By Des Brennan
Walking the Dog
The Cessna O-1 Bird Dog was developed as Cessna Model 305 by levelling out the rear fuselage of the existing Model 170 and adding new cockpit windows with 360 degree all-round visibility. Production began in 1950 and just under three thousand four hundred aircraft in various versions were built before it ended in 1959. Additional aircraft were licence built by Fuji in Japan and a further eighty itted with a turbo prop engine and revised tail built by SIAI-Marchetti in Italy as the SM.1019. The aircraft was operated by the sometimes multiple air arms, paramilitary and civil organisations of some two dozen nations with in time ex military examples finding their way directly into the civilian light aviation market or remanufactured as the Ector Mountaineer and Super Mountaineer. Initially designated L-19 for the US Army and OE-1 for the US Marine Corps the O-1 designation was universally adopted under the tri-service naming arrangement that took effect from September 1962 by which time the US Air Force was showing an interest in acquiring aircraft for service in South East Asia.