1917 Curtiss JN-4D 'Jenny'
Client:
Museum of Science and Industry
Chicago, IL
Chicago, IL
JN-4D “Jenny” S/N 5368 belongs to the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, IL. It was built by the Springfield Aircraft Company in 1918 and has a wonderful history. It started as a military trainer and was sold to a private individual after the war. He used it to barnstorm around Illinois and Indiana. It was given to the Museum in 1933 and its last flight was at the 1933 Century of Progress, Chicago Worlds Fair. It went into MSI in 1934 and has been placed and hung in various places in the Museum since then. In early 2006 we were contracted to do an inspection on all of the aircraft that are in MSI. Most of the aircraft just needed a cleaning and some “TLC” but the Jenny needed some minor repairs and new fabric as the old fabric was literally ready to fall off.
In September 2006 she was lowered from the ceiling and staged to await conservation work. Century Aviation disassembled the “Jenny” and it was shipped to our shop in East Wenatchee, WA. We inspected it and found it to be in amazingly good condition. We gave the Jenny a thorough cleaning and made some repairs to the wood in her wings and center section. We put on new fabric and paint and reassembled the plane in our shop to insure fit and finish. It was then disassembled and shipped back to the Museum of Science and Industry. The last portion of this project was to reassemble the Jenny upside down so that we could raise it up into its new display location.
