Finished this one late last week, a very nice kit to build. The decals are aftermarket, though I made stencils for the larger markings. The stars and bars and the smaller markings are decals. After the photos is some text about the name and the artwork which I found interesting.
Origin of the Jaywalkin molecule
The guy who wrote the B29 article reported that he was told by a scientist on the project that when flying at high speed, the stabs went transonic - which was no small problem for the SuperFort! He then tried to describe the effect in simple terms for the readers. Basically, He said the air molecules hit the stabs and scattered in many directions causing an unwanted transonic vibration.
Moving forward a few months to the September issue ( which Capt. Lipscomb also read) someone wrote into the magazine & had his letter published in the readers section.
He noted that he read the original article and was intrigued by the " Jaywalkin' molecules" that the scientist had described. He then asked if the magazine artist had any artistic take as to what the " Jaywalking Molecules" looked like. Below his query was an image of the artists rendering of a Jaywalkin' Molecule.
After seeing this caricature, the pilot got his tent mate (Charles Dooney) to help him apply this same image to the cowl of his P-47 and apply the name Jaywalkin' Molecule to the fuselage side.
Now if you see a similarity to the style of artwork and application of the name to the Turtle series of 509th P-47s and the same type of lettering down the side of The Molecule, (there were 10 Turtles) you shouldn’t be surprised by the fact that Dooney was the artist and pilot for all of the Turtle P-47s.
Norris Graser