0C0 (Dacy Airport) founder and owner goes west

ScottM

ScottM

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iBazinga!
0C0 is a great little airstrip in North Central Illinois, near the town of Harvard this strip is a throw back to yesteryears. There are three runways, all turf, an old hangar and an active pilot population. I loved landing there as there were always airport bums around. One would often see a DC3 doing touch and goes on the turf as well as some other vintage stuff. Harvard and Dacy airport was on my commute to the lake where we train scuba divers so when not flying I would also get to go a mile out of my just to pass by.

The founder of Dacy airport and it's namesake passed away.

John Dacy died Tuesday at age 91.

“He was probably the most positive, happy person I’ve ever known,” Susan Dacy said of her father. “He was one of those really lucky people whose work was his passion, his job, his hobby. He got to do every day what he truly loved.”

John Dacy began flying in and out of his family farm on the south side of Harvard in 1933. Soon after, he opened Dacy Airport to the public and started an airplane-repair business, Phil Dacy said.

“He just loved working on airplanes, and engines in particular,” said Susan Dacy, herself an American Airlines pilot. “Everything about the airport had his touch on it. It was a happy, relaxed place.”

When John Dacy closed his mechanic shop on weekends, he loved to watch the planes come and go, and to talk with the pilots, recounting stories from as early as the 1930s, his daughter said.

“He could tell stories just as vividly as if it was a snapshot,” Susan Dacy said.

John Dacy was named Illinois State Mechanic of the Year in the 1960s, received the Charles Taylor Master Mechanic Award, and was inducted into the Illinois Aviation Hall of Fame, Phil Dacy said.
Click to expand...
http://www.nwherald.com/articles/2007/05/17/news/local/doc464c1753cd099896899497.txt
 
I'm gonna miss this guy

Around Northern Illinois, every pilot I know knew or knew of John Dacy, who kept alive a small grass strip airport in Harvard that is home (or home away from home) to many aviators. Many times you'd fly in to Dacy and find him mowing the runways himself. Aviation could use a few more like him.

http://www.nwherald.com/articles/2007/05/17/news/local/doc464c1753cd099896899497.txt

EDIT: AAAARGH, Scott, you did beat me to the punch! Sorry I missed that and thanks for your post!

P
 
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