One More Airplane Story

There is at least one more story to tell about Tyre and the DC-3 airplane.  I was expecting someone to point out that the picture below was not of Dad standing next to a DC-3.  Some of you may know that the plane in that picture belongs to Ken Jordan.  I'm very glad to say that Ken reports his Champ is very close to flying again after he has spent many months putting it back together from that "hard landing" a few years ago.

Dad wrote about one of his encounters with a Douglas DC-3 in a newspaper article in July 1994.  I will continue to look for a picture of Dad with a DC-3 but below is his recollection of that encounter:

This past Saturday, two sons-Jim and Jeff, and four grandsons-Ty, Daniel, Jared and Jordan, and I went to the International Air Show in Dayton, Ohio.  As we walked through the front gate, sitting there in all her glory, was a restored Piedmont Airlines DC-3.  I was over, under, and all around it and would have gone in it but the "air stair door" was roped off and a big fellow was standing in front of it.  But all was not lost.  On our way to where the Air Force planes were parked, Jeff spotted another one.  This one had been restored by some Continental employees who were a more congenial lot.  In fact, after I had invested $2 in a tie tac they were selling and walked over to look at the Boeing 727, Ty came running to find me.  "Daddy D!  Daddy D!  Come over here!  There's a man who wants to meet you!"  When we got back to the Continental 3, Jim explained that Ty, wanting to get a closer look, had said to one of the men, "My grand-daddy used to work on these airplanes, too."  That's all it took.  Blood is thicker than water and engine oil is thicker than that.  After Jim introduced us, I was treated like a long lost cousin.  In less time than it takes to tell it, I was through the door, up the sloping passenger compartment, and standing in the cockpit touching the controls, smelling the smells, seeing the sights, reliving those days of long ago.  And expecting the engine to go to turning over just any second.  In a little bit, I fumbled my way back down the aisle, and as I stepped down the air stair door, my new friend asked, "Did it bring back memories?"  "Memories?  Friend, this'll bring tears to your eyes."  And it did.

And, it still does today.  Some of my fondest memories of Tyre are when airplanes were involved.  Whether we were looking at them on the ground or watching them fly at an airshow in Ohio or Nebraska or Mather Air Force Base in California; or flying a Cessna or Piper to Bowman Field in Louisville for lunch; or flying across eastern Kentucky and then deciding to fly on over to an airport in Virginia for lunch just because we could, my Dad and I shared a passion for airplanes and shared passions between father and son are to be cherished for a lifetime.  And, I will.