On tangentially transitive projective planes

The existence of Baer collineations in a projective plane is related to the existence of desargues-like configurations. The plane of order four is characterized as the only finite plane that possesses a Baer subplane partition into tangentially transitive Baer subplanes which is preserved by each of the tangentially transitive groups. It is shown that a finite projective plane has either no or one tangentially transitive Baer subplane or is partially transitive of Hughes type (4, m), (5, m) or (6, m) for some m. The Lenz-Barlotti classes which contain a finite plane which is not a translation plane nor its dual and which possesses a tangentially transitive Baer subplane are shown to be classes I.1 and II.1.