Tuesday, July 10, 2018

Stroud, Okla., and Luftwaffe jet engines

Stroud is in Creek and Lincoln counties in eastern Central Oklahoma. The 2010 population was 2,690. In 1980, Stroud had its biggest ever population, 3,148.

In its early days, Stroud was a whiskey town, but with statehood in 1907, all of Oklahoma went dry. In 1915, outlaw Henry Starr decided to rob two banks in Stroud. Armed citizens made Starr to decide he had made a mistake.

More of Stroud history, including its days as a Route 66 town, can be read here:

https://www.legendsofamerica.com/ok-stroud/

A few miles north of Stroud, and west of Stroud Municipal Airport, is Mint Turbines. The company specializes in repair to the T53 turbine engine. The T53 was originally developed and manufactured by the Lycoming Turbine Engine Division in Stratford, Conn. Lycoming was started in the 1850s making sewing machines. In 1907, Lycoming switched to the more lucrative manufacture of automobile engines, and then in 1929 produced its first airplane engine.

A team headed by Austrian-German engineer Anslem Franz designed the T53. Franz joined the Junkers company in 1936, three years after Adolph Hitler became chancellor of Germany. Junkers built the JU-87 Stuka, the JU-52 transport, the JU-88 bomber and many other aircraft for the Nazi Luftwaffe. Junkers made lots and lots of money.

While with Junkers, Franz designed the Jumo 004 turbine engine, which powered the Me-262 jet fighter and the majority of German turbine-powered aircraft.

After Germany’s defeat, Franz was brought to the United States in Operation Paperclip. His Lycoming T53 engine, built in the 1950s, was the world’s first turbine helicopter engine and powered the UH-1 series helicopters, the AH-1 Apache attack helicopter and the OV-1 Mohawk. Franz died in 1994, at age 94.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anselm_Franz


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