First Flights

[flyingcheesehead]

This thread is prompted by the One Hundred Years Ago thread, where I said Spike should ask his 100-year-old grandmother-in-law about her first flight, as I'd gotten an interesting story from my dad about his. There was a request to post it, but I figured this would make an excellent thread of its own.

So, step one for everyone: Ask your parents/grandparents/(self!) about the first time they rode on an airplane. Then, post their stories here. I, for one, am looking forward to the reliving of the glory days.

So, without further ado...

 

[flyingcheesehead]

OK...

My dad's first flight was when he was in high school in the early 1960's. He grew up on a farm near Clarion, PA and most of the extended family on that side were also farmers.

One of the tractor dealers had a promotion going on: Buy a new tractor, get a free flight to the factory for a tour. One of my dad's uncles bought a new tractor and got a pair of tickets to fly to somewhere in Canada (IIRC) to tour the factory. My dad and one of his cousins were the lucky guys who got to go.

He wasn't sure what type of airplane it was, but that it was propeller-driven.

That's all I remember, I'll have to ask him again for more details. I'll have to ask my mom and my grandma, too...

As for me, my first was when I was about 3 years old on a 727 going to Pittsburgh. I remember sitting with my dad and looking out the window and enjoying it and being amazed at how we tilted when we turned.

 

[Ghery]

Don't have to ask, he's told me.

My dad's first flight was when he was in the Navy in WWII. He was a corpsman and was escorting a bunch of patients to another hospital (he was based at Mare Island Naval Shipyard at the time). Coming back up the pilot came back (this was an R4D) and found out that this was his first trip in an airplane. The pilot invited him up the to the cockpit and they put him in the right seat. Beautiful clear night flying up the San Joaquin Valley of California. They showed him the controls and how they worked. Then said hold this altitude and follow the lights. He was everywhere. Up, down, left, right. Finally got it going straight, but the altitude was wrong. Oops. Finally, the pilot and co-pilot had finished laughing themselves silly and the pilot took the controls back, set his altitude, set the trim (I somehow suspect that had been set off a little bit) and took his hands off the controls to show that the plane would really fly itself.

When dad went back and joined the other corpsman, his buddy commented on the rough weather that they'd had while he was gone.

I couldn't get him to take the controls when I took him up in a 172. I'll have to try again.

 

[gismo]

I can't say for certain, but I suspect my dad's first ride in any airplane would be when my mom took him for a ride after getting her license in 1941. It's even possible that this was in the Porterfield I now own. When the war broke out he joined the Army Air Corps and ended up a flight engineer and squadron maintenance officer on B29s in India and other parts of Asia. They weren't married until the war ended, but I know Mom was flying before the war and my dad was dating her around the same time so it seems likely he went flying with her then. I have her old logs so maybe I could find a note to that effect somewhere. I guess I'd better take a look see.

And I'm pretty certain that my mom's first experience in an airplane would have been when her boss took her flying in a Porterfield. He became her instructor and mentor, but I don't know his name. They worked in the engineering department of a company in Michigan that made electric motors. Among other things that company made the motors inside the turn and bank indicators used in the B29s my dad flew.

 

[Shipoke]

Well Kent here is my story,
I wanted nothing to do with planes, Got involved with A Special needs Fly-in with the Corvette club. Someone said i had to go for a flight, told them where to go(lol), 3 guys picked me up and carried me to a Piper Warrior and literally threw me in it, I figured if they went through al that trouble i would go for a flight,We took off and after gaining alltitude the pilot said he had a itch can i grab the yoke ( he started srcatching his leg). I flew around the pattern that we were flying ,on final he pulled the power and said i was doing fine, i told him "Jack I'm not landing your damn Plane" and let go of the yoke. after landing the 3 guys asked me how my flight went, told them it was OK and jack had a itch and had me fly the plane,they laughed and said Jack couldn't feel a itch on his leg if he wanted to he's paralized from the waist down. I said Bull,then walked back to the plane to say Thanks,Then i noticed Jack has Hand Controls for the rudders, then the next year they started pestering me about taking lessons , so i started just to shut them up. At this point i now have almost 300 hours and working on IR and broke most of the time cause i bought my own Piper Warrior 3/07/2003. since then I've been doing Young Eagle Flights and have flown 112 Kids.
Dave G

 

[tonycondon]

My first flight was when my uncle got his Private license in or around 1991. He had a Cherokee 140. I cant remember the details but I know we did several trips from Estherville to Sioux Falls when my mom was in the hospital for chemo treatments. I didnt do much other flying from about 93 until I started training for my private in 03.

 

[Greg Bockelman]

Well, three out of four of my grandparents are gone now. I am not real sure my dad's folks were ever in an airplane.

My mom's parents' first flight and my mom's first flight were when they took a family tree trip to Denmark. That was in '81. I don't know details. They probably don't remember much.

 

[Greg Bockelman]

Now for mine.

It was 1970. I was ten years old. I had always wanted to fly for a living. We went to a fly-in at the old State Line Airport in Kansas City. (It no longer exists. I think there is a strip mall on it now. It was vacant for the longest time.) There was a DC-3 giving rides there. My first ride was a 15 minute ride in a DC-3.

Fast forward about 22 years or so. I was a First Officer at United Airlines flying the 737. The Captain was from Lebanon, MO and did a lot of flying around the KC area. He was asking me about various airports around KC. He asked me if I had ever been to State Line airport. I told him that my first ride was in a DC-3 there. He looked at me kind of funny. He said he and his brother were the only ones who ever flew a DC-3 out of State Line.

I claim that I was flying with the guy who was flying during my first airplane ride.

 

[infotango]

Some of mine:
I'm not sure when my grandfather first flew, although I have to imagine that it was when he was receiving basic training to be a mechanic on a B-24's. I'll have to ask him next time I see him.

I was to young to remember my first flight, being only 3 months old at the time, but the first flight I remember was on an Icelandair 757.

My first light plane flight was in a restored Ercoupe at the College Park Airport in Maryland when I was a lineboy there. There was an Erco flyin (the ERCO factory is a block away from KCGS) and I had been working for all of two weeks when I was invited up. I remember that warm day in June very well. We took off on that pre-9/11 day and flew along the Beltway NORDO quite low with the cockpit totally open. It was fantastic. The plane was dirt simple to fly, with its rudder aileron interconnect and docile characteristics. And the view of Washington DC was unparalleled.
The pilot was Robert Swanson, who was a Young Eagle legend, and has since perished in a LSA crash. Like so many of my aviation memories, this one is bittersweet, a mix of the elation of flight, with the knowledge that both the freedom to fly in that area, and a wonderful man are no more.