Unlike other Cessna products like the Cessna 172 Skyhawk, most models are virtually identical from the outside. In the 27 years, it was built, there were officially 180 variants going from A to K, with only the letter I being skipped. With the first units made in 1953, the Cessna 180 was produced all the way up to 1981, when it was fully superseded by its tricycle gear cousin, the Cessna 182 Skylane. Even today, many of these planes are still in use as personal aircraft or light utility aircraft for bush flying. What Cessna did not know at the time was that they had, in fact, introduced what would eventually become a staple of down and dirty, backcountry bush flying! In hindsight, its “Skywagon” moniker could not have been more perfect. The campaigns of the time made no secret about their intended audience: Cessna had branded their new creation as “the businessman’s airplane,” owning up to its expanded and comfortable passenger cabin that made the trip a lot more enjoyable for those not sitting behind the controls. It married the classic exterior lines with a modern spinner design and an all-new square vertical stabilizer top. It would not be wrong to characterize the original 180 as a “Super 170”. Sleek, robust, and with roots that clearly traced back to the company’s commercially successful Cessna 170. In 1953, Cessna ads leaned heavily on the 50th anniversary of the Wright brothers’ first flight to proudly introduce their new offering to the market: the Cessna 180.
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