On Line

I hope that your evening was as nice as your set up. That tray looked mighty inticing...to the dogs too. I hope that the book was okay. Thanks.

 

I can get all of them in any size that you like. I just delivered a 24 X 30 of Night Bird and have done several others. Amazing that stuff that I did 40 years ago would still be wanted. I was actually learning how to paint with gouache and really just how to paint aviation subjects. No one will ever know how apprehensive I was to have to paint things that were to be in a book written by a famous author and slated for international distribution. It was shortly after I had been laid off from Boeing in 1970 after 20 years of good work. Shades of my father who went through the same thing in 1930. Both of us lost everything material but we still had some talent and health. Thus is life , I suppose.

 

I had a lot of books and old photos from which I worked to capture both the airplane and the setting. I had to draw everything first, sometimes making a complete charcoal sketch that was approved by Gann who told me what the location was, the time of day, and the story situation. The "Scipio" is one of the best paintings in the book and also one of the toughest to do. It took three weeks to complete because I struggled with the background. The airplane was also a basket weaving project and if I remember correctly, the upper wing had 152 ribs that had to be shown with the correct perspective. I happen to have a framed print on canvas of that painting.

 

Some of the paintings had a specific setting that was extremely difficult to attain. An example was the first painting attempted in the series where an Armstrong-Whitworth Argosy was arriving at Paris near noon. It had to be at 1500 feet, heading 270 deg. circling the Eiffel Tower , and over "some clouds", circa 1926. i attempted to find some aerial photos of the Eiffel Tower and Paris from 1926. No luck. I found an old Nat. Geo. map of Paris and laid out a perspective of the city from the viewpoint specified AND drew the tower from 1500 feet altitude by looking at photos from ground level. I had accounted for all the buildings and landmarks including Le Bourget in the distance where the Argosy would land. GOT IT RIGHT ON ! Wrong. It was supposed to be spring and there were clouds so I added a few. Not enough. So I added some more. Not enough. So I added some more and it finally came out that Paris was usually covered with a cloud layer that time of the year that forced the Argosy crew to rely on " Local Knowledge Approach" to circle the Tower on top and then take a course for Le Bourget and make a blind letdown through the clouds to land at Le Bourget, relying on notes recorded from VFR approaches. After painting the city from laboriously drawing the entire thing, I had to cover it all with clouds. That is just one little story from attempting to creat the specified scenes in the book. The other work intensive subject was " Five Cans" where after finishing the painting I was told that the color of the sand was wrong and I had to change it by painting around the airplanes and all their rigging and that was after I had to add another airplane , the Brueget , to show the need for an interpreter.
All airplanes were drawn in complete detail on tissue and then transferred to the pre-painted background but the entire composition was drawn in detail and approved before anything was started. I have to bite my tongue when people say that I charge too much for the aviation works when, "After all, you are doing fun things when you sketch and paint your favorite subjects."

 

Thank you. I knew a UAL pilot, Jack Leffler, who knew Gann through their membership in QB. Jack took my first painting of a DH4 over the fog and showed it to Gann. He stared at it and said, " Iv'e been there! That's a Suckerhole" and the name stuck. Leffler bought the painting. My second painting , also a DH4 in the cold moonlight, was purchased by Gann. Soon after I was approached by Gann to illustrate a series in Flying Magazine that would accompany his short stories. We did this for 2 1/2 years and then put them together in the book, "Ernest K. Gann's Flying Circus".This didn't assure a big success because aviation paintings were not "real art" then and I was always asked if I painted landscapes or something else. So, now I paint landscapes, seascapes, and boats.

 

Thanks, Bill. Hope that the rest of the book and the technical stuff will be enjoyable too.

 

You're right on ! I think that it must have been a luxurious experience to fly the length of Africa at 1500 feet over the Nile, being put up at night in a fancy hotel, and having comfortable sumptuous meals served on lace tablecloths by a steward with towel over one arm. The British knew how to do it. The succeeding Short flying boats, I think they were the "C" class, also fine airplanes as was the Boeing 314. I honestly have to grit my teeth to fly now days. Flying 50 years ago in the US was just about the way it should be done.

 

In looking at the first painting of the Argosy over Paris I remembered an interesting thing when I was researching the airplane. The center engine was mounted on rails and the exhaust had a slip joint arrangement. If the airplane was a bit tail heavy, the engine could be cranked forward and if it was nose heavy, the engine could be cranked aft. Charmingly British and very effective. They also served a fancy lunch with wine on the airplane as it casually wended its way to Paris at 65 mph. The "Silver Wings Lunch Time Service".

 

The only thing that I know about the Mod. 80 was that the stewardesses were registered nurses and there was no hot food service on board or much of a food service at all. There was no galley on board and maybe box lunch things were served. There was, however, a chemical toilet aft and hot and cold running water and a little sink in the small lav.

 

I shouldn't have said "that's all I know about the Mod 80". In the 60's I dug through the Boeing archives and pulled most of the drawings on that airplane and did an 11 foot long drawing of the entire airplane, inside and out. All the exterior details; left, right, top, bottom. Then I did the interior structures. All at 1/2" =1' scale. I worked on it at home for 15 months. The Museum of Flight has the remaining airplane on display and the original drawing somewhere in the basement. Anyway, it was interesting to see that the same structural design philosophy (Warren truss) was used on the B-17, both expressed in square aluminum tubing.
One comment from Bob Reeve, Alaskan bush pilot and airline owner, " That airplane would fly anything you could squeeze into it". They once flew a huge boiler to a mine but they had to pull the aft fuselage off the airplane, stuff the boiler into it, and put the fuselage back together.

 

Jim, I thought that I was the only one to start a book at the back. Well, at least you read what the end was when I was at Boeing. Mulally was, indeed, a great leader and motivator and honored the work force. He was everywhere extolling those who were doing the work and made the program something to look forward to every day. The greedy jackass that is running the company now is absolutely the opposite and he has extorted the unions, extorted the company, has extorted the state of Washington, and is in the process of dismembering the company and disbursing it all over the country. He has totally destroyed the morale of EVERYBODY in the work force and is using the most sinister means of getting rid of the older employees who hold the strength of experience and years of knowledge. Remember, the old guys cost more than some young guy fresh out of college and they will have to have expensive retirement payments. They are faced with moves to distant locations if they want to hold their jobs when they have just a few years from retirement. Move or loose your job. He has no interest in the company, no knowledge of airplanes or how to build them and only wants to extract as much money as he can out of manipulation instead of future productivity. Has to please the stock holders margins. The Douglas Disease strikes again. I am sickened at what I hear from those who are working there now. I hope that I'm not around ten years from now...but I might be.

 

Thank you for your interest . Yes, Sarasota-Bradenton Airport is my old place of many hours of enjoyment and hard work. It's far different now from when I worked and flew there. Like a kid in a candy store, I had the pick of anything that I wanted to fly and could afford. While my more grounded friends were saving and investing their money, I was running what little I had out of the exhaust pipes of a lot of airplanes. I didn't have many riches but I had a lot more fun than they did and riches that they would never know about.