Apologies in advance if this is a repost. I did a couple of different searches, but couldn't find a thread on this. First Air Force One: [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ehwvZXVKmPU[/ame] Mike
Thanks Mike, what a beautiful airframe. I think I saw it at the Pima Air Museum in Tucson a few years ago.
I think you can get an argument that the first "Air Force One" was Harry Truman's VC-118 "Independence", which is now at the museum in Dayton.
I was thinking the same thing, but was thinking of the VC-54 "Sacred Cow" before it. Both planes were ordered and built specifically for the President (Roosevelt and Truman). Then there was the converted Liberator before that (Roosevelt). None of them were ever called "Air Force One", though. And, I thought that "Columbine III", (a later Super Constellation) was the first plane to be labeled "Air Force One". The III is in the Air Force Museum.
I saw Eisenhower's Connie (AF-1) sitting on a weedy tarmac in Santa Fe in 93' when I was on one of my cross country's getting my private. She looked unloved at the time.
