The USAAF, impressed by the German Army's use of gliders to capture the Belgian fortress of Eben-Emael during the campaign of the previous summer, had decided to commence a glider pilot training program.
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In late 1937 the Airhoppers Gliding Club of Long Island, New York approached the Schweizer brothers to see about the design of a Schweizer two-place glider specifically for training purposes.
Schweizer brothers | SGS | Schweizer Radio DRS | Schweizer SGS 1-23 | Schweizer Fernsehen | SGS S.A. | Schweizer-Reneke | Schweizer Illustrierte | Schweizer Aircraft | Peter Schweizer | Irène Schweizer | ''General Alexander Hays'' (c. 1914) by J. Otto Schweizer |
On November 4, 1945 Frank Hurtt and Paul A. Schweizer broke the multi-place duration record in a TG-3A.
The 1956 Worlds were held in Saint-Yan, France and saw the SGS 2-25 flown in the two-place category, by Kemp Trager and Gene Miller.
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Schweizer Aircraft supplied all the gliders for the US team: the sole Schweizer SGS 1-23E was purpose built for Paul MacCready, a Schweizer SGS 1-23D for Paul A Schweizer and the SGS 2-25 to be flown by Stan Smith and Bob Kidder.
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This was a joint USAF Cambridge Research Center and UCLA Department of Meteorology research project to gain a better understanding of Lee waves and was flown in the Sierra Nevada mountains of California.
The USAFA TG-4s were all donated to other US government agencies, such as the Civil Air Patrol or to aviation museums.