1. Our homebuilt glider in 1937
Stories from my love of airplanesBy Fred Burlingame, Jr.
Born in 1924, I grew up in Smethport, PA and can remember seeing Piper Cubs flying over the town. One day when I was 8 years old, as I looked up at a Cub flying by, I said to myself, “When I grow up that’s what I’m going to do, I’m going to fly!” I built many models and when I was 13 years old, Kermit Peasley designed a glider and he and Bob Keenan and I built it and flew it at the Stadium with Bob Kerr furnishing his Dad’s car to tow it. Bob was the only one old enough to drive. Bob Keenan was the test pilot because he was the lightest.
It took off, reached about 15 feet altitude when Bob Kerr ran out of Stadium and stopped. All Keenan could see was the back of that big 1937 Dodge staring him in the face. Instinctively he made the best move possible. He pulled the stick full back and pancaked in. I never saw such a great shower of splinters in all my life. It looked like it was raining toothpicks. Kermie and I rushed up saying, “Are you hurt Bob, are you hurt? Bob had his breath knocked out and he gasped, “No – I- Don’t- think-so. That was the only flight of our glider.
We tore the fabric off and threw the rest over the stadium fence and as far as I know it is still there today. We went away, sadder but wiser and very thankful that Bob was OK.