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the Duke when he quoted the movie Apollo 13: “We just lost moon.” Such is it with the thousands that attend Oshkosh.
Through EAA, I’ve learned much more about people than I ever have about airplanes.
– Paul Poberezny
Last year, we were sitting just off the Oshkosh flight line at the campsite of a fellow retired AA pilot waiting for the night airshow to begin. The picnic table we sat at was one of many available for campers to borrow and transport to
campsites. I was shocked that no one but me noticed or recognized the carved signature on the tabletop. I wondered why the table wasn’t across the field in the EAA museum. I took a picture of the signature with my phone and later showed it to another retired AA friend who had known the signatory for decades. They verified its authenticity: it was Paul Poberezny. This year, just as the convention was about to begin, we heard the news of Tom Poberezny (Paul’s son) passing. I’ve been attending Oshkosh since 1972. While I skipped a few years to fly the F-16 and a couple of times for maintenance and weather, it’s been a welcome constant in my life. And over those 50 years, it’s a given that you will lose friends, acquaintances, innovators and supporters along the way. While new friends are made yearly at Oshkosh, it’s never easy to lose old ones to age, illness or retirement; such as it is with Senator Inhofe.
After 35 years in congress, aviation friend and supporter senator Jim Inhofe, (R) Oklahoma, made his final trip to Oshkosh as a U.S. senator. He relayed the two aspects of AirVenture that he enjoys the most: the people he’s known all of his life that he only sees once a year, claiming, “It’s the most enjoyable thing I do every year,” and second, the support he is able to gather for aviation-related legislation. Among the legislative goals he sees remaining is the transi- tion to unleaded avgas. Senator Inhofe’s legislative support and constant involvement in aviation will be sorely missed – as was Burt Rutan several years ago.
Usually, the wacky people have breakthroughs.
The ‘smart’ people don’t.
– Burt Rutan
In the early 1980s, I was an F-16 crew chief for a test squad- ron at Edwards AFB. The first time I met Burt Rutan was at the Mojave airport which was only a stone’s throw away from Edwards. Well, after the 30-minute drive just to get off base followed by another 30 minutes to Mojave, that is. Burt
was wearing latex gloves, holding a paper cup of goop in one hand, and a wooden stir-stick in the other. The aroma of epoxy filled the room. His dark, mutton chop sideburns were in- stantly recognizable. Out- side the hangar that day was a boat-of-a-car. I don’t remember the model, but it was big – maybe because my ’76 Honda Civic looked so small parked next to it.
The license plate on the boat-of-a-car said some- thing like Eze-1. On the ramp side of the hangar, resting on sawhorses,
EAA AirVenture Oshkosh 2022 set records with an attendance of approximately 650,000.
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