The International Cessna 170 Association

Early in my flying-career an employer told me that airplanes used to be “hung” by their tails from rolling casters suspended from the ceiling of storage bldgs...and that was why they were called “hangars”. I don’t think he was joking because I’d seen photographs of early light aircraft so stored.
However recently while reading, I came across the word “hanger” being used to describe the edifice and realized the similarity in pronounciation leads many to misspell the word. This caused me to research it online and that resulted in the discovery of the Wikipedia explanation that “hanghart” was a French word meaning “an enclosure near a house”.
The story also arises in early aviaiton that Louis Bleriot crash-landed and gained permission from a farmer to story his aeroplane in the farmers cattle-shed/hanghart.... and so the term was adopted.

The British simply revolt at most things French and called them “sheds”... but, I’m guessing since many early aviation developments had French origins that “hangar” became the accepted term, along with “aileron”, “Pitot”,“empennage” and “fuselage”.

I suppose I must chandelle out of this post now.

Au revoir and Adeiu.

From a Popular Mechanics 1940 issue later reprinted in 2007, the only picture of hanging planes I've seen. Old timers at Lochhaven, Pa., home of the Piper factory, say there was a wheeled nose dolly built to allow the aircraft to be moved about the floor tail high to facilitate this.
I don't know a single pilot who has a hangar who doesn't hang around it. Fact is more time is spent hanging about the hangar than flying I'd bet. This is why I've often spelled hangar with an e. It's a place lots of people hang about, a hanger. Some don't even have an aircraft anywhere in them.

That picture could be Zahns Airport in Amityville LI. They trained in Cubs and had a bunch of them and stored them like that.

I have seen a picture of Stearmans stored similarly at the Ottumwa NAS during WWII.

Bruce Fenstermacher wrote:From a Popular Mechanics 1940 issue later reprinted in 2007, the only picture of hanging planes I've seen. Old timers at Lochhaven, Pa., home of the Piper factory, say there was a wheeled nose dolly built to allow the aircraft to be moved about the floor tail high to facilitate this.

med_planes_on_noses.jpg

I don't know a single pilot who has a hangar who doesn't hang around it. Fact is more time is spent hanging about the hangar than flying I'd bet. This is why I've often spelled hangar with an e. It's a place lots of people hang about, a hanger. Some don't even have an aircraft anywhere in them.

Back in the 40's (right after the war), my Dad learned to fly at Kristport, which was a grass field near Farmington, Michigan. I remember the planes being on their noses in the hanger there. The airport is long gone, but the main building is still on 13mi. road. https://members.tripod.com/airfields_fr ... oit_NW.htm