Gene Matheny of Portland Oregon, beautiful spirit and memories still live in all those addicted newbee NW stunt flyers hearts and minds.
He was the ultimate stuntmaster builder, flyer, who took the time to share his wealth of knowledge and winning ways. Best of all, he was always  there for us, just when we needed a friend.
I first met Gene...at  Portland Oregon's Delta Park flying site, waaaaaay back in the early 60's during my last year at Pacific University and Portland State.
 I was between airplanes...I was flying a quickly profile model to break-in a brand new K&B 35 Stallion engine, that was going to be installed in a modified Nobler. (see ugly kid picture)
 Sadly that Nobler of mine, took a huge back seat to my assignments with the Portland Symphony (now Oregon Symphony) and with a dance band called the Stardusters, plus working part time at Sandy's Camera Shops.

TALK ABOUT BURNED CANDLES.

Back to Gene: As I drove up to Delta's flying site I couldn't take my eyes off  this guy flying what appeared to be some kind of Smoothie? His flying was amazing. I then took my stupid little profile airplane out of my 57 Impala's back seat and sat it on the grass, next to his field box.  I walked over and watched Gene put in the MOST AMAZINGLY BEAUTIFUL PATTERN THAT I HAD EVER SEEN BEFORE MY SLEEP DEPRAVED-N' DEPRIVED EYEBALLS!

When he landed....he walked up and said somethin' like---"Interesting paint job you have there." My names...Gene, You?  I wanted to say: Uhhh! "Dumb-Donnieboy."
I felt pretty shabby, especially when I got a close up view of that beautiful little stunt model of his sittin there  with with the rounded leading edge and trailing edged wing.
Also I couldn't help but notice the generous rounded and balanced elavator on that model of his.
It was blustery that winter day...but that little "GENIE BIRD" model cut through the wind (like there was virtually no wind at all..no speed up what so ever...even better than my old open cockpit Smoothie that I had stupidly wrecked about six months before while attempting dead stick loops after my old Forster 29 ran out of fuel.

Although from a distance...I thought Gene's model might have been a modified Smoothie...but up close and personal, only the rounded nature of the wing tips shared a common platform. THE REST WAS PURE GENIE MAGIC...

From that day forward: Gene was my devoted mentor, teacher, older brother, friend, and often supplied me so many item that I could neither afford or had the knowledge to build.

 He shared so many secrets...how to build a good stunt tank....control systems--HIS INSISTANCE ON THE IMPORTANCE OF PERFECT ALIGNMENT and leadout placement, CG balance points and wing tip balance..etc.

He was often such a lifesaver....I had so little $$$ he so often took me to breakfast, lunch or dinner or shared a sandwich at Delta park practice sessions.

BOTTOM LINE: GENE, PASSED THIS LIFE ALL TOO SOON...BUT...WHAT A DIFFERENCE HE MADE TO SOOOOOO MANY and how fortunate for those of us, who shared life and stunt circle with this most gifted generous and humble man. Gads he took lots n' lots of 1st place awards away from us for so many years.
Thanks be to God for sharing Gene with us.

I gotta stop this....hey you Portland and NW stuntgrunters...JUMP IN HERE AND ADD YOUR STORY ABOUT GENE!

And you guys didn't have problems finding a place to fly.

Jim Cameron tried to fly a float plane in the pond at Westmoreland and they kiked him out. I told him we could never fly in that park. The only other parks were the Panninsala park and Lents park until they started putting ball fields and soccer fields in them. we are syill the minority and this city had Ivancie who was talked into a lot of stuff during the Hippie days.