The Northrop Project number one or N-1M was to be the company's first official design project. Not intended to be a project that would bring in a large contract but instead it was to be a flying laboratory. This project was initiated to fulfill Jack Northrop’s dream of an all wing tailless aircraft, a design, which he believed, posses maximum aerodynamic efficiency.

Jack Northrop’s quest to find the most efficient flying body design can be traced back to the early 1920s. After years of toying with the idea he came to the conclusion that the flying wing design was the answer and the future of aviation. But it was not until 1939 that he was finally able to put his idea to the test.

Since Northrop would have to fund the N-1M project it had to be cheap to build but also it had to be versatile enough so it can be reconfigured in a short period of time by a limited number of personnel. The goal with the N-1M was ultimately about extracting data that may be invested on other more worthwhile projects, which as a result would bring interest from the government and/or the commercial sector.

The aircraft made of mainly plywood and tubular steel lend it self well to the Project requirements. This allowed engineers to study different angles of sweepback, dihedral, and wing droop in any combination. This reconfiguration element gave the N-1M many different looks throughout its short history and this can be seen in the many images taken of the N-1M.

Maneuvering an aircraft of this type had its challenges. Like its European counterparts controls were accomplished using many of the same techniques. The elevons could work together to provide pitch while they could also work opposite of each other to provide roll. The rudder controls were achieved by a set of split flap arrangement set near the wing tips. These flaps worked independently from each other and when one set would open up it would produce drag therefore it forced the aircraft to yaw in the desire direction. These flaps could also be open together to act as airbrakes, which could help slowing the aircraft down or help increase gliding angle. The trim flaps were located between the engine extensions which would assist with landings.

Its maiden flight was actually an “accidental” one as the aircraft sort of bounced of the desert floor when during fast speed taxi run the aircraft went over a rough spot. It was discovered during this event that the aircraft could not climb above five feet. This led to some modifications to the N-1Ms elevons, which was enough to fix the issue. The aircraft went on to make over 200 flights.

The marginal success of the N-1M inspired Jack Northrop to submit patented drawings for a flying wing medium bomber, which turns out was an exact copy of the N-1M. Northrop also envisioned a flying wing design that could also be applied commercially as a cargo plane or passenger aircraft.

After Northrop was finished with the N-1M he gave it over to the Army hoping that it would end up on display somewhere. A few years later the little aircraft went to Indiana and then from there it was transported in crates into storage to the Smithsonian. In the late 1970s it was taken out of the crates and by 1983 restored to a non-flyable static position.

Underpowered and heavy the aircraft was not very fast and was not able to climb above 4,000 feet. But the N-1M proved to Jack Northrop and others that the flying wing concept was plausible. The tiny aircraft yielded a ton of data that was used on many other projects like the N-9M, XP-56, XB-35, and the B-2 Stealth Bomber some 50 years later. The N-1M went through many configurations but the final version of the N-1M now sits restored in the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC.