Thank you for sharing this information...

You have helped fill in the blanks on an otherwise faceless poster to the
group. Rightly or wrongly the internet and in particular the newsgroups
tend to be rather impersonal places of the faceless. We are all drawn a
common interest (in this case aviation imagery), and occasionally we make
friends. However too often we lose track of the real person behind the
postings either that or it never occurs to us to ask.

One of my sins is that I wear my feelings on my sleeve and tend to be rather
transparent (or happy); so when I am upset it reflects in everything from my
photography, to the tone I use when I comment and post. However people such
as wrylypost, and a great many others do not, and very often they are the
ones with the real bragging rights, with rich histories that are very often
full interesting facts.

Andrew


wrote in message
...
Thank you Mr O'Neill for passing the word of my fathers demise and
telling me of this newsgroup

A correction tho, he was a paratrooper and was just interested in
helicopters. Most of his intrest was in planes and jets

His early years were spent growing up around Jacksonville, Florida and
ransaking the aviation graveyard there. He told me of a pretend plane
he made as a kid from liberated parts of junked airplanes

As a teenager he was interested in R/C model airplanes and made many
using gas, diesel, solid fuel rocket and scaled down buzz bomb motors

He invented the dual axis gimbal joystick but gave away the patent
rights to an unknown person.

He was the first person to use solid state electronics in a model
plane, all designed by himself

He was also the first person to use fiberglass in a planes
construction (just models but they flew). He later was also the first
to use fiberglass to construct a boat (not a model)

Dad lived his late teen and early adult life in the suburbs of Detroit
where he was invited to demonstrate his pulse jet plane at the state
fair. As he was preparing the plane the for a predemonstration, the
officals all crowded around him and his model. He fired up a model T
coil for a spark and thrust down on the tire pump handle.

The plane made a deafening roar as it fired up and reverbated thru the
stadium

The officals all fell all over themselfs trying to get away from the
thing and immediately cancelled his event

Instead of being dissapointed he laughed for months at the reaction of
the officals

These planes he made were the first jet powered planes in the Detroit
area

Later he was drafted into the army but instead enlisted into the air
force where he scored a perfect on the exams. The air force refused to
turn him over to the army and he promptly signed up as a paratrooper

His intrests included many other things including electronics, amature
radio and motorcycles

I'm not sure why I am saying all of this but it does make me feel less
of a loss knowing that least some of the living are aware of some of
his acomplishments

His #2 son