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From: R.S. Critchfield/bobcritch@socal.rr.com
Date: 2/18/2003
Time: 12:20:40 AM
Remote Name: 66.27.250.64
To add to the confusion, several years ago I had a phone conversation with a fellow who, in about 1939, at Pasadena Junior College, took a class in aircraft construction at that was taught by Max B. Harlow.
(See: http://www.paccd.cc.ca.us/75th/missing/harlow/harlow.html)
He remarked that there was always the suspicion that the Japanese had, in the "Zero," copied features of the Harlow airplane that was built by Harlow's PJC class -- in particular, the design of the wing-to-fuselage union, where the wing was made an integral part of the fuselage, rather than being "bolted on."
He said that a classmate had been a Japanese who returned to Japan after the airplane was completed, and supposedly took a careful set of class notes with him.
Note: Maybe six years, at an airshow in Long Beach, California, ago I saw a Harlow airplane that was owned by a pilot based at Torrance airport. With its perforated flaps, it looked a lot like a Douglas SBD-3 dive bomber.
Bob Critchfield