Beech A-36 Bonanza

The Bonanza is one of a few truly revolutionary light personal transportation planes, and it is, in our view, the first truly modern personal plane, period. When it was introduced in 1947, just two years after the war, it was in a class of one. It was the most practical, fast, affordable and easy-flying four-seater ever, and Beechcraft's competitors hurried to keep from being left completely behind. Eventually, Cessna would introduce a true competitor, in the form of the Model 210 Centurion, but with its big head start and a strong edge in terms of aesthetics, the Bonanza was a decade or more ahead of the competition. And Beech engineers continued to find ways to make the Bonanza better, faster and stronger, eventually coming up with a conventional-tail hangar-mate, the Model 33 Debonair and a straight tailed stretch version, the B-36, which continues in production today.