Steve there are a few times in my life when a picture painting a 1000 words has been provocative enough to move me light years through time and it changes me so I am hence forth never quite the same. This picture is one of those. I'd like to share a story with you and the guys.
When I was 5 years old, we lived in a basement apartment below an old lady's house on the steep sides of Mt Victoria in Wellington. The house used to shake and rattle a lot in earthquakes, pretty scary for a five year old kid. Air, naval and military activity ( mainly American ) were themes that ran through my early days as Wellington had this stuff well embedded in it's history. And of course my Uncle was still in the RAF having gone to England during the war to fly Spitfires.
One evening my father bought home something marvelous. It was a balsawood glider based on the English Vampire Jet. Hot stuff in those days. We worked on it together that night and I can remember waking the next morning, leaping out of bed and running to the hallway cupboard. Pulling open the door, sitting on a board in the dim 20 W light, there she was in all her glory. The mighty Vampire! So much depended on that Vampire. To this day it represents my father's love for me as his son. He had used the wrong glue ( stringy UHU stuff that wouldn't dry hard) and the glider never flew all that well. But it had fired my imagination and planted a seed that is still growing.
Steve , the boy in that picture is me - only now my Gross Takeoff Weight has trippled and my hair has been grey for some time. But that fire in the belly still glows strong. It is one of life's miracles to me how a grown man who is almost 70 can instantly transported back in time to being 5 years old. Perhaps - no- I'm sure this is one of the reasons ( we? ) I so love this whole world called Model Airplanes on every level, ESPECIALLY Control Line!!
Some extra stuff you might be interested in - kinda connected to this theme.
Richard E Byrd, has an impressive monument to his flight over Antarctica atop Mt Victoria. This American explorer went on to help establish the Deep Freeze programme that operates out of Christchurch. ( I saw the vapour trail of one of these a few days ago above Auckland - one of the first for this season no doubt. Their vapour trail at 40,000 ft from Christchurch has a distinctive kink as they reset their course for Hawai over Auckland.) US aircraft carriers, warships and submarines would regularly visit. I can remember standing on the wharf looking at the Halibut, one of the USA's first guided missile subs , a modified Gato class - if I'm correct. Wellington ( and Auckland), during WW2 had been the base of tens of thousands of US troops preparing for the Pacific. There are smatterings of memorabilia all over Wellington and Auckland to this day that hark back to the US forces here during WW2. I could swear that last time I was in Wellington a few years back, I could catch the ghostly echoes of US Marines marching along the waterfront! Many remaining artifacts are living of course, if not, their prodigy indeed are!
Thanks for the memories Steve.
John ( Jonathan ) Carrodus
Spelt John because as a 10 year old I preferred that to Jon
Topic: What every Kids Room Should Look Like (Read 867 times)
