Subject: The Most Beautiful Thing Ever
From: "Yann D"
Date: 10/26/03 4:42 AM Pacific Standard Time
Message-id:

Does the Piper Cub and all of its avatars compete for being the most
beautiful thing ever ?
It's a legend and it's wonderful to fly (and a bit nasty to land), but I
wouldn't say it's beautiful !

Piper Cub.



Cubs were beautiful because they were there.I think every American airbase had
one or more. They were used as "puddlejumpers" to run errands. When you had to
run down to a parts depot to pick up some small parts, you took the Cub. When
a couple of guys had a three day pass to Paris, you didn't take a B-26, you
hopped in the Cub. Unfortunately some hot shot fighter jocks borrowed one of
our Cubs one day and eneed up crashing into the Alps while trying to run the
tight passes through the Alpine gourges. Anybody can fly a cub except a
fighter pilot who thinks he is a lot better than he really is.I think for many
of us who flew in the war, Cubs will always be a fond memory. And that is
beautuful in it's own sense. So we can say Cubs are beautiful. But the most
beautiful of all is a B-26 Marauder coming home from the Ruhr Valley, war
weary,with one engine pouring oil, smoking and barely turning that crash landed
so badly damaged it had to be junked. It's beautiful because it it brought its
entire crew home safely And that is true beauty,


Arthur Kramer
344th BG 494th BS
England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany
Visit my WW II B-26 website at:
http://www.coastcomp.com/artkramer