Douglas DC - 2 The Douglas DC - 2 was a 14 - seat , twin - engine airliner produced by the American company Douglas Aircraft Corporation starting in 1934 . It competed with the Boeing 247 . In 1935 Douglas produced a larger version called the DC - 3 , which became one of the most successful aircraft in history . Design and development . In the early 1930s , fears about the safety of wooden aircraft structures ( responsible for the crash of a Fokker Trimotor ) compelled the American aviation industry to develop all - metal types . With United Airlines having a monopoly on the 247 , rival Transcontinental and Western Air issued a specification for an all - metal trimotor . The Douglas response was more radical . When it flew on July 1 , 1933 , the prototype DC - 1 had a highly robust tapered wing , a retractable undercarriage , and only two 690 hp ( 515 kW ) Wright radial engines driving variable - pitch propellers . It seated 12 passengers . TWA accepted the basic design and ordered 20 , with more powerful engines and seating for 14 passengers , as DC - 2s . The design impressed a number of American and European airlines and further orders followed . Those for European customers KLM , LOT , Swissair , CLS and LAPE were assembled by Fokker in the Netherlands after that company bought a licence from Douglas . Airspeed Ltd . took a similar licence for DC - 2s to be delivered in Britain and assigned the company designation Airspeed AS . 23 , but although a registration for one aircraft was reserved none were actually delivered . Another licence was taken by the Nakajima Aircraft Company in Japan ; unlike Fokker and Airspeed , Nakajima built five aircraft as well as assembling at least one Douglas - built aircraft . A total of 130 Civil DC - 2s were built with another 62 for the United States military . In 1935 , Don Douglas stated in an article , that the DC - 2 cost approximately $ 80 , 000 per aircraft , if mass produced . Operational history . Although overshadowed by its ubiquitous successor , it was the DC - 2 that first showed that passenger air travel could be comfortable , safe and reliable . As a token of this , KLM entered its first DC - 2 PH - AJU " Uiver " ( Stork ) in the October 1934 MacRobertson Air Race between London and Melbourne . Out of the 20 entrants , it finished second behind only the purpose built de Havilland DH . 88 racer " Grosvenor House " . During the total journey time of 90 hours , 13 min , it was in the air for 81 hours , 10 min , and won the handicap section of the race . ( The DH . 88 finished first in the handicap section , but the crew was by regulations allowed to claim only one victory . ) It flew KLM ' s regular 9 , 000 mile route , ( a thousand miles longer than the official race route ) , carrying mails , making every scheduled passenger stop , turning back once to pick up a stranded passenger , and even became lost in a thunderstorm and briefly stuck in the mud after a diversionary landing at Albury racecourse on the very last leg of the journey . Variants . Military . Modified DC - 2s built for the United States Army Air Corps under several military designations : Operators . ♠ Original operators Survivors . There are currently no DC - 2s in commercial service , however , several aircraft made it into the 21st century : Notable appearances in media . The DC - 2 was the " Good Ship Lollipop " that Shirley Temple sang about in the 1934 movie , " Bright Eyes " . A DC - 2 appears in the 1937 film " Lost Horizon " ; the footage includes taxiing , take - off , and landing , as well as views in flight . Author Ernest K . Gann recounts his early days as a commercial pilot flying DC - 2s in his memoir " Fate Is the Hunter " . This includes a particularly harrowing account of flying a DC - 2 with heavy ice .