Pages

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Civil Air Transport Cigarette Lighter, CAT, 1950's to 1970's era


While going through my odds and ends, I ran across a lighter that I picked up quite a number of years ago.  This is a VERY unique piece of US history.  It is a cigarette lighter from the Civil Air Transport.  This was the airline that the US Central Intelligence Agency purchased back in the 1950 and used for covert operations and "black-ops" throughout China and Southeast Asia until it was officially disbanded in 1976.  CAT flew regularly scheduled passenger flights as a cover for the covert operations that were being flown at the same time.

Here is a bit of history on the Civil Air Transport:   Civil Air Transport

There is actually a non-profit organization dedicated to the history of CAT and a museum and archive located at Texas Tech University:  www.air-america.org

Here are the photos of my little piece of US Aviation, covert-ops style:

No comments:

Post a Comment