The first of Grumman’s “Cats” and their first monoplane began life on the drawing board in 1935. It was the U.S. Navy’s sole carrier-based fighter at the start of World War II. A contemporary of the Japanese Zero, its performance was inferior in many respects, yet the F4F held its own because of superior armament, rugged construction and well-trained pilots.

The F4F-4 Wildcat entered service at the beginning of World War II, and was the Navy’s frontline carrier-based fighter aircraft by the time of the Battle of Midway in June of 1942. Grumman’s design for the F4F-4 evolved in several stages over the course of seven years. It was initially conceived as a biplane in 1935 for the Navy, the XF4F-1, but Grumman lost the contract to a monoplane design by Brewster. Not to be outdone, Grumman redesigned the biplane into a monoplane, the XF4F-2, yet the design was considered underpowered. Finally, with the addition of a more powerful supercharged Pratt and Whitney 1830 Twin Wasp engine, Grumman was awarded a Navy contract. This was the F4F-3 which was also produced for France and Britain, where it went by the designation “Martlet.”