Tony Italiano 1923-2013
Tony Italiano was a simple man. His models were simple. His .020 Old-Timer was simple. His K&B .21 was simple. The only mechanism I ever saw him use was an auto-rudder on his towline glider. He was one of the few who still used a standard 1.5-volt battery to start his engines. I have no idea how he did it, but his technique for finding thermals was merely to start the engine. I timed many of his flights at his home field, the Bong Recreation Area, and most ended up in thermals.
There were no Mylar streamers, thermometers, or bubbles. He would launch when he started the engine. He had the knack.
But this was far from who the man was. The following is an excerpt from his obituary.
Early business
When Tony was 18 years old, he and his brother, Victor, opened a hobby shop in Waukesha, Wisconsin. The business grew and they needed to relocate to larger quarters three times. He organized Supreme Model Supply Company to produce model airplane kits.
Military service
Tony joined the Air Force and, after completing pilot training, he went to New Guinea on the baby flattop CVE Admiralty Island. He joined the 64th Squadron at Lae, New Guinea, in November 1944. Tony gained much experience under trying weather conditions and strange mission environments.
During August of 1945, Tony transferred to the Far East Air Force headquarters squadron in Manila. In December of 1945, he was assigned as an engineering officer and then transferred to Chofu Air Base in Tokyo as an operations/engineering officer and interim commander of the base. He was the only officer supporting 67 skilled personnel. The assignment involved 27 aircraft, which included the two supporting Generals MacArthur and Eichelberger.
Tony returned to the U.S. in July 1946 and joined the Air Force Reserves, from which he retired April 2, 1983, having achieved the rank of lieutenant colonel.
Industrial career
Tony entered the industrial world, eventually joining General Motors at its Delco Electronics facility in Milwaukee. He had various assignments, including head of fire-control engineering for equipment that went into:
- F-84
- F-86
- F-94
- F-102
He was the head of the Apollo program office for the guidance equipment for the mission to the moon, in cooperation with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Tony retired from General Motors in 1984.
Modeling and legacy
Tony never left the modeling world. His first love was free flight. He was a charter member of the Bong Eagles. He was instrumental in many National Free Flight Society (NFFS) activities and served three straight terms as NFFS president. His crowning achievement was running an indoor free-flight world championship competition, the Mini-Dome in Johnson City, Tennessee.
NFFS and the modeling world will miss Tony, but I am sure there are some models up in heaven with his name on them.
— John Lorbiecki, NFFS president
Transcribed from original scans by AI. Minor OCR errors may remain.
