Lee and Shirley Dautreuil’s “Yellow Duck” is a 1946 BC-12D based at New Iberia, Louisiana.

It’s not often that the federal government restores what it has taken away but in some ways, that’s exactly what has happened with the Taylorcraft, a classic taildragger design. As of mid-2004, the FAA’s new light sport aircraft rules actually permit owners of some T-craft to operate them under vastly less restrictive rules that hark back to the days when the airplane first appeared on the market.

Whether the brave new world of LSA will make old taildraggers like the Taylorcraft a hot item, thus driving up the prices, is a crap shoot. Regardless, as of mid-2004, the airplane is back in production and the model can be counted among those…