It's "Wheels Up" At AirVenture Oshkosh 2025

The Experimental Aircraft Association's (EAA) annual week-long AirVenture gathering in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, is underway. It's better known as "Oshkosh" to aviation enthusiasts and you can be assured that every one of them has the event on their bucket list. There's good reason. Imagine a fly-in attracting around 7500 airplanes. Imagine 2500 aircraft exhibits, 800 commercial exhibitors, daily world-class airshows, and a total of around 700,000 guests.

AirVenture at Oshkosh is far from your average fly-in

Organizers call the event "the world's greatest aviation celebration" and this year marks its seventy-second edition. The map below gives readers an idea of the scope and scale of Oshkosh and indicates why the event turns a rather sleepy Wittman Regional Airport into the busiest airport in the world for one week each year.

AirVenture grounds - for scale, that's an 8000 foot runway at the top 

AirVenture grounds looking east to Lake Winnebago

I had the privilege of attending the event several times in the last decade of my career. Energizing, informative, and significant, the show was a great vehicle for delivering an organizational message to a large, captured, and enthusiastic audience. You may ask why the National Park Service (NPS) would send a dozen or so employees and volunteers to work an air show. First, the agency has almost fifty out of its more than 400 units with a significant link to an aviation theme. In addition, the Service maintains a fleet of fixed and rotary wing aircraft contributing over 20,000 hours of flight time annually in support of park operations, maintenance, and resource and fire management. Add to that interagency cooperation across departments as well as airspace regulation over the parks and the justification become clearer. In recent years the NPS's presence at the event has been reduced significantly and folded into a more cooperative effort with other federal agencies. In summation, it's a grand and demanding opportunity to reach out face-to- face with thousands of guests who enjoy and impact resources and services in and ver the parks.

Nothing like fly-in camping with thousands of your best - in this case closest - friends

If you can't attend AirVenture, the EAA maintains a comprehensive up-to-the-second website where you can spend hours reading, watching and listening to events. I've been looking up at the sound of an aircraft engine ever since I could lift my head. If you are blessed with the same response make your plans to attend an Experimental Aircraft Association AirVenture. You will not be disappointed. Until then "wheels up" every chance you get!

Footsteps On The Moon

 

Lunar Module Eagle in landing configuration, July 20, 1969

July 20, 1969, fifty-six years ago today, the Apollo Lunar Module Eagle landed on the moon. Millions watched at 10:56 PM, EDT, as Neil Armstrong, the commander of the Apollo 11 mission, descended the Eagle's ladder and made what he called a "giant leap for mankind" with his final step onto the powdery lunar surface. Learn more about the Apollo 11 mission here on Wikipedia where you can find scores of links to more National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) reports and multimedia.

Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, the lunar module pilot, spent almost 22 hours on the moon including their 150 minute walk where they erected an American flag, collected soil and rock samples, and deployed experiments. On their return to Earth much of the material they collected was eventually archived and displayed at the Smithsonian Institution. Some rocks entered our culture in some fascinating ways, including this one at the Washington National Cathedral, where one was embedded at the center of a red planet in what has become known as the Space Window.

Time is catching up with those first attempts at exploring our nearest celestial neighbor. Neil Armstrong passed away in 2012 at the age of 82. Buzz Aldrin turned 94 earlier this year. Michael Collins, the command module pilot, passed away in 2021 at the ago of 90. With the creation of the Artemis program in 2017, the US and its partners hope to return to the lunar surface with a crewed polar landing scheduled for 2025. That's an ambitious target date , but no more so than the private sector timetable for similar missions to Mars. Regardless of what the future holds, those early years including the mission we commemorate today were an exciting and almost magical time for science, exploration, and discovery of the frontier "out there."






Sources

Photos and Illustrations:
atlasobscura.com, Space Window detail
nasa.gov, Space Window, full photo

Text:
Wikipedia.com

Andrew Wyeth: Master Of Fine Illustration

My career often involved planning and producing a broad variety of visual media including publications, audiovisuals, and museum exhibits. The work made me aware of any number of artists, illustrators and styles both historic and contemporary. It's led me to appreciate the work of two artists in particular. One is Walter Inglis Anderson. There'll be a post about him in September. On this day we note the birth of another favorite, Andrew Wyeth. He was born in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, in 1917 and died there in 2009 after a lifetime of painting individuals and landscapes near his home and at his summer residence in Maine. He represented the second of three generations of famous painters in the Wyeth family. His father, N. C. Wyeth, was a renowned illustrator and painter. His son, Jamie, who turned 75 last week, continues painting in his father's footsteps in Pennsylvania and Maine.

I can best characterize his work as compelling, thought-provoking dreamscapes on canvas, not quite real, not quite abstract. Here are three painting by Wyeth offering a comfortable contrast to the season of his birth. Readers can see the full range of his subjects at his authorized website.

Ice Pond 1969

My aim is to escape from the medium with which I work; to leave no residue of technical mannerisms to stand between my expression and the observer. To seek freedom through significant form and design rather than through the diversion of so-called free and accidental brush handling.

Branch in the Snow 1980

My aim is not to exhibit craft, but rather to submerge it, and make it rightfully the handmaiden of beauty, power and emotional content.

Shredded Wheat 1982

What you have to do is break all the rules.

Thanks to the BBC and Michael Palin we have a fine documentary of Andrew Wyeth, his craft and emotion, and especially his sense of place. Hope you take the time to enjoy it.

Sources

Text:
quotations, art-quotes.com

He Penned A Masterpiece At 21

Bob Dylan turned 84 earlier this year. That means he's been writing songs for over 60 years. He was only 21 on July 9, 1962 when he walked into the Columbia Recording Studios in New York to record a song to be included on his second album. The song, Blowin' in the Wind, brought him fame and recognition as one of the nation's leading folk poets of the twentieth century. The lyrics and Dylan's comments on the song were published in June 1962 in the folk journal, Sing Out. He said this:

Too many of these hip people are telling me where the answer is but oh I won’t believe that. I still say it’s in the wind and just like a restless piece of paper it’s got to come down some . . . But the only trouble is that no one picks up the answer when it comes down so not too many people get to see and know . . . and then it flies away.

Dylan and Joan Baez, March on Washington, August 8. 1963

The music critic, Andy Gill, said this about the song in his book, Classic Bob Dylan, 1962-1969: My Back Pages:

Blowin' in the Wind marked a huge jump in Dylan's songwriting. Prior to this, efforts like The Ballad of Donald White and The Death of Emmett Till had been fairly simplistic bouts of reportage songwriting. Blowin' in the Wind was different: for the first time, Dylan discovered the effectiveness of moving from the particular to the general. Whereas The Ballad of Donald White would become completely redundant as soon as the eponymous criminal was executed, a song as vague as Blowin' in the Wind could be applied to just about any freedom issue. It remains the song with which Dylan's name is most inextricably linked, and safeguarded his reputation as a civil libertarian through any number of changes in style and attitude.

Blowin' In the Wind is a poem for our time, perhaps all time.

Sources

Photos and Illustrations:
U.S. Archives and Records Service, Rowland Scherman Collection

Text:
wikipedia.com, Bob Dylan entry
history.com

The Battle Of Gettysburg, July 1-3, 1863: Of Endings and Beginnings

Today marks the conclusion of the Battle of Gettysburg, fought July 1-3, 1863, and the beginning of the end for the Confederate States of America. A year later, in August 1864, the Union unconditionally controlled the Mississippi River and relentlessly pressed Confederate forces in Virginia. In the Deep South, General Sherman's army devastated Atlanta. Six months later, he would be in Savannah and poised to destroy the remains of the Confederacy as he moved north through the Carolinas.

The American Civil War is a perennial topic in our history. Indeed, it did preserve the Union as President Abraham Lincoln intended and left us with any number of consequences in our national experience, both good and bad. Regarding those consequences, we should not expect otherwise as that is the way events unfold in the great wheel of history. And so it is with our great wheels of personal experience. Now in  my seventh decade immersed in all of this I'm a bit surprised and certainly privileged to experience Gettysburg at 100 and 150 years after the pivotal battle. The place is a personal holy ground because three people cared.

The Old Ranger and his dad at Gettysburg in 1954

First of all. my parents always loved being in nature and its historical overlay. Living in the Potomac River watershed afforded our family many opportunities to enjoy any number of places of national significance. As is often the case, first impressions become lasting ones. I was seven years old when we spent a long weekend exploring almost every foot of Gettysburg National Military Park. It was a fascinating experience and I still have the souvenirs to prove it. About six years later I met George Landis, the third person in this story. Landis taught middle school history and social studies on the eve of the Civil War Centennial. A Pennsylvanian with a love of history and basketball, he devoted an entire school year to the study of the Civil War. He was a superb teacher, highly animated and far ahead of his time. He focused on learning that took his students beyond lectures into the world of role-playing, performance, critical thinking and more. I recall fondly seeing every chalkboard in his classroom filled with detailed maps of battles, each carefully drawn and labelled with colored chalk. A little more than a decade after my year with Landis, I began a long and rewarding career immersed in experiential learning in the sacred places and histories in our national parks.

The Old Ranger and his mom at Gettysburg in 1954

There will be tens of thousands of people visiting Gettysburg this holiday week as well as many thousands of volunteers recreating and commemorating the events that took place there. Lasting impressions will be made this week about the sacrifice, the consequences, and the wheels of history both national and personal. And somewhere in that crowd will be a seven year-old with a new enthusiasm for a defining moment in our national experience. The commemorative landscape at Gettysburg will wait with pride and serenity like an old veteran to welcome him on his return visit in 2063.

Lena Horne: An American Legend

In the years around the turn of the century I was a member of the planning and design team for the newly established Tuskegee Airmen National Historic Site in Alabama. Fundraising was a big part of our mission and we asked a large core group of airmen who they would like to see as a national spokesman for the effort. To a man, the response was, "Lena Horne!" who made a number of visits to their two Tuskegee airfields during World War II. They adored her. She was beautiful, had a sultry voice, the perfect figure for a World War II pinup, and a highly successful musical career on stage and screen. She was also strong-willed and, at times, defiant, both characteristics that served her well in the American civil rights movement following the war. No wonder she appealed to them.

Horne publicity photo from 1964, NBC Bell Telephone Hour

Who was this international star and favorite pinup? Lena Horne was born on this day in Brooklyn in 1917. Those familiar with the singer will always remember her remarkable talent as a legendary performer with a sparkling personality and a beautiful smile, In her almost seventy years in entertainment she worked the big band and cabaret circuits, movies, Broadway, and television. She became politically active in the fight for civil rights following World War II, a decision that placed her on the federal entertainment blacklist for over a decade. Readers can learn more details about Horne's life and career in a New York Times obituary published following her death in May 2010.

Horne at Tuskegee Institute banquet, Tuskegee, Alabama, during World War II

Due to her age and disabilities, Horne was unable to take on the role the Tuskegee Airmen so enthusiastically desired but fundraising commenced in a different direction and eventually contributed to construction and interpretation at the park. Her image and the stories of her visits are embedded in those exhibits.

I remember Horne well from her frequent television performances and recordings beginning in the 1950's. She's always been a personal favorite among pop and jazz singers and the stories of her association with the Tuskegee Airmen tells me she was one very special lady.

Here she is performing her signature song, Stormy Weather, from the 1943 film of the same name.

And here is a fine synopsis of the life and times of Horne prepared for a segment of the PBS News Hour in 2010.

Sources

Photos and Illustrations:
public domain photograph, NBC Television, Wikipedia.org
banquet photo, Noel Parrish Collection, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington

Happy Birthday, Mel Brooks: He's 99 Years Young Today

When he was 14, Mel Brooks, began his career in show business as a comedian at several Catskill Mountain resorts north of New York City. After service in Germany in World War II - he dismantled booby traps and defused land mines among other duties - he returned home determined to establish a career in entertainment where he soon found himself enjoying writing more than performing. He honed that skill for several years on Sid Caesar's Show of Shows and Caesar's Hour. Around 1960 he teamed up with Carl Reiner, also a Caesar comedy writer, to develop a sketch that would make both of them famous.

Entitled "The 2000 Year-Old Man," the concept featured a comic Brooks as the old man being interviewed by Reiner as the straight man. Over fifty years the duo produced several recordings of the often ad lib sketches produced in studio as well as live on countless television programs. After this success and a move to Hollywood filmmaking wasn't far behind.

Today we wish the 2000 year-old man a very happy birthday. The performer, writer, director, producer, songwriter, and perpetually wacko comic personality is 99 years old. In his seventy year career he's brought us some of the finest comedy to grace the American stage, big screens in theaters, and the television screens in millions of our homes. And there's no end in sight either with his work in animated features and now rare television appearances. It's only a guess where his talents could emerge in the future.

Brooks in a still from Blazing Saddles, 1974

His film career began with The Producers in 1968. The rest is history, a laugh track of films including:

Blazing Saddles (1974) "Mongo only pawn...in game of life."

Young Frankenstein (1974) "Abby...Normal."

Silent Movie (1976) "Non!"

High Anxiety (1977) "Those who are tardy do not get fruit cup!"

History of the World Part I (1981) "It's good to be the king."

Spaceballs (1987) "May the schwartz be with you."

Robin Hood: Men in Tights (1993) "Actually Scarlet is my middle name. My whole name is Will Scarlet O'Hara. We're from Georgia."

Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1995) "I have been to many stakings - you have to know where to stand! You know, everything in life is location, location, location...."

The Producers (musical) 2001 "Will the dancing Hitlers please wait in the wings? We are only seeing singing Hitlers.

The Producers (film remake) 2005 "My blue blanket! Give me back my blue blanket!"

Young Frankenstein (musical) 2007 "He vas my boyfriend!"


The American Film Institute's 100 Greatest Comedies list has The Producers (1968), Blazing Saddles, and Young Frankenstein ranked at #11, #6, and #13. Here is the unforgettable three minutes and twenty seconds from the film he calls his personal favorite, the 1968 production of The Producers:

I think one reason why the 2000 year-old man is still laughing with us at 99 rests with the fact that the Mel Brooks on stage and film is most often the same man one finds in private life. How does he do it? I recall the many stories my National Park Service colleagues told of Brooks and his wife, Anne Bancroft. In the '70's and '80's they were frequent guests at Caneel Bay Resort inside Virgin Islands National Park on the island of St. John. Known for playing practical jokes on the younger park rangers and resort staff during the day, Brooks and Bancroft hosted them at after-hours gatherings where hilarity ruled. Given the public comedy we know, one can only imagine the memories to come out of the spontaneity of such an evening. The world would be a far happier place if all of us could have more evenings like that.

Today, instead of laughing at the comedy and satire Brooks gave us over the years the political correctness of the day would rather smother it and insure we never produce it again. So unfortunate. Regardless, with the passing of Carl Reiner at 98 in 2020, we're looking at Brooks as the last man standing from a remarkable era of comedy entertainment in the US. Here's wishing one of the funniest men on the planet a very happy birthday. It's my hope that we can laugh at his wacko genius for years to come. 


For more information as well as a most entertaining read this summer I recommend Brooks's memoir published in 2021. Without a doubt it will leave you smiling.

But wait, there's more. Brooks has two new projects under developement. First, there is Very Young Frankenstein, a television series influenced  by his earlier film, Young Frankenstein, in 1974. A pilot is expected soon. The second project is Spaceballs 2, a sequel to his 1987 film, Spaceballs. The film is expected to be released in 2027.

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