Why nickname Lulu Belle for XP-80?

[Stephan Wilkinson]

Anybody know exactly why Lockheed used the nickname Lulu Belle for the first Shooting Star prototype? Somebody's wife's name? Character in L'il Abner? Inside joke?

And who was it that came up with that name? Kelly Johnson himself?

[mike furline]

Memphis Belle was already taken? Lulu Belle sounded better than Clyde? I got a million of 'em!

[phil65]

Pappy was flying it, I saw it on Baa Baa Black Sheep...

Phil

[Paul Stroud]

After a bit of Googling, according to the author Steve Pace in his book 'The Projects of Skunk Works: 75 Years of Lockheed Martin's Advanced Development Programs' Lulu-Belle was a 'seductive songstress featured in a 1926 play'. Also made into a movie in 1948 with Dorothy Lamour.

[old iron]

An orchestral tune from 1927: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7HsDCONeHjs>

The tune does sorta bring the XP-80 to mind!

[Chris Brame]

Lulubelle was also the name of Humphrey Bogart's M3 Lee tank in the 1943 film Sahara.