As many of you already know, I am the builder of a Ron Sands replica of the Fokker Dr1 Triplane replicating one of the many aeroplanes flown by a German army reservist known as Lt Joseph Jacobs (pronounced ‘yoseph yacobs’ ) but known to many of his friends as ‘Kobes’. ‘Kobes’ could be a patronymic for ARROW or Pumpkin or even ‘pumpkin head’ as we say in English….with the same connotations in this thread I will refer to him simply as ‘JJ”.
The building of my aircraft has been quite a journey: a journey as yet unfinished but I have enjoyed every step in the process. Here is a shot from way back on a sunny day in Tennessee when I rolled it out for a little sunshine. Unlike a few others here building this same aircraft mine will not be an exact replica: certain customizations to personalize it have been made, in much the same way that old JJ customized his aircraft.
Along with the many tasks given me by my mentor in building the plane, I have undertaken documenting as much as I could about the aircraft itself, its services and such. In this research endeavor I have become increasing consumed with finding out as much as I can on Ltn. Joseph Jacobs himself. He is a fascinating subject and fine example of what we like to believe was one of the last examples of chivalry in war. I know, I know many will cite examples of historic figures claiming that this war was no example of chivalry, but chivalry in war to human culture is a part of our mythology that cannot be removed by historical accounts of event long gone. It lived then as now in our imagination and interpretation more than in facts. My guess is it always has. It was a bigger part of the WW1 pilot’s culture than of ours and even if they never attempted to be THE KINIGHTS of old, acting out their mythology still happened even if subconsciously.
Anyway what is this thread about? Well in my attempt to find out more about JJ and his aircraft I have had the good fortune to travel the United States looking at collections and analyzing bits and pieces of his history and the history of the Jastas to which he was assigned. From the Smithsonian in DC and Boeing Air Museum of Seattle to the Lafayette Foundation of Denver to the Ed Ferko collection at the University of Texas at Dallas, I have combed through quite a bit of stuff looking for an elusive image that may not even exist but still it’s been fun anyway. I am on the quest for a better and different image of the 450/17 machine’s icon-badge of the “flying devil”. I’ve never found it but I’ve picked up a lot of stuff along the way. Which makes me think a bit.
Supposedly the badge would have been painted on any aircraft Jacob’s flew as flight leader of Jasta 7. I’m still looking for that second photo after all these years and so far have run up against only rumors and wishful thinking. The one photo we have all seen clearly illustrates the shape of the wings, but the face and horns, the color and expression are all conjecture as far as I am concerned. Unless there is a second photo that could detail these elements, everything you’ve seen with respect to that aspect of the badge is all wishful thinking or faded memory.
You know the photo I’m talking about its this one:
When zoomed in, you can clearly see the tell tale signs of early offset printing: “HATCHMARKS”. This means this well known photo is actually a photo of a printed image and is not really an original. When held in the hand in person at the Ferko Collection, the photo appears to be a standard LICA photo from the period, but the high density scan reveals the truth. It’s a low density copy.
Unfortunately this means that no matter how much you manipulate the image the tiny features of the face which are smaller than the hatchmarks resulting from the offset printing process are completely obscured and therefore can never be truly revealed or defined.
The Ferko Photo collection (the source of this particular scan) is the product of a number of gentleman who began collecting such photos long before most of us where born. Very few of these folks (the original collectors) still survive but their collections are still with us… somewhere. Unfortunately most of us have no idea where. Likewise with their passing and the subsequent sale of their collections to other private persons, the light of day never sees these photos except for those in the Ferko Collection housed at the University of Texas at Dallas.
These collectors and the original photo owners were highly possessive. I really do not understand why but they did not then nor do they now want you to see even a copy of what they spent a lifetime trying to find. I cannot comprehend the sentiment but none the less it’s there.
This bothers me greatly. It has plagued me in my attempts to render accurately the final badge of Dr1 450/17. I do realize they spent their lives pursuing these images and texts but really what good are they if filed away like the last scene of Indian Jones and Arch of the Covenant? Therefore I would hate to fall into this trap with anything I’ve stumbled across and vow to post here for your use everything I’ve bumped into. It’s not much but it’s a start and I hope it will encourage you to get off your duff and go see it for yourself.
As such, I will use this thread to post every image I run across on old “JJ” and his birds in the highest resolution the site can handle and still function properly. Most of my scans are in excess of 20 meg but I will bump them down to fit and make available the high density to those that really need it. 90% of the best scans I will post are from the Ed Ferko Collection at UTD but there will be others and I will note their source. My hope is that others that hold secret undisclosed photos literally thoudands of them, (maybe even that second shot of the devil badge) will post them, but I hold no allusion that they will. I do this because I honestly believe the correct format for all these historic photos is on the NET rather than socked away in some drawer or museum.
This thread should be looked at as a testament to what could be done with a modern scanned collection like that of Ed Ferko’s: thousands of photos and texts just waiting to be placed in cyberspace. Treated like GOOGLE, it could be filtered and searched by countless methods, annotated by experts like Wikapedia and the Wikipedians, it would always be there even a thousand years from now and could yield an infinite amount of new knowledge. We could benefit from searching it and finding anything we ever wanted from our snowed in cottages in Tennessee, Englewood Colorado or even Marlborough New Zealand.
At the Ferko Collection you can literally pick a person or a bird and follow it through posts and photographs through Jastas until its demise. Imagine if the whole thing were scanned in and freely available online. The impact is unimaginable. I think if we pulled together, we could make that happen, but we’ll talk about that later … until then let’s talk and look at the real master of my favorite flying machine from Anthony Fokker’s the DR1 and its ACE of ACES: Ltn. Joseph Jacobs.
I cannot post them all at once so be patient