North American  XSN2J-1    121449(?)

                                  

                                      I could not discern the BuNo. on this aircraft, even on the original (poor) North American
                                      print, but it was almost certainly 121449..   Known by N.A. Aviation as the NA-142, only
                                      two prototypes were built (the other was 121450).  Oddly, it was the Navy which encourag-
                                      ed North American to develop an "SNJ replacement".  Although production of this aircraft
                                      did not occur (the Navy stayed with the SNJ Texan until eventually they were replaced with
                                      the Beech T-34 Mentor) much of the XSN2J's design work went into a new trainer being
                                      prepared for the USAF, namely the T-28.  In fact, about the only difference between the
                                      aircraft seen above and the T-28 Trojan is that the XSN2J-1 was a taildragger. Sadly, neither
                                      of the prototypes survived.