History of Spitfire MK923

MK923 in the middle of  MH415 ( closest ) and MK297 ( farthest ) during the filming of The Longest Day

Picture from Peter Arnold

Cliff Robertson purchased MK923 in 1963 and had the Spit moved from the UK to California USA

MK923 the way Mr. Robertson purchased it.

Jerry Billing, Bill Ross, Don Plumb ( picture supplied by Mr. Peter Arnold )

Cliff Robertson met with the only other Spitfire owner in the USA the late Bill Ross ( MK XVI- SL721) They decided to totally rebuild MK923 at the Ross facility at Dupage County Airport near Chicago Cliff wanted an expert Spitfire pilot and Ross recommended ex RCAF Spitfire pilot Jerry Billing who was piloting the late Don Plumb’s T9 ser. TE308

Jerry Preparing for his first flight in MK923

Jerry's first flight in MK923

MK923 after rebuild in primer

After rebuild Jerry flew MK923 to Wellsville NY for the plane to be repainted and acquired her original squadron letter 5J-Z in #126 squadron colours.

Cliff and Jerry had the arrangement that Jerry would display MK923 at air shows as living history for younger generations to see and Cliff would keep the aircraft flying fanatically.

MK923 after painting

22.5 years Jerry Billing displayed MK923 at air shows around North America. During those years Jerry was the only pilot in North America doing low level acrobatics in a Spitfire ( if not the world ).

Working a full time job during the week, Jerry spent most of his weekends during the Spring, Summer and Fall flying MK923 to various Air Shows around North America.

In 1994 Jerry retired from flying MK923 and the Spitfire was sold to Craig McGraw and is displayed at Seattle Museum of Flight

(Special thanks to Mike Henniger for the use of his Photo's)