rough draft of my book, "Have Goggles, Will Travel"

[AAC Cadet Leader]

Mom's Log
Day 29
Saturday, June 25
Wyoming

Martha met a pilot flying a Mooney at the airport who was on his way to Florida. He offered her free film developing at his connections [film labs he owns] in Idaho Falls, Montana and Richmond, VA. He spends two weeks each year in Dallas and two weeks in Pensacola.

At General Brees Field Airport, Martha arranged for Alva Jones of Rock Springs, Wyoming to fly her to Idaho Falls on Sunday.







Martha called at 9 p.m. Cleveland time from Alva Jones’ home in Rock Springs, Wyoming. 1941 Interstate Cadet. He has a wife (w/ same birth date as Martha’s?) and four small children: Sarah 9, Rosie 7 ½, Rebecca 5, Elizabeth 1 ½.



Day 30
Sunday, June 26
Wyoming
Stayed with Alva Jones’ (weather threatening). [I had a great time with this fun family! Such happy, joyful, little Jones girls!]

[AAC Cadet Leader]

Mom's Log
Day 31
Monday, June 27
Wyoming to Idaho


Idaho Falls, Idaho. Left Rock Springs, Wyoming at 5:30 a.m. with Alva Jones. They passed the Grand Teton Mts. and landed at Fanning Fields Airport at Idaho Falls.


Martha then boarded a 1941 Piper Cub Float plane, owned by Linn Hower at Idaho Falls. They went swimming in the Snake River off of the pontoon landing gear floats on their way to American Falls.




[Insert slide of Linn’s floating Super Cub at Tom’s Marina]

Then on to Burley – Tom’s Marina to an FBO owned by people who know a pilot with a Beech Staggerwing who will take Martha to Twin Falls Tuesday morning. Stayed at a hotel Monday night registered at midnight. Thompson Videos, Burley, Idaho.

Day 32
Tuesday, June 28
Idaho
Twin Falls, Idaho Lee Moyle flew Martha from Burley to Twin Falls in Staggerwing Beach and Don Chapton flew to Boise from Twin Falls in WWII Navy Trainer N3N, they landed at 4:15 p.m.

Newspaper photograph took pictures and drove Martha to town to newspaper office where reporters took story and printed it in Wednesday’s paper. Julie Stutts a writer for newspaper invited Martha to stay at her home tonight. Tomorrow, Wednesday they will take her to a photo lab to get her pictures developed. Twin Falls photo lab did not develop slides. Margin notes: S. Thompson - see video Burley. John Paul P-40 Boise, Idaho, see card.

[AAC Cadet Leader]

Mom's Log
Day 33
Wednesday, June 29
Idaho to Nevada
M had 12 rolls of slides processed and printed $150 at Boise. Will have others processed elsewhere as they are Kodachrome.

Joe Corlett from Boise flew Martha to Winnemucca, Nevada arriving at 5:30 p.m. in his 1957 Cessna 182.



Ted Contri is coming in from Reno to pick Martha up and take her to Reno in his P-51 Mustang WWII fighter. He is Butch Gordo’s employer. He flies Butch to California on Mondays where he works.

Ted Contri flew M from Winnemucca to Reno, Nevada's Cannon Int’l Airport where he has three Warbirds in his hangar. They flew very fast (370 mph?) and
[re-insert rest of this sentence pending clearance]
She did not fly as there was no control stick in back.

At Reno she met Butch Gordo [who has a] Cessna 172 and his friend Volker Zakerei who soloed first time today. They all went downtown for dinner at a casino. Martha gambled $5 of Gordo’s money and quit.



Martha stayed in spare room of Butch’s mobile home with his brother and sister-in-law. It is near the desert and mountains. Ted Contri flew Butch back to CA and Butch Gordo left his car, a classic Thunderbird and his plane, a Cessna 172 for Martha to use.

Day 35
Friday, July 1
Nevada
M catalogued photos and sent them to us. Worked all day on organizing notes on trip so far. Has 12 more rolls of film to be processed (Kodak). [Drove Butch Gordo's T-bird into Reno, did some sightseeing, some swimming, then met with Brandon Gentry for lunch at a second floor outdoor cafe to plan out the next few flights to go with him in his 1947 Aeronca Champ Arizona and California.]

[AAC Cadet Leader]

Mom's Log
Day 36
Saturday, July 2
Utah
In a 1947 Aeronca Champ, M left at 8:30 am with Brandon Gentry for St. George Utah. Rented a car and toured Zion National Park. Stayed overnight.



Day 37
Sunday, July 3
Utah and Arizona
M and Brandon left at 7 AM from St. George, Utah and flew over the Grand Canyon for Sedona, Arizona. At Sedona Martha enjoyed the river valley and rock slides. [Brandon and I went swimming in Slide Rock Canyon while in Sedona. What an incredibly beautiful place that is!]

[AAC Cadet Leader]

Mom's Log
Day 37 continued
Later this day, M and brandon flew to Prescott, Arizona and M got a ride there in Bob DeFord's St. Louis Streetcar, which is not a car at all. It is a biplane that looks just like a Stearman. Bob said that the St. Louis Streetcar was built by a motor company and only 15 were built, and this one is the last in existence.

M went to the Ready Room to fill out logbook, in the hangar. It was like a fort similar to The 100th Bomb Group Restaurant at Cleveland Hopkins Airport, [only better]. Looked like a WWII Army headquarters, [barracks, with sandbags piled up,] old military uniforms and jeeps and WWII movies [and GlennMiller records]. There are 6 or 8 pilots here that call themselves “frustrated WWII fighter pilots” (a squadron of fanatics). Great fun. They loved Martha’s attire.

[AAC Cadet Leader]

Mom's Log
Day 38
Monday, July 4
Arizona
M flew to Prescott with Brandon in his Champ to see Trey Johnson - he was not home. On to Tucson arriving at 5:40 p.m. Martha and Brandon ate at Gary Abrams’ Restaurant (on list of correspondences) and attended Tucson - Marana. Avra Valley Airport Fly-In.

Met Dorothy Dickerhoff, a 99 pilot (correspondent) who organizes air shows and gave Martha two passes to tour Pima Air Museum on Tuesday a.m.

M stayed at Beth Meyers’ home overnight Monday July 4th. Saw fireworks and a town fair. Beth is friend of Dorothy Dickerhoof.

[I also flew with Gary Abrams at Marana, Arizona just before the fireworks show.]

[AAC Cadet Leader]

saving this space for more photos

[AAC Cadet Leader]

saving this page to add photos at a later time

[AAC Cadet Leader]

Mom's Log
Day 39
Tuesday, July 5
Arizona
Tucson, Prescott and Scottsdale.
Called R. Finkenbine (correspondent) he was working today. Met Trey Johnson at Prescott’s (Embry Ridelle Air View.) at 4:00. They followed 4 UPS trucks trying to track down Martha’s shipment of Air Adventurers wing pins that she to gives to her pilots. Pins COD pkg. $800 on its way back to Florida for not having been picked up after four notices. They found the right UPS truck at a gas station getting ready to leave that was about to take the package back to the UPS station to send it back to Florida!

Three TV stations and two newspapers photographed Martha [and Brandon] on take off from Tucson to Prescott. They landed first at Scottsdale where the Arizona Republic News covered - page B5.

Day 40
Wednesday, July 6
Arizona to California
Prescott to Corona
Martha picked up the package containing clothes, etcetera that I sent to Trey Johnson’s home in Arizona. She made calls to her California contacts I’d given her then she left with Brandon Gentry in his Aeronca Champ for Corona at 11a.m. They said they flew over the outer, eastern edge of the Los Angeles area’s brown, thick smog layer into Corona, California. Martha said she’d never seen anything like it. It was unbelievable flying into southern California for the first time.

[It looked very distinct, like an overcast layer of clouds, except that it was a yucky yellowish-brown, instead of white and the air above was a beautiful, clear blue. We took a deep breath just before we sunk down into it, as we descended for the airport approach.]

They arrived at Corona Airport @ 4 PM then had dinner at the airport restaurant with Brandon Gentry and his stepfather. Wore the long white skirt and blouse I sent. She stayed on the airfield in a small furnished, uninhabited, air-conditioned Scotty’s Trailer. The daytime temperature outside was over 100 degrees.

[AAC Cadet Leader]

Twentynine Palms
Written in mid July, 1988, in southern California.

Thinking back to about a week ago, I wasn't asking this kind stranger to take a week of vacation from his job to fly me all over the southwest, but he volunteered the generous gesture, and out there with so much space between airports and populated towns I wasn't about to turn him down. Not while my two and a half-day stint at the laundromat in Taos, New Mexico that happened two weeks earlier, was still fresh in my mind. That was where I spent the majority of my Taos visit, leaning up against the triple loader, making hours upon hours of calls from the payphone attached to the wall, looking for a pilot with an old plane to come fly me out.

Like many of the other phone numbers I've collected, someone who knew him and knew that his plane was pretty old gave Brandon Gentry’s number to me. I called and told him how I was trying to hitchhike through all of the continental states via vintage aeroplanes, etcetera, and could he take me in his antique plane to, or in the direction of Utah?

He said he'd wanted to fly out to see his step dad in Corona, California, anyway, and had the vacation time coming to him, so why not take it now, help me out and have someone to do some sightseeing with. We planned to meet in person the next day over lunch and talk about the places we'd fly to.

At an outdoor second floor cafe in Reno we planned a tentative schedule to land at St. George, Utah and do some hiking in Zion National Park and to fly over the Grand Canyon into Arizona. He was tall and trim, looked like a bicyclist and it was apparent that he liked the big desert west outdoors; he said he would bring two tents and we could camp out near his airplane.

Three days earlier Ted Contri's P-51 Mustang brought me to Reno Cannon Field so we arranged that Brandon would fly over to Cannon from his home base airfield, just twenty miles away, and pick me up by Ted’s hangar, there the next morning. This way I would be keeping my rule of no car rides or other transportation to get to the next airfield.

Over the next four days, the sweet little red 1959 Aeronca Champ took us from: Reno, to Yerington, Nevada; to St. George, Utah; then into Arizona over the Grand Canyon; and southward down to Prescott; Sedona; and Tucson; then back northward to Scottsdale; and back to Prescott; then we turned westward for Twentynine Palms, California; then Corona, California. Whew!

Between our flights, Brandon and I hiked and swam in two red rock canyons, watched Fourth of July fireworks and explored the Pima Air Museum together. He was a terrific travel companion.




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