyager
will have a 125-horsepower
plant, the Bellanco Cruisair from