Folsom’s DC-3 on Floats: The Story is Told-

Moosehead Lakeshore Journal October 3, 2024 Edition

By Jakob McKenney

   Over the years, there have been a few memorable images that have synonymized the unique combination of vibrant natural beauty and timeless down-home character that the Moosehead Lake Region has to offer. Among them: the hand-carved moose and loon that adorn the wooden sign, beckoning visitors to the gateway of Maine’s North Woods… The first glimpses of Moosehead Lake while cresting Indian Hill. The vintage craftsmanship of the Steamship Katahdin as it proudly rests on its slip. The ancient, mystifying face of Mount Kineo, lit in the early morning hours…

   And the elegant lines and profile of the Folsom’s DC-3 on floats, be it thundering through the skies or carving a tremendous white wake along the lake’s deep blue surface.

   Its massive pontoons more closely resemble small submarines than the standard aircraft floats commonly seen on the lake’s resident Cessna 180s and De Havilland Beavers. While countless folks are very familiar with the unmistakable aerial leviathan that has called Greenville home for nearly four decades, and many recount thrilling stories of seeing it take flight or even getting an unforgettable ride aboard, only a few know the full story of how it came to be.

   Following America’s entry into the Second World War and the escalation of the campaigns in the South Pacific, the U.S Army found that many of the remote islands captured from the Empire of Japan lacked airfields. As a result, they approached the EDO Aircraft Corp. of College Point, NY, the country’s foremost float builder, to supply 150 sets of amphibious floats large enough for use on their most capable transport: the Douglas C-47, military variant of the famed DC-3 airliner.

   Introduced in 1935, it was an airplane that had revolutionized the concept and comfortability of air travel, providing supplies, ordinance, and replacements for the troops on these islands within a day of each beach assault. The floats would be the largest amphibious floats ever built, at 43 feet long, 2,284 lbs., displacing 29,400 lbs. of water a piece. The Prototype XC-47C, christened ‘Dumbo’ by the USAAF and also known as ‘Waterbird,’ first flew in June of 1942.

   Maine-born aviation mechanic Dana L. Hodgkins handmade the reinforcements to the tail of the aircraft before its first flight. Flight trials, including the use of JATO solid-fuel rocket bottles mounted to the drop racks under the fuselage to shorten takeoff distance proved successful, though use of the floats significantly diminished the speed and payload of the C-47. However, the C-47s that received the float conversion saw use as a medical evacuation aircraft as far away as Port Moresby, New Guinea and the large waterways of the Burma Road.

   Ultimately, the little-known military project would be canceled in 1944 after 33 pairs of the floats were built. At that point, the Seabees had devised methods to prepare makeshift airfields in isolated locations in a matter of days, virtually eliminating the requirement for such a massive seaplane.

   As a result, the type was assigned the secondary role of air-sea rescue work in Alaska and the Pacific in very limited numbers. In total, 13 C-47s were put on floats, including the prototype. Most were returned to wheeled operations after the war, save for one example that saw intermittent use as a transport in remote water-locked communities of Alaska and Northern Canada in the late 1940s to early 1950s. After several decades passed, it was believed that none of the gargantuan EDO Model 78 Floats remained.

   After the war, the 20 unused sets were auctioned off to a surplus dealer outside Dallas, TX, who melted down all but one pair. He kept these for use on a catamaran-style houseboat which proved too large to be legally towed on the highway. Subsequently, the two floats were abandoned at a junkyard in Texas.

   It was in the early 1980’s that legendary Greenville bush pilots Dick and Max Folsom became interested in such an airplane. Prior to founding Folsom’s Air Service on Moosehead’s East Cove in 1946, Dick had turned wrenches on DC-3’s for Pan American Airways and later worked on its military counterpart, the C-47, for the Army Air Corps during the War in the Pacific. He was familiar with the type while Max was eager to see how one would operate on floats.

   In the years prior, Folsom’s Air Service would often pick up airline passengers in Bangor, Boston, and New York on light twin engine aircrafts and bring them to Greenville. With the volume of these customers increasing, they had hoped to expand an on-demand charter service connecting coastal cities in the northeast to the Moosehead Lake Region aboard a larger airplane as “The Moosehead Express.” The Folsoms learned of the last surviving pair of the enormous EDO Mdl. 78 floats from J. Frey, President of EDO’s Float & Aircraft Division, who was in Greenville for the International Seaplane Fly-In.

   Dick and Max soon joined with fellow “floatplane crazies” (as Max put it) Louis Hilton and Herman Bayerdorffer, both of whom were multi-engine seaplane rated, to form HBF Inc. with the goal of acquiring a DC-3 or C-47 and locating this set of floats. Max Folsom traced the serial numbers of all known C-47s that had been on floats in the war, but found that on surviving aircraft, the float kit had been removed once the military was done with them. Eventually the group settled on the DC-3, N130Q, which they discovered for sale in Wichita Falls, TX in 1985.

   N130Q had initially been built as C-53D Skytrooper, a version of the C-47 built for troop transport, lacking the -47’s reinforced cargo floor and hardware, and large cargo door. The airplane had actually seen combat action, dropping paratroopers over Germany and the Netherlands during Operation Market Garden in September 1944 before being acquired by Eastern Air Lines and converted to a standard passenger-carrying DC-3A Airliner in 1946. In 1949, it was further converted into an executive DC-3 by L.B Smith Aircraft Corp., receiving a luxurious interior and 1350hp Curtiss-Wright Cyclone engines, both lighter and more powerful than the Pratt and Whitney engines the C-47s used during the war. The lighter airframe and more powerful engines made it ideal for the float conversion.

   Next, the floats were located in 1987 outside Dallas, TX. Max Folsom and Otis Gray recovered them using two low-bed tractor trailers. Next came the challenge of rebuilding the struts and attachment gear. J. Frey was able to supply these parts with EDO reverse-engineering them based on the original wartime blueprints stored on microfilm, while the restoration of the floats was undertaken by Folsom’s Master Mechanics, Dave Hall and Charlie Later. The World’s Largest Floatplane was finally ready to be assembled. On a quiet, foggy day in June of 1990, it took six hours, two cranes from the Cianbro Corp., and a crew of over a dozen to hoist the massive airplane and connect the finished floats.

   The one-of-a-kind flying machine received its airworthiness certificate in August and its debut coincided with the 16th Annual Greenville Fly-In. Unfortunately, due to new and stringent regulations, the massive seaplane could not be certified as a commercial transport aircraft and was instead registered in the experimental/exhibition category. HBF Inc. changed direction and eventually hoped to gain a corporate sponsor that could operate the airplane on the air show circuit.

   Folsom’s DC-3 on Floats made its first flight on September 5th, 1990 with Max Folsom in the left seat and Lou Hilton in the right. The Massive seaplane’s performance defied their expectations, with Max reporting from early test trials the floats only slowed the airplane down by 10-15 mph instead of the expected 30, and that the airplane could make 158 mph at 65% power, clear the water within 25 seconds, and even fly adequately on one engine.

   Over the next decade and a half, The Folsoms and their ever-determined crew of pilots and mechanics gallivanted the open skies of the Moosehead Lake Region aboard their one-of-a-kind flying machine, making the occasional excursion to Florida for the Sun N’ Fun Fly-In & Air Expo or other events once the busy flying season in Maine wound down. Wherever they went, they drew awestruck eyes and alighted the youthful sense of wonder within everyone who witnessed it fly or felt the rumble of its mighty engines in their chest. Even the oldest and most well-traveled aviators were not immune to its charm.

   Still, the Folsom’s DC-3 was most associated with the yearly International Seaplane Fly-In in Greenville. Folks made the trek from far and wide around the country to Greenville each September with the hope of glimpsing the craft in the air or on the water. Its image became a permanent fixture of the town’s iconography even after its floats were removed in 2004, all a testament to the determination, skill, craftsmanship, and adventurous spirit of both Dick and Max Folsom, Louis Hilton, Herman Bayerdorffer and all those who made the project a reality.

   After many years of diligent restoration and repair, the floats were returned to the airplane in July of 2020.

   On September 14th, 2024, a day that so many long-hoped for, and more than a few doubted, finally came. “Dumbo” took flight once again.