Cessna 195. This example was manufactured in 1951.
Cessna Aircraft Company, located in Wichita, Kansas, is a manufacturer of general aviation aircraft, from small two-seat, single-engine airplanes to business jets.
The company traces its history to June 1911, when Clyde Cessna , a farmer in Rago, Kansas , built a wood-and-fabric plane and became the first person to build and fly an aircraft between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains.
In 1924, Cessna partnered with Lloyd C. Stearman and Walter H. Beech to form the Travel Air Manufacturing Co., Inc., a biplane-manufacturing firm, in Wichita, but in 1927, he left Travel Air to form his own company, the Cessna Aircraft Company, to build monoplanes.
After World War II, Cessna created the 170 - which, along with later iterations, notably the 172, became the most widely produced light aircraft in history.
Cessna was bought by General Dynamics Corp. in 1985, and stopped producing piston-engine airplanes the next year due to concerns over product liability. In 1992, Textron Inc. bought Cessna and soon resumed producing light aircraft.
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Last updated: 10-25-2005 15:16:02
