George W. Meyer’s contributions to the aviation community began long before 1952, when he started the Little Toot. George was already a well known craftsman and model airplane builder prior to his full size project. He started the Little Toot by drawing it in ½ inch to the foot scaled drawings and proceeded to build a metal, 1/24” scale model of his dreams.
The model duplicated what he wanted in the full size airplane including a scale metal engine. Many of the building processes were refined in the small model, prior to starting the full size project.
Well it must have worked, because the airplane performed perfectly on the first flight with only a slight adjustment to the rudder trim tab. The first flight was flown on February 2, 1957 in Corpus Christi, Texas. The pilot for the test flight was a great lady pilot by the name of Pauline Glasson, who is now in her 90's and still a flight instructor in Corpus Christi. All the test hours were flown off and the plane came through with flying colors. The plane was fully aerobatic, and had no bad habits in stall or spin type maneuvers. George originally intended for the Toot to be a one of a kind airplane, but the requests for plans soon overwhelmed that decision so he began to produce plans with all of the modifications incorporated into them that he had made during the project.
George was an early pioneer and promoter of the EAA, as evident by his EAA member number of 64, which was later passed to George’s son, Tommy Meyer who currently carries it proudly. George designed, worked on, and completed the Little Toot project out of a single car garage. He was a craftsman, designer, and experimenter in every sense of the word.
The first fly-in to see Little Toot was the 1957 EAA Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin where he promptly took the top award from Mechanics Illustrated for “Outstanding Achievement in a Homebuilt Aircraft”. He also took 2nd place in “Outstanding Design”, and “Longest Distance Flown” to the convention. Rumor has it that Paul Poberezny took George aside and told him that he had won 1st place in every event they had, but that if he gave them all to George, no one would ever come back. So Paul told him to pick the one he wanted most, and George choose the Mechanics Illustrated award.
George’s design and spirit continue today with an airplane that is still popular in appearance and functionality. There are approximately 30 completed and flying Toots around the country today, from coast to coast and Canada. Hundreds of projects that are in various stages of completion are sure to continue George’s dream well into the next millennium. Tommy Meyer, otherwise known as "Son-of Toot" took over where his father, the late George Meyer left off. Tommy has taken the company to a higher level. Today it's possible to buy pre-fab components that were not previously available, and the tech support is excellent. A new model, the Big Toot is in development and will be offered as a two place airplane.
Hello! And Welcome to the new
Meyer Aircraft Little Toot Web Site
George Meyer started Meyer Aircraft with his first Sports Aerobatic Biplane, started in 1951 and first flown in February of 1957. The plane was named from the Disney Cartoon called Little Toot the tug boat, a phonograph record I listened to in my young life.
It is my hope this new Web site will give you all kinds of information to assist you in purchasing or building your very own little Toot. We have fixtures, parts, and plans, and we can teach you how to make your Little Toot look just like the ones you see on this website.
If there is any way I can assist you with Plans, Parts, Aircraft assembly, Aircraft rigging, Pictures of components, names of other builders and their projects, just let me know and we will respond immediately. It is my hope this new site will continue the legacy of this wonderful airplane, and extend the Little Toot movement. When you build a Little Toot, you become part of the family of builders. We call ourselves “Tooter’s”.
Below is a little bio on the Little Toot, I hope you enjoy it!
Tommy Meyer (“Son of Toot”)
