DanH

DanH

Legacy Member
Mentor
Let's have some fun.

Have you been crazy about airplanes since forever? Prove it!

I'll start. This photo taken about 1970. Fifteen, flying very early proportional RC.

Dan RC Airplane.jpg
 
My earliest memory is curled up with my dad watching the crew (and Snoopy) walk to Apollo 10.
Next earliest is my Granny holding me while I wave at taxiing aircraft from the viewing pad at Lindburgh.
No photos.
 
OK, I don’t have scanned photos handy, but we could compare scars from hand propping the engines back then. 😉 Or compare the number of brain cells lost to plastic model cement, and later balsa wood cement (not the water based stuff), and balsa wood dope.
 
I still have a Control Line Rat Racer hanging on my shop wall. I built and flew it circa 1960 (at age 12) with a McCoy 29 engine. RC didn’t happen for me until about 15 years later…after college and a real job! Sorry…no pictures!

My first CL airplane was a Jim Walker Firebaby with a Cox .049 engine.

My dad told me that when I was about 5 years old, i saw a Vee tailed airplane flying over our town and called it a “Beechcraft Banana!”
 
Last edited:
No pictures to prove it but starting about 5 years of age, I started "flying" behind my parents box fan. Like a drug, It progressed to the point of needing stronger fixes. Within a couple years it progressed to line control gas models with .049 cox engines. Eventually I scored a radio control plane. It was then I knew I had a real problem. Although they've long since been retired, those RC planes are hanging on the walls of my hanger today. All of this contributed to this habit which now cost me about $800 a month, (taxes, hanger rent, insurance and fuel). This does not include the purchase price of my first plane and the kit purchase and build of my RV 7A.
So many wonderful people in aviation.
In all seriousness... it has been worth every cent.
 
No memory of it… but my mom made my dad wait until I could fit into a forward facing car seat. So about 18 months. First flight with Dad in a Cessna 140. Middle school age I got into models (balsa/monocote).
 

Attachments

  • 4400C064-CBD4-4E40-973C-281CFE839E3E.jpeg
    4400C064-CBD4-4E40-973C-281CFE839E3E.jpeg
    1.8 MB · Views: 2
"Were you always plane crazy?"

Yes, bitten deep by the bug quite early...
Here, early sixties, I'm seen slightly anxious looking prior to what must have been my first flight as an aviator. As I wasn't born Captain, I took the function of First Officer.
Having performed the outside check I had quickly become aware of the size, or rather lack of, and a rather specific airfoil, or lack of, of the wings on that first aircraft I had to flight test.
Luckily, and no doubt aided by my attractive Captain and her bangs hairstyle of the time, I survived that flight to tell the tale.

IMG_0817.JPG
 
You must log in or register to reply here.