Very interesting search on the identification of this ship.

If someone is interested enough, and wants to spend $10, they can
request from the FAA all the information about a particular tail
number, either on paper or on CD. I did that with my glider and the
information went all the way back to the original German paperwork (in
German), 26 documents altogether. Very interesting.

Importantly, you will need both the tail number AND THE SERIAL
NUMBER. This second component may be the difficult nut to crack. Was
there a data plate on the glider and, more importantly, did someone
get the SN? I suppose both the SN and N number is required as N
numbers are reused (like in this case) and you would only want the
information related to "your" ship.

See http://aircraft.faa.gov/e.gov/nd/ for details.