Thinking Out Loud: A Photo Challenge Answered
There’s a story behind every photo. Especially this one
Long ago in a time far away there was an aviation wonderland in Florida known as St. Augustine Airport. More specifically, Aero Sport, Inc, the dominion of Jim Moser and his dad, Ernie, who occupied and created that wonderland. It’s only in retrospect that I realized their company name, AeroSport, pretty much spells out what they were, what they were thinking and what they were promoting: Sport of the Aero variety.
You’ll have to excuse me because I’m fighting off the urge to wander off into the journalist weeds and tell the St. Augie/Aerosport story. However, my goal here is to get into the background of the ridiculous shot below, not reminisce about what was the golden period in my aviation life. Mine and so many others. However…
Briefly, there are only a few places on the planet where you could go and instantaneously have a more than ample supply of super high quality formation pilots matched by a similar supply of camera ships and airplanes (homebuilt, antique, etc) worthy of being captured on film (remember film?). This at an airport that’s bordered by the Atlantic Ocean’s inland waterway which offered an endless supply of interesting backgrounds. Where else could you go and shoot two Stearmans in tight formation waterskiing (main gear in the water)? Where else could you learn to land a Cub on a moving truck, as I did? Where else could I be going straight down in an Extra while Patty Wagstaff is nailed to our right wing, but her Extra is rotated 90 degrees so I’m looking at the top of her head. My camera plane pilot, Carl Pascarell, is holding position while the two planes are going straight down and I’m burning film capturing a plan-view of her. The unusual was usual during that time in St. Augustine. You’ll never know how much I miss that. Nor will anyone ever know how much I learned there.
Now that I’ve mentioned Aero Sport, you’ll see the planes and people from St. Augie pop up in Thinking Out Loud from time to time. I once figured out I had shot over 40 national covers down there, so I’m up to my keester in Florida plane porn.
This time we’re discussing a shot that resulted from the unintentional throwing down of an aeronautical gauntlet challenging us to respond to a photo forwarded by some of our friends. They were obviously proud of having orchestrated it.
The “friends”, were race pilot and warbird entrepreneur, Denny Sherman, and his two sons. They had, and still have, their boutique-like, warbird-heavy aircraft sales operation in West Palm Beach. They raced regularly at Reno and, although not wildly competitive, they had a helluva good time doing something that can be damn dangerous. ‘Just that kind of family.
Denny and Jim Moser were long-time friends and during one of my many visits down there, Jim got a big mailing tube from him that held a poster-size photo. Without saying so, Denny expected it to be displayed in the Aero Sport lobby because the image was so unusual. Or so he thought.
The photo was of him flying their Mustang racer (which I think was clipped), with his two sons, Scott and Kent, snuggled up close to him in a Sea Fury and a Corsair. In broad, dramatic marker strokes on the image, Denny proclaimed “The family that flies together, stays together”. It was a good photo and a worthy gift from one friend to another. Jim, however, for some reason saw it as a challenge.
Jim Moser could be competitive, and he was always surrounded by talented formation/aerobatic pilots all of whom were always ready for action. When he unrolled that poster, a bunch of us were standing around. Someone made a coarse comment. Then someone else. In a matter of minutes comments and ideas were flying around the room and the next thing I know I’m stuffing film into my pockets and walking out to a Citabria while I’m loading a Nikon. Jim was going to fly me in the Citabrick, Craig Fordom the lead Pitts, Carl Pascarell the second Pitts and Eliot Cross was going to fly the third.
In talking with Carl about that episode recently, he says, “What was funny at the time was Craig was not fully comfortable flying inverted formation. So, we told him ‘Just roll the airplane upside down and Jim, in the Citabria, will fly off of you.’ It was what we called, backward formation.
“Concept sounded good, except Craig rolled upside down and concentrated on being smooth, straight and level. Unfortunately, he was 15 miles an hour faster than the Citabria, and was quickly out in front of the entire formation with Elliott and me struggling to keep up. We were yelling at him on the radio, but apparently his wasn’t working.”
For some minutes we’re scattered and everywhere but where we’re supposed to be. Then Craig throttled back, we caught up with him and locked into our assigned positions. Jim got me and my camera ahead and to the left of Craig in the lead Pitts, while Carl and Eliot stacked their Pitts up on him and tried to obey me saying “Carl, up five, Eliot back ten. Now 20 feet.”, etc., etc.
When you’re shooting that many light airplanes in formation they don’t just fall into a groove and stay there. Even with guys this good, they move around a little. However, I could guess which direction they’d be moving and used the motor drive accordingly.
Incidentally, film being sucked through a Nikon motor drive creates a uniquely satisfying sound that digital cameras just can’t match. They feel soulless by comparison.
One of the best things about the digital world is that you know whether you have “it” or not as soon as you trip the shutter. In the days of Kodachrome, I’d drop the film off at one of the four Eastman labs in the country that processed Kodachrome and, luckily, was right on the road I routinely took to the office. So, we didn’t know whether the guys had done their job flying and I’d done mine for another four or five days. Frustrating!
The Kodak plant manager was an airplane freak and always came out pre-view my slides in the lobby with me, so he was right there when I started flipping transparencies onto their light box. We each had a 10X loupe and the instant I put an eyeball on the first slide, I couldn’t keep from grinning and the lab manager couldn’t stop jabbering. He was as excited as I was. If you’ve never seen a Kodachrome slide under a ten-power loupe, you don’t know what “sharp” is. And these were as sharp as any image ever gets. Digits still haven’t caught up to Kodacrome in that area.
I fired some off to Jim in Florida and he made up a poster the same size as that sent him by the Shermans. On this one, in equally dramatic strokes, he wrote, “It’s not what you fly…It’s how you fly it!”
Mike drop!
COOL!I'd love to have a poster of this. Lots of fun memories flying that Pitts with you Bud.
Kind of like Burchinal's strip in Texas with all the warbirds available, Aero Sport is one of those mystical places that sort of came and went before I came along, and I have to live with that. The stories from there, however, are gold, and thanks for putting them out for us.
Jim Moser's Jungmann lives on — Gordon Clement bought it, brought it to Georgia and opened up the front cockpit so he could share the fun. Cancer claimed Gordon a few years back, but his son, Zak, is a fine caretaker and I've flown with father and son in the Jungmann that factors into a lot of stories from Aero Sport. I grew up reading your PIREPS and I mourn their absence in the magazines we have left today. Glad to find you here on substack and looking forward to much more.