This has been posted other places But I wanted all of you back country Pilots to see it. I am a share kind of a person after being a school teacher for 32 years. So here is the story: A woman called me in Vale, Or. and explained that she was the activity director at a care facility. She went on to tell me that she had a program called FORGET ME NOT where she tried to fulfill the residence requests. Why she was calling me was because she understood that I was a pilot and owned a plane. It seemed a mutual friend of ours had dropped my name. Seems she had a 80+ year old man that at one time had been a PP and flew a Piper Tripacer. He had suffered a very bad stroke, that affected his right side and his speech. His forget me not was to take another airplane ride. She told me she had tried locally to find someone with no luck. She was crying and told me that one guy had told her that he gave at the office and flying his airplane was expensive. I couldn't turn her down and we made arrangements for me to fly Francis Hoopes on his cherished ride. I flew to TTD Troutdale Or. They had the red carpet rolled out snoopy characters cut out of plywood and ballons flying in the breeze. We lifted Francis into the Cessna 182 and a couple of the workers from the care facility went along to video tape and help with Francis. We flew up the Columbia River Gorge and shot a landing at Cascade Locks. All the while Francis had his good left hand on the control yoke. I let him do all he could and wanted to do. We took about a 30 minute flight and I would have done more but they had a whole bus load of other care facility residences there that needed to get back. I hope you get a thrill out of this short version of my video tape. I know you won't be able to get the thrill that I got out of it.
Francis Hoopes Died the following June and this video was played at his funeral. Bob


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fOqaU96iLI

more than cool,
totally a gift that is indescribable for the man.

Very good.

What a wonderful gift. Thanks for sharing that with us.

My dad is almost 84 and would love to fly one more time in an N3N. He bought his first plane--a surplus Navy N3N--for $800 when he was just 21 years old. He barnstormed all over the southwest in that thing. Then he met mom, they got married, had kids, and....you know the rest of the story. He sold it for $500.

I wish I could somehow find a way to get my dad up one more time in an N3N!

Your story really got me to thinking...

Sanjuander, from your handle it sounds like maybe you're a PNW islander? If so, be advised that there's a fellow out in Forks named Gary Jennings who owns an N3N-3, and I believe he hops rides in it. Don't have his contact info but he organizes the Forks fly-in every year.

Eric

sanjuander wrote:What a wonderful gift. Thanks for sharing that with us.

My dad is almost 84 and would love to fly one more time in an N3N. He bought his first plane--a surplus Navy N3N--for $800 when he was just 21 years old. He barnstormed all over the southwest in that thing. Then he met mom, they got married, had kids, and....you know the rest of the story. He sold it for $500.

I wish I could somehow find a way to get my dad up one more time in an N3N!

Your story really got me to thinking...

Sanjuander---- There was a shop in Caldwell Id. that was reconditioning a coupe of N3Ns for someone locally. The Shop Is called Shore and Shore. Jim and Anitia Shore run the shop. I don't have the phone number, but it might be a chance to get your dad airborne in one again. Bob

sanjuander wrote:What a wonderful gift. Thanks for sharing that with us.

My dad is almost 84 and would love to fly one more time in an N3N. He bought his first plane--a surplus Navy N3N--for $800 when he was just 21 years old. He barnstormed all over the southwest in that thing. Then he met mom, they got married, had kids, and....you know the rest of the story. He sold it for $500.

I wish I could somehow find a way to get my dad up one more time in an N3N!

Your story really got me to thinking...

Sanjuander---- There was a shop in Caldwell Id. that was reconditioning a coupe of N3Ns for someone locally. The Shop Is called Shore and Shore. Jim and Anitia Shore run the shop. I don't have the phone number, but it might be a chance to get your dad airborne in one again. Bob

Great job Bob!

David

Bob, that's one great story. And I'm sure you got as much out of it as the fellow you took for the ride. Congrats and thanks for sharing.

Scoot----- You are right there, I got as much if not more out of this as Francis did. It made me very happy to see the twinkle in his eye and the smile on his face. I was already happy because I was getting to fly. How can you beat double happy. LIFE IS GOOD! Bob