"Dave Stadt" wrote in message
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"Dudley Henriques" wrote in message
ink.net...
The old days at Rhinebeck when the Cole Palen crowd were there are
remembered by many who frequented the place. The nostalgia of that
operation during those days ranks right up there with Pancho's out at
Edwards. Both places bring back some of the finest "just hanging out"
moments in aviation history in the United States.
I seem to remember some trouble going on there a few years back
concerning the running of the operation by a new board of directors at
the museum but I don't have a real handle on what it was all about.
Propping a Le' Rhone might have been a job for Arnold Swartzenegger at
that :-)))
Dudley

The new board wanted to close Rhinebeck and sell the land, the planes and
anything else worth a nickel. Not sure what changed their minds. Could
be Cole came back for a 'visit' and set them straight.

I hope so. The place deserves some good treatment.
Wish the same held true for Pancho's. Last I heard of that it was a burned
out ruin sitting out there in the desert. I walked through what was left of
it once. It wasn't pretty.
Of course there's no real reason to preserve it. It would never be a tourist
attraction way out there, and the place was really only special to those who
went there during the early testing days at Edwards. If only those burned
out ruins could talk, a lot of history might become clear from what passed
back and forth at the bar the week before Yeager's trip through mach 1.
They ought to build a monument right in the middle of what's left of the bar
to George Welch. :-)
Dudley Henriques