Almansur: The jolly days of VF-61

THE JOLLY DAYS OF VF-61

VF-5B became VF-61 on 28 July 1948. The mission changed from fighter-bomber to fighter-interception, and the F4U-4 was replaced by the Grumman F8F-2 Bearcat.

On March 1949 VF-61 was flying the Bearcat from the deck of the USS Franklin D. Roosevelt.

The Bones would be prominently featured on every aircraft flown by VF-61, up until its disestablishment in 1959.

Next in line was the Grumman F9F-2 Panther. My only photo of a Panther flying the Bones shows an attractive scheme based upon natural metal overcoated with a protective clear varnish. This was not rare on Panthers. VF-61 became a jet squadron in April 1950. These Panthers were flown aboard the carriers USS Franklin D. Roosevelt and USS Midway.

VF-61 flew the Panther with the most common sea blue overall scheme, but I cannot locate the Bones on the photo bellow:

The Panther gave way to its swept-wing derivation, the Grumman F9F-6 Cougar, during 1953. I had trouble documenting this period, but then I met my friend Walt Niblick. Walt painted the insignia on many of these Cougars himself, and suddenly I had on my hands more VF-61 pictures than I thought were in existence. I cannot begin to thank you, Walt.

All but one of the pictures of Jolly Rogers' Cougars, and the solo picture of a VF-61 Fury, and most of the documentation on this period, are via Walt Niblick.

Jolly Rogers' Cougars came in 3 paint scheme variations. Walt is posing by an early F9F-6 in overall Sea Blue with no trim on the mid fuselage. Existing trim was in red, bordered in white, on the nose, wingtips and rudder, as shown on the following pictures, taken in 1954 and 1955, aboard the USS Lake Champlain.

The aircraft with the modex 105, pictured bellow, was still to recieve the Jolly Rogers' insignia. This photo was taken by Robert Semel.

Aircraft 103 was pictured on Lake Champlain's deck by Mike Mitchell.

Walt documented the off-loading of modex 104 at Naples, after a hard landing that exploded its left main gear strut. The bird looks really sad on that barge...

The sole exception to the Niblick pictures is a US Navy photo sent to me by another good friend, and fellow bonehead, David F. Brown. This photo shows an F9F-6 parked side-by-side with an F2H-4 Banshee, and documents well the second variation, where the trim extended to the mid fuselage, and was changed from red to yellow.

The final Cougar paint variation came aboard the USS Intrepid, when VF-61 was flying the ultimate derivative, the F9F-8, and the Navy was abandoning the standard sea blue overall scheme in favor of the then new gray over white scheme. The photographer has been identified as Phil Oliver.

There is an interesting bit of trivia from this fertile period: in the Med cruise of 1954-55, when the Jolly Rogers of VF-61 were flying the fighter mission from the Lake Champlain in the red-nosed Cougars, the fighter bomber mission was being flown from the same carrier by the yellow-nosed F9F-5 Panthers of VF-84, which then went by the name of Sidewinders.

The Sidewinders were slatted to convert to the F7U Cutlass, and when they did, they changed their designation to VA-86. Then the designation of VF-84 went to a new squadron, formed in 1 July 1955, which took the name Vagabonds, and flew first the FJ-3 Fury and then the F8U-2 Crusader aboard the USS Forrestal.

The Cougar was traded for the North American FJ-3 Fury in late 1955, a move that was not welcomed by many of the pilots. Standing closest to the Fury is John Maltby. The Fury was to be flown by the Jolly Rogers for a short period only, as the unit reverted to the F9F-8 Cougar for the Med cruise of 1956, immediately before converting to the F3H Demon.

For contrast, this is what the well attired Jolly Rogers' pilot looked like on the deck (Ens Delroy Meyer):

The last aircraft flown by VF-61 was the McDonnell F3H-2M Demon, that started to replace the last Cougars in September 1956. Their first carrier trials were made aboard the USS Franklin D. Roosevelt in April 1957.

which were followed by two periods at sea aboard the USS Saratoga and a short stint aboard the USS Forrestal.

During 1958 the Jolly Rogers had no carrier assignment, and mostly stayed at NAS Oceana. A small detachment (Det A) of four aircraft was sent to Port Lyautey, in French Morocco, a common destination for aircraft on Med cruises at the time.

VF-61 was expected to transition to the F8U Crusader in 1959, but that never happened, and the squadron was disestablished on 15 April 1959.

But what do pirates do when their ship is sunk? They hijack another. And so they did.