Jimmy Rollison sent us video from the first flight of the late Bud Field's De Havilland DH.89 Dragon Rapide on May 18th, and photos from subsequent flights. Jimmy said:

Today she flew, after 36 years, she flew!

I now know why Geoffery de Havilland only put one set of controls in the front of the Rapide......so you don't have to share flying. Like the saying, "the only thing better than sharing a great bottle of wine is having it all to your self". Les Wittlesey, Casa Grande,AZ 2010

I agree with Geoffey and Les.

Here's a thread on Oshkosh365.org which has a posting and video of the recent first flight of the 1929 Hamilton.

Jim Clark of Junction City KS has the wings back on his Custom Cabin Waco project. It is moving fast!

Here are new chapter newsletters. Lots of fly-in announcements!

• Colorado Chapter June 2010 Newsletter
• Wisconsin Chapter May 2010 Newsletter

Photo courtesy Colorado Chapter

See all the Chapter newsletters.

The Pemberton Family wants to thank the visionaries at the Boeing company for making this piece of history a reality.

These pictures were taken by Ryan Pemberton May 8 2010 at 2:30 PM West of Mt. Rainer South East of Seattle at 12,000 ft. The outside air temp was -13 degrees.

Photo Subject: 1928 Boeing 40C 5339 Serial number 1043 is the oldest flying Boeing aircraft of any kind and considered the first successful airliner in the US. 5339 was delivered to Pacific Air Transport a division of Boeing Lines to fly CAM 8 in July of 1928. The airplane crashed Oct 2 1928 in southern Oregon when Northbound from Medford to Portland. The airplane was recovered in the 1990's by the Oregon Aviation Historical Society and purchased by Addison Pemberton in 2000. The aircraft was restored over an eight year period and first flown after restoration Feb 2008.

Boeing 40C pilot Addison Pemberton/owner. John Bevan B40 passenger Photo Plane A36 Bonanza flown by Randy Ingraham of Spokane with his wife Julie. Taryn Pemberton provided camera support in the photo plane. Safety/weather scout plane C-185 flown by Jay Pemberton.

Photographer Ryan Pemberton of Spokane using a Cannon D40 / stabilized 200mm lenses with 12 megapixel resolution.

Photo Subject: Boeing 787 Serial number 001 Dreamliner flown by Michael Carriker, Boeing flight test pilot and his crew. Theses image capture the Boeing Legacy contrasting the oldest and the newest aircraft in flight near their Seattle environment.

The plan was for the Boeing 787 to intercept our flight of three with an overtake on our right side with the Boeing 40 in the foreground and 787 Dreamliner in the background of the photo. The Bonanza was lead for our flight of 3. Two conference calls with Boeing flight test were conducted the morning of the flight to confirm details. The Boeing 787 was light and could overtake us dirty at approximately 150 kts and clean at 190 knots. Our flight of 3 was stabilized at 90 knots. This would provide a 3-7 second photo window during each overtake pass.

The shoot took place after departure from Hood River Oregon, 80 miles south of Mt Rainier. We climbed out of Hood River with the goal of reaching the south face of Mt Rainier at 12,000 feet at a prearranged longitude-latitude location at 2:15 PM. A 310 degree heading was selected for a favorable sun line and join up with the Boeing 787 serial number 001. Our flight was composed of 3 aircraft: An A36 Bonanza with both rear doors removed flown by Randy and Julie Ingraham as a photo platform, a Cessna 185 Skywagon flown by Jay Pemberton acting as a weather scout and safety overview, and the Boeing 40C flown by Addison. My son Ryan and his wife Taryn were staged for the photos in the Bonanza with Ryan in a safety harness grasping his Canon 40D cameras.

The weather did not pan out as planned and our weather scout C-185 proved invaluable to find us a last minute update location for a photo run 20 miles south west of Mt Rainer. Also the freezing level that day was 5000 ft and at 12000 feet were we were flying the air temp was -13°C. The prolonged exposure to the low temperatures caused camera failures but they were resolved by heating the cameras in the front of the Bonanza between each photo run. We were all dressed in cold weather flying gear (but not enough).

The 787 1st appeared at 12:30 climbing up to meet us through a broken cloud deck. The sight was absolutely breathtaking as Beoing Test Pilot Mike Carriker arced the graceful airplane wide to our left to to set up the 1st overtake on our right side. The four passes were perfect and the skill of Mike Carriker was quickly apparent. He made four passes on us in a matter of minutes with absolute safety leaving us star stuck. The Dreamliner in its element is beautiful and the experience is etched in all of us for ever now. With a brief broadcast from the Dreamliner he was gone as quickly as he had appeared and the images are now a historic record for all of us to enjoy.

Our many thanks to the Boeing company for the vision to make this event take place and there willingness to work with us.

Addison Pemberton

Ken Kinsler has a report on his Culver V:

I purchased Culver V N3057K from Mark Holiday in October of 2008. It had been landed gear up and had not been flown in over 20 years. Mark and I disassembled the plane and loaded it on my 16' trailer for the trip from Lake Elmo Airport Minnesota to Mannford Oklahoma, a trip of 750 miles. After having made the deal with Mark to purchase N3057K, John Kass put his V parts up for sale on barnstormers. So I purchased N6211Q also. It just happened that John Had his V parts right on my way to Lake Elmo, at Fairbault Minnesota. It was uncanny the highway curved and there was the airport - just exit and turn into the airport! John and another fellow we enlisted helped to load the fuselage onto the trailer.

I started working on N3057K in the fall of 2009. Wing was stripped of most of the paint and inspected for damage. 4 holes and 1 cracked walkway stringer were found damaged. Holes were repaired by removing material cleaning up damage to a rectangle and scarfing in a new piece of plywood. Stringer was replaced with a new fabricated stringer from spruce stock. Work was then set aside on the wing and attention was turned toward the fuselage.

Fuselage was stripped of paint on the exterior and in the cockpit and inspected. 5 holes were found in fuselage skin. The next from last bulkhead in tail was found to have wood rot. 2 holes had been cut into aft cabin bulkhead at some time to install speakers and one damaged spot was found. The speaker holes were also on the aft side of the bulkhead along with 2 bolt holes which had cracks running through the holes about 2 inches long.

After a number of other repairs for rot and holes in the fuselage, the fuselage was again inspected and any divots found on the exterior were filled with 2 part wood filler and sanded smooth. The interior of the empennage was cleaned with mineral sprits and varnished with thinned polyurethane spar varnish. The entire exterior fuselage and cockpit was then sanded and 2 thinned coats of epoxy varnish was applied. After curing for a week the varnish was given a light sanding in preparation for covering with polyfiber light weight cloth.

The entire fuselage was brush painted with a coat of thinned polybrush and then a spray coat was added. Glider cloth was laid out, tack down, trimmed, heat shrunk and painted with a coat of thinned polybrush. That bring me up to date on the restoration of N3057K.

Jimmy Rollison and Chris Galloway recently held a fly-in in Northern California as a way to get the antique aircraft community out and about. Maybe more people will do the same around the country. Jimmy says:

Attached are photos of the antique airplane fly-in that Chris Galloway and I held at Yolo County Airport, just west of Sacramento, CA. As you know, fly-in's for antiques are becoming few and far between here on the West Coast and usually have more public than planes. We decided last year that we would try a "word of mouth, no charge for anything, who cares what comes, not an open house, 11-3, like minded people, fly-in".

Chris Galloway's Hangar where 160 people were fed!

Honestly we had hoped for 15-20 planes and had planned to feed 40-50 people. On the Wednesday before the response of "what can we bring" made us realize we would exceed the head count for lunch. In a slight panic, we told the caterer to plan on 100 people, and lucky for us, he planned on a head count of 175! Final count was 55 antique/classic planes and 160 people!

We served tri-tip beef, chicken, beans (as I said, we gave everyone all the free gas they wanted!), a salad, desert, drinks and chips. It was such a success that we are planning one for next spring, and are considering one in October as a fund raiser for the Antique Airfield Hangar project. We believe everyone had a great time, for sure Chris and I did, truly, if you have one, they will come!

Lloyd Tinscher

Don Carter's Curtiss 19R