A quick story about Charlie and Allen Brickhaus. I was born in Mayfield, Kentucky, just 25 miles south of Paducah but have lived in New Orleans for the past 25 years. On a trip to visit some of my family in Paducah several years ago, I called Allen and Charlie and we made plans to fly at the field in Paducah which was an old landfill if memory serves me correctly. Anyway, I drove from Mayfield and met Charlie and Allen at the flying field and we had a great day of flying. One of the planes I took to fly was a Rayette designed by Bob Gialdini (spelling?) which was a profile version of his sting ray I think. Allen had built one as well and had his at the field also. I always like the Olympic Rings that Allen put on his planes.
I asked Allen to fly mine and see if it needed any additional trimming and when he went inverted, the engine quit and he landed it upside down. The only damage to the model was the sharpened dowel pin that was glued to the top of the rudder and it was sheared off and was under the grass somewhere. I never understood the reasoning for the dowel pin anyway unless it was supposed to look like an antenna or something.
We all started looking to see if we could spot the dowell pin and after about 15 minutes, I called off the search because it was just a painted dowell pin and could easily be replaced. But Allen and Charlie were determined they were going to find it and looked for a good 30 minutes scowering the field. Finally I said, yall forget it please and lets do some more flying.
And we had a great afternoon and the little dowell pin is somewhere on that field today.
Just a memory I have of flying that day with two gentlemen that I admired greatly. Allen died several years ago and I still miss his phone calls to me when he was on the road travelling. I have not seen Charlie in years and hardly ever get back to Paducah because most of my family there are gone now.
Mike
Topic: Anyone talked to Charlie Reeves lately? (Read 1197 times)