86 MODEL AVIATION
Flying for Fun D.B. Mathews | [email protected]
Lockheed Little Dipper lovers are in luck
Also included in this column:
• Cox history with Dale Kirn
• 1946-1953 Plymouth Internats
• The 47-year-old youth problem
Pan American airlines ad for PAA Load and Clipper Cargo events
at the AMA Nats. Watches and cash were awarded.
Announcement of the Plymouth Internats contest and photos of
CL Speed, Jet, and Combat contestants and their models.
FOR THOSE who do not have access to the
Internet, my mailing address is 909 N.
Maize Rd., Wichita KS 67212.
Do you remember the Lockheed Little
Dipper I featured in the June column? I
mentioned a short kit with cowl, canopy, etc.
by P&W Models.
Frank Healey, at 189 Columbus Dr.,
Archibald PA 18403, read the piece, which
sent him on a search. He finally found his
old kit, complete with construction
drawings, among the Christmas decorations.
He is willing to sell it if you’re interested.
His E-mail address is [email protected].
The telephone number I gave you in that
column for the Radio Control Modeler plans
service went out of service shortly after I
wrote about it. The Web site—www.rcm
magazine.com—is still functional at this
time.
Old Friends and Good Memories: I recently
visited with Dale Kirn at the one-day “Just
Plane Fun” exhibit at the Smoky Hill
Museum in Salina, Kansas. This marvelous
and well-done display centered around
Dale, a local boy, and his lifetime activities
and achievements with model aviation.
I enjoyed a wonderful visit with Dale.
We reminisced about our modeling
adventures in the long ago. He and I are
contemporaries, and our paths crossed many
times in the late 1940s at local contests.
I’ve always secretly envied Dale for
managing to carve out a career in modeling,
which many of us longtime modelers
dreamed of doing in our youth. When he
finished his tour with the Air Force (and he
was on several Air Force national modeling
teams), he went to work for Victor Stanzel
demonstrating Mono-Line (single-line)
flying across the country.
Dale would show up in cities and towns
in a Chevy Bel Air station wagon. It had a
large Stanzel sign on the roof, with all sorts
of Stanzel and Mono-Line graphics on it.
Dale would then fly at the local CL circles.
Most memorable was his flying a .35-
sized model on a 120-foot line. No joke! I
distinctly remember the lines actually
dragging the ground. This was astonishing
to us since slack lines were the nemesis of
the two-line-system flier.
Later, after earning a degree from
Kansas State, Dale went to work for Leroy
Cox as an industrial engineer. Most of the
Cox line of engines and ready-to-fly CL
models have his touch on them.
Dale and a gang of young boys would
show up at important contests, particularly
the Nats, to run a “fly a model” circle for
the kids in attendance. They enclosed a
circle with snow fence and would put any
kid on the lines for a free introductory
flight. The line often had 50 or more
youngsters in it, waiting their turn.
10sig3.QXD 8/24/06 10:24 AM Page 86October 2006 87
My sons, who were young at that time,
got a kick out of Dale’s method of handling
the inevitable crashes. He and his crew
would pick up the pieces and toss them into
a 55-gallon barrel! They salvaged the pieces
and reassembled the good parts in the
evenings, but my boys didn’t know that!
Shown are contestant charter bus and Chas. Siegfried (center L):
a nearly forgotten RC pioneer and future column subject.
You can see the Fort Shelby Hotel, which served as contest
headquarters, and a long registration line.
An overview of the Selfridge Air Force
Base field, Belle Isle athletic fields, and
Bob-Lo Island amusement park.
There was a large awards banquet and
tons of trophies for the huge number of
entrants in the Plymouth Internats.
Dale and I were chatting about this
activity when we met, and I asked for an
estimate of how many young boys and girls
got their first exposure to modeling at the
Cox circles. Dale didn’t have an accurate
count, but we estimated it to be in excess of
200,000.
That led to a question of how many of
those kids went any further with the hobby.
We concluded that there was no way to tell.
Was this promotion successful? Cox sold
a ton of ready-to-fly PT trainers, etc. for
sure. For years the things were included in
the Sears Christmas catalog. But kids could
fly CL on school playgrounds, parks, and
baseball diamonds then.
Dale and his crew conducted a training
session each year between Christmas and the
new year for youngsters, and there were new
CL ready-to-fly presents on the parking lot
of the Anaheim stadium.
In later years Dale restored models and
developed displays for the Stanzel Aircraft
Museum in Schulenburg, Texas, which I’m
told is excellent. For many years he
manufactured and sold accessories for Cox
engines—most notably a fine-thread needle
valve and body which greatly simplified
setting a needle on the TD engine series—
especially when using fuel pressure.
Plymouth Internats: Dale loaned me some
newspapers he saved from the Plymouth
International Model Airplane
Championships, or Internats, which he
attended in 1949 and 1950. They set off
recollections that I’ll share with you—not
just because it was such a huge, widely
publicized event, but as a way to reflect on
modeling specifically and American industry
in general in those years compared to today.
When I brought up the subject at the
10sig3.QXD 8/24/06 10:50 AM Page 87local hobby shop, I was astonished to find
no modelers younger than 70 who were even
aware of the Plymouth events or of their
sponsorship. It seems that a significant part
of our history has been forgotten, but it was
full of successes.
The Plymouth division of the Chrysler
Corporation and its dealers sponsored local
contests (at least 175 in 1950) to select the
entries for a national event in Detroit,
Michigan, in the summers of 1946 through
1953. In most instances the local dealers
paid all expenses for the entrants to get to
Detroit, and then Chrysler provided food
and housing at the Internats.
All contestants were housed together in
the Fort Shelby Hotel, where breakfast and
dinner were provided. The hotel also served
as event headquarters. Imagine the fun and
chaos a hotel full of 500 or more young
modelers must have enjoyed.
Selfridge Air Force Base was used for
the FF and some of the CL events. Belle Isle
athletic fields (see photos) hosted Speed,
Aerobatics, flying Scale, and carrier-deck
events. Sunday was reserved for the Combat
and Team Race activities.
On Monday a program of sightseeing
included a trip through the Plymouth plant
on specially conducted tours. Buses then
carried the contestants and their families to
the docks of the Bob-Lo Island amusementpark
ferries. This was followed by a huge
awards banquet (see the pictures) with
hundreds of trophies.
Originally limited to modelers who were
less than 21 years of age, the Internats was
expanded in the last years to include older
modelers who had been active leaders in the
local Plymouth Aero League: a local club
program also sponsored by Plymouth
dealers. The categories were Junior, Senior,
and Leader, following the AMA rule book.
Internats events were Hand Launch
Glider; Outdoor Rubber; Free Flight Gas
classes 1/2A, A, B, and C: CL Speed classes
A, B, C, and Jet; Aerobatics classes A, B,
and C; Scale classes A, B, and C; and
Combat classes A, B, and C. Three special
events were open to all age groups, in
competition for a single set of trophies.
They were Team Racing, Carrier Deck, and
Radio Control.
I can’t establish how many entrants each
event had, but the 1953 issue of the
newspaper lists winners through 10 places in
each event including Juniors. The results
listed the contestants’ names and the
dealerships that sponsored them.
Each contestant was given a special Tshirt
and hat, which became prized
possessions. Examples of these are on
display in the AMA museum in Muncie,
Indiana.
Many local Plymouth contests were
staffed with volunteers from local civic
clubs such as Civitan, Rotary, Lions,
Optimists, etc. Each state and some
Canadian provinces held at least one
qualifying contest, while the more densely
populated areas had multiple contests. This
truly was an international competition,
requiring qualification at local contests to
enter.
This event received lots of media
coverage every year, including newsreels at
the movies. The local Plymouth dealers
advertised the local events and received
much newsprint. It is difficult to even
imagine a promotion of this size, success,
and scope in the present. For that reason
alone I felt it necessary to educate
contemporary modelers about it.
I’m sure the reasons for the demise of the
Plymouth Internats are diverse and not
clear-cut. But in the immediate postwar
years US automobile manufacturers could
sell everything they manufactured and at a
reasonable profit. The car factories were
making lots of money and ran three shifts a
day.
And then things began to change for the
US automobile industry. In 1956 the first
Volkswagens were imported, and a sort of
VW “cult” began. At roughly that same time
a few Toyotas and Datsuns were appearing
on the West Coast, but no one—most
notably the US builders—took them
seriously. The original appeal was low cost
and good quality.
Within 10 years the US factories were no
longer highly profitable. Their sales volume
had declined and they were cutting down on
workers, closing factories, and even
dropping names including the Plymouth
line.
Do you remember Packard, Nash,
Studebaker, Hudson, and Kaiser Frazier?The former cash cow had gone dry, and
the factories were running in the red.
Funds were no longer available for such
high-minded promotional activities as
sponsoring kid-type activities, no matter
how successful they were.
Throughout our hobby’s history,
leaders were able to enlist the support of
businesses by selling the concept that
“busy kids don’t get in trouble.” The
nation was concerned about juvenile
delinquency and was willing to combat it
with private funds.
Many firms and organizations have
been involved in promoting modeling as a
wholesome activity for youngsters.
Consider the Navy sponsorship and the
fact that it provided facilities and sailors to
staff the Nats.
There were also several newspaper
publishers that sponsored modeling events,
such as the huge New-York Mirror meet.
Then there was the Jimmie Allen promotion
on the radio and local contests sponsored by
Skelly, Marathon, and BP oil companies. I
attended FF contests in the 1960s that had
sponsorship from local civic clubs, and the
timers and administrative staff were
members.
Pan American airlines, with the
leadership of Dallas Sherman from its
marketing program, sponsored FF weightlifting
events at the Nats; they were
cleverly called PAA Load and Clipper
90 MODEL AVIATION
Cargo. The prizes were watches with the
PAA logo on their faces.
I’ve touched on the economic factors
involved in the loss of these sponsorships,
but an even more revealing factor is the
declining number of youngsters involved in
them. That’s a harsh judgment for sure, but
it’s true.
The last few years of the Navy Nats
featured royal treatment of kids, mine
included, in an effort to attract more of them
to the events. That didn’t work, and the Navy
withdrew its support in 1973.
It’s unfortunate that the Navy had no real
way to measure how successful its
sponsorship of the Nats was as a recruiting
tool. The wonderful way the Navy personnel
treated the kids is bound to have influenced
at least some of them to “Go Navy.”
My oldest son Mark did, and he ended up
a carrier officer serving on nuclear
submarines. That was in no small way a
result of the kindness shown to him and his
little brother Bruce.
Checking back in my old magazines, I
found articles published as early as 1959
about the “Junior Problem.” In spite of heroic
and good-intentioned efforts by AMA, local
clubs, and individuals, we still have the
“Junior Problem” 47 years later. I can only
diagnose the persistence of this dangerous
trend; I have no treatment plans to offer.
Many of us have enjoyed model aviation
in its many forms for a lifetime and feel deep
concern that our heritage will go the way of
the wheelwright, wooden-boat builder, and
blacksmith.
As Dave Brown wrote in his “President’s
Perspective” column in the July issue of this
magazine:
“Look around and see all of the gray hair.
Our average age is increasing ... That new
blood is banging at the door; all we need to
do is to welcome it.”
In the words of poet John Dunne, “No
man is an island. Ask not for whom the bell
tolls; it tolls for thee.”
I’ve written this in a feeble attempt to
point out the tremendous advantages we all
might enjoy again if we could attract more
young people into our beloved hobby.
Edition: Model Aviation - 2006/10
Page Numbers: 86,87,88,90
Edition: Model Aviation - 2006/10
Page Numbers: 86,87,88,90
86 MODEL AVIATION
Flying for Fun D.B. Mathews | [email protected]
Lockheed Little Dipper lovers are in luck
Also included in this column:
• Cox history with Dale Kirn
• 1946-1953 Plymouth Internats
• The 47-year-old youth problem
Pan American airlines ad for PAA Load and Clipper Cargo events
at the AMA Nats. Watches and cash were awarded.
Announcement of the Plymouth Internats contest and photos of
CL Speed, Jet, and Combat contestants and their models.
FOR THOSE who do not have access to the
Internet, my mailing address is 909 N.
Maize Rd., Wichita KS 67212.
Do you remember the Lockheed Little
Dipper I featured in the June column? I
mentioned a short kit with cowl, canopy, etc.
by P&W Models.
Frank Healey, at 189 Columbus Dr.,
Archibald PA 18403, read the piece, which
sent him on a search. He finally found his
old kit, complete with construction
drawings, among the Christmas decorations.
He is willing to sell it if you’re interested.
His E-mail address is [email protected].
The telephone number I gave you in that
column for the Radio Control Modeler plans
service went out of service shortly after I
wrote about it. The Web site—www.rcm
magazine.com—is still functional at this
time.
Old Friends and Good Memories: I recently
visited with Dale Kirn at the one-day “Just
Plane Fun” exhibit at the Smoky Hill
Museum in Salina, Kansas. This marvelous
and well-done display centered around
Dale, a local boy, and his lifetime activities
and achievements with model aviation.
I enjoyed a wonderful visit with Dale.
We reminisced about our modeling
adventures in the long ago. He and I are
contemporaries, and our paths crossed many
times in the late 1940s at local contests.
I’ve always secretly envied Dale for
managing to carve out a career in modeling,
which many of us longtime modelers
dreamed of doing in our youth. When he
finished his tour with the Air Force (and he
was on several Air Force national modeling
teams), he went to work for Victor Stanzel
demonstrating Mono-Line (single-line)
flying across the country.
Dale would show up in cities and towns
in a Chevy Bel Air station wagon. It had a
large Stanzel sign on the roof, with all sorts
of Stanzel and Mono-Line graphics on it.
Dale would then fly at the local CL circles.
Most memorable was his flying a .35-
sized model on a 120-foot line. No joke! I
distinctly remember the lines actually
dragging the ground. This was astonishing
to us since slack lines were the nemesis of
the two-line-system flier.
Later, after earning a degree from
Kansas State, Dale went to work for Leroy
Cox as an industrial engineer. Most of the
Cox line of engines and ready-to-fly CL
models have his touch on them.
Dale and a gang of young boys would
show up at important contests, particularly
the Nats, to run a “fly a model” circle for
the kids in attendance. They enclosed a
circle with snow fence and would put any
kid on the lines for a free introductory
flight. The line often had 50 or more
youngsters in it, waiting their turn.
10sig3.QXD 8/24/06 10:24 AM Page 86October 2006 87
My sons, who were young at that time,
got a kick out of Dale’s method of handling
the inevitable crashes. He and his crew
would pick up the pieces and toss them into
a 55-gallon barrel! They salvaged the pieces
and reassembled the good parts in the
evenings, but my boys didn’t know that!
Shown are contestant charter bus and Chas. Siegfried (center L):
a nearly forgotten RC pioneer and future column subject.
You can see the Fort Shelby Hotel, which served as contest
headquarters, and a long registration line.
An overview of the Selfridge Air Force
Base field, Belle Isle athletic fields, and
Bob-Lo Island amusement park.
There was a large awards banquet and
tons of trophies for the huge number of
entrants in the Plymouth Internats.
Dale and I were chatting about this
activity when we met, and I asked for an
estimate of how many young boys and girls
got their first exposure to modeling at the
Cox circles. Dale didn’t have an accurate
count, but we estimated it to be in excess of
200,000.
That led to a question of how many of
those kids went any further with the hobby.
We concluded that there was no way to tell.
Was this promotion successful? Cox sold
a ton of ready-to-fly PT trainers, etc. for
sure. For years the things were included in
the Sears Christmas catalog. But kids could
fly CL on school playgrounds, parks, and
baseball diamonds then.
Dale and his crew conducted a training
session each year between Christmas and the
new year for youngsters, and there were new
CL ready-to-fly presents on the parking lot
of the Anaheim stadium.
In later years Dale restored models and
developed displays for the Stanzel Aircraft
Museum in Schulenburg, Texas, which I’m
told is excellent. For many years he
manufactured and sold accessories for Cox
engines—most notably a fine-thread needle
valve and body which greatly simplified
setting a needle on the TD engine series—
especially when using fuel pressure.
Plymouth Internats: Dale loaned me some
newspapers he saved from the Plymouth
International Model Airplane
Championships, or Internats, which he
attended in 1949 and 1950. They set off
recollections that I’ll share with you—not
just because it was such a huge, widely
publicized event, but as a way to reflect on
modeling specifically and American industry
in general in those years compared to today.
When I brought up the subject at the
10sig3.QXD 8/24/06 10:50 AM Page 87local hobby shop, I was astonished to find
no modelers younger than 70 who were even
aware of the Plymouth events or of their
sponsorship. It seems that a significant part
of our history has been forgotten, but it was
full of successes.
The Plymouth division of the Chrysler
Corporation and its dealers sponsored local
contests (at least 175 in 1950) to select the
entries for a national event in Detroit,
Michigan, in the summers of 1946 through
1953. In most instances the local dealers
paid all expenses for the entrants to get to
Detroit, and then Chrysler provided food
and housing at the Internats.
All contestants were housed together in
the Fort Shelby Hotel, where breakfast and
dinner were provided. The hotel also served
as event headquarters. Imagine the fun and
chaos a hotel full of 500 or more young
modelers must have enjoyed.
Selfridge Air Force Base was used for
the FF and some of the CL events. Belle Isle
athletic fields (see photos) hosted Speed,
Aerobatics, flying Scale, and carrier-deck
events. Sunday was reserved for the Combat
and Team Race activities.
On Monday a program of sightseeing
included a trip through the Plymouth plant
on specially conducted tours. Buses then
carried the contestants and their families to
the docks of the Bob-Lo Island amusementpark
ferries. This was followed by a huge
awards banquet (see the pictures) with
hundreds of trophies.
Originally limited to modelers who were
less than 21 years of age, the Internats was
expanded in the last years to include older
modelers who had been active leaders in the
local Plymouth Aero League: a local club
program also sponsored by Plymouth
dealers. The categories were Junior, Senior,
and Leader, following the AMA rule book.
Internats events were Hand Launch
Glider; Outdoor Rubber; Free Flight Gas
classes 1/2A, A, B, and C: CL Speed classes
A, B, C, and Jet; Aerobatics classes A, B,
and C; Scale classes A, B, and C; and
Combat classes A, B, and C. Three special
events were open to all age groups, in
competition for a single set of trophies.
They were Team Racing, Carrier Deck, and
Radio Control.
I can’t establish how many entrants each
event had, but the 1953 issue of the
newspaper lists winners through 10 places in
each event including Juniors. The results
listed the contestants’ names and the
dealerships that sponsored them.
Each contestant was given a special Tshirt
and hat, which became prized
possessions. Examples of these are on
display in the AMA museum in Muncie,
Indiana.
Many local Plymouth contests were
staffed with volunteers from local civic
clubs such as Civitan, Rotary, Lions,
Optimists, etc. Each state and some
Canadian provinces held at least one
qualifying contest, while the more densely
populated areas had multiple contests. This
truly was an international competition,
requiring qualification at local contests to
enter.
This event received lots of media
coverage every year, including newsreels at
the movies. The local Plymouth dealers
advertised the local events and received
much newsprint. It is difficult to even
imagine a promotion of this size, success,
and scope in the present. For that reason
alone I felt it necessary to educate
contemporary modelers about it.
I’m sure the reasons for the demise of the
Plymouth Internats are diverse and not
clear-cut. But in the immediate postwar
years US automobile manufacturers could
sell everything they manufactured and at a
reasonable profit. The car factories were
making lots of money and ran three shifts a
day.
And then things began to change for the
US automobile industry. In 1956 the first
Volkswagens were imported, and a sort of
VW “cult” began. At roughly that same time
a few Toyotas and Datsuns were appearing
on the West Coast, but no one—most
notably the US builders—took them
seriously. The original appeal was low cost
and good quality.
Within 10 years the US factories were no
longer highly profitable. Their sales volume
had declined and they were cutting down on
workers, closing factories, and even
dropping names including the Plymouth
line.
Do you remember Packard, Nash,
Studebaker, Hudson, and Kaiser Frazier?The former cash cow had gone dry, and
the factories were running in the red.
Funds were no longer available for such
high-minded promotional activities as
sponsoring kid-type activities, no matter
how successful they were.
Throughout our hobby’s history,
leaders were able to enlist the support of
businesses by selling the concept that
“busy kids don’t get in trouble.” The
nation was concerned about juvenile
delinquency and was willing to combat it
with private funds.
Many firms and organizations have
been involved in promoting modeling as a
wholesome activity for youngsters.
Consider the Navy sponsorship and the
fact that it provided facilities and sailors to
staff the Nats.
There were also several newspaper
publishers that sponsored modeling events,
such as the huge New-York Mirror meet.
Then there was the Jimmie Allen promotion
on the radio and local contests sponsored by
Skelly, Marathon, and BP oil companies. I
attended FF contests in the 1960s that had
sponsorship from local civic clubs, and the
timers and administrative staff were
members.
Pan American airlines, with the
leadership of Dallas Sherman from its
marketing program, sponsored FF weightlifting
events at the Nats; they were
cleverly called PAA Load and Clipper
90 MODEL AVIATION
Cargo. The prizes were watches with the
PAA logo on their faces.
I’ve touched on the economic factors
involved in the loss of these sponsorships,
but an even more revealing factor is the
declining number of youngsters involved in
them. That’s a harsh judgment for sure, but
it’s true.
The last few years of the Navy Nats
featured royal treatment of kids, mine
included, in an effort to attract more of them
to the events. That didn’t work, and the Navy
withdrew its support in 1973.
It’s unfortunate that the Navy had no real
way to measure how successful its
sponsorship of the Nats was as a recruiting
tool. The wonderful way the Navy personnel
treated the kids is bound to have influenced
at least some of them to “Go Navy.”
My oldest son Mark did, and he ended up
a carrier officer serving on nuclear
submarines. That was in no small way a
result of the kindness shown to him and his
little brother Bruce.
Checking back in my old magazines, I
found articles published as early as 1959
about the “Junior Problem.” In spite of heroic
and good-intentioned efforts by AMA, local
clubs, and individuals, we still have the
“Junior Problem” 47 years later. I can only
diagnose the persistence of this dangerous
trend; I have no treatment plans to offer.
Many of us have enjoyed model aviation
in its many forms for a lifetime and feel deep
concern that our heritage will go the way of
the wheelwright, wooden-boat builder, and
blacksmith.
As Dave Brown wrote in his “President’s
Perspective” column in the July issue of this
magazine:
“Look around and see all of the gray hair.
Our average age is increasing ... That new
blood is banging at the door; all we need to
do is to welcome it.”
In the words of poet John Dunne, “No
man is an island. Ask not for whom the bell
tolls; it tolls for thee.”
I’ve written this in a feeble attempt to
point out the tremendous advantages we all
might enjoy again if we could attract more
young people into our beloved hobby.
Edition: Model Aviation - 2006/10
Page Numbers: 86,87,88,90
86 MODEL AVIATION
Flying for Fun D.B. Mathews | [email protected]
Lockheed Little Dipper lovers are in luck
Also included in this column:
• Cox history with Dale Kirn
• 1946-1953 Plymouth Internats
• The 47-year-old youth problem
Pan American airlines ad for PAA Load and Clipper Cargo events
at the AMA Nats. Watches and cash were awarded.
Announcement of the Plymouth Internats contest and photos of
CL Speed, Jet, and Combat contestants and their models.
FOR THOSE who do not have access to the
Internet, my mailing address is 909 N.
Maize Rd., Wichita KS 67212.
Do you remember the Lockheed Little
Dipper I featured in the June column? I
mentioned a short kit with cowl, canopy, etc.
by P&W Models.
Frank Healey, at 189 Columbus Dr.,
Archibald PA 18403, read the piece, which
sent him on a search. He finally found his
old kit, complete with construction
drawings, among the Christmas decorations.
He is willing to sell it if you’re interested.
His E-mail address is [email protected].
The telephone number I gave you in that
column for the Radio Control Modeler plans
service went out of service shortly after I
wrote about it. The Web site—www.rcm
magazine.com—is still functional at this
time.
Old Friends and Good Memories: I recently
visited with Dale Kirn at the one-day “Just
Plane Fun” exhibit at the Smoky Hill
Museum in Salina, Kansas. This marvelous
and well-done display centered around
Dale, a local boy, and his lifetime activities
and achievements with model aviation.
I enjoyed a wonderful visit with Dale.
We reminisced about our modeling
adventures in the long ago. He and I are
contemporaries, and our paths crossed many
times in the late 1940s at local contests.
I’ve always secretly envied Dale for
managing to carve out a career in modeling,
which many of us longtime modelers
dreamed of doing in our youth. When he
finished his tour with the Air Force (and he
was on several Air Force national modeling
teams), he went to work for Victor Stanzel
demonstrating Mono-Line (single-line)
flying across the country.
Dale would show up in cities and towns
in a Chevy Bel Air station wagon. It had a
large Stanzel sign on the roof, with all sorts
of Stanzel and Mono-Line graphics on it.
Dale would then fly at the local CL circles.
Most memorable was his flying a .35-
sized model on a 120-foot line. No joke! I
distinctly remember the lines actually
dragging the ground. This was astonishing
to us since slack lines were the nemesis of
the two-line-system flier.
Later, after earning a degree from
Kansas State, Dale went to work for Leroy
Cox as an industrial engineer. Most of the
Cox line of engines and ready-to-fly CL
models have his touch on them.
Dale and a gang of young boys would
show up at important contests, particularly
the Nats, to run a “fly a model” circle for
the kids in attendance. They enclosed a
circle with snow fence and would put any
kid on the lines for a free introductory
flight. The line often had 50 or more
youngsters in it, waiting their turn.
10sig3.QXD 8/24/06 10:24 AM Page 86October 2006 87
My sons, who were young at that time,
got a kick out of Dale’s method of handling
the inevitable crashes. He and his crew
would pick up the pieces and toss them into
a 55-gallon barrel! They salvaged the pieces
and reassembled the good parts in the
evenings, but my boys didn’t know that!
Shown are contestant charter bus and Chas. Siegfried (center L):
a nearly forgotten RC pioneer and future column subject.
You can see the Fort Shelby Hotel, which served as contest
headquarters, and a long registration line.
An overview of the Selfridge Air Force
Base field, Belle Isle athletic fields, and
Bob-Lo Island amusement park.
There was a large awards banquet and
tons of trophies for the huge number of
entrants in the Plymouth Internats.
Dale and I were chatting about this
activity when we met, and I asked for an
estimate of how many young boys and girls
got their first exposure to modeling at the
Cox circles. Dale didn’t have an accurate
count, but we estimated it to be in excess of
200,000.
That led to a question of how many of
those kids went any further with the hobby.
We concluded that there was no way to tell.
Was this promotion successful? Cox sold
a ton of ready-to-fly PT trainers, etc. for
sure. For years the things were included in
the Sears Christmas catalog. But kids could
fly CL on school playgrounds, parks, and
baseball diamonds then.
Dale and his crew conducted a training
session each year between Christmas and the
new year for youngsters, and there were new
CL ready-to-fly presents on the parking lot
of the Anaheim stadium.
In later years Dale restored models and
developed displays for the Stanzel Aircraft
Museum in Schulenburg, Texas, which I’m
told is excellent. For many years he
manufactured and sold accessories for Cox
engines—most notably a fine-thread needle
valve and body which greatly simplified
setting a needle on the TD engine series—
especially when using fuel pressure.
Plymouth Internats: Dale loaned me some
newspapers he saved from the Plymouth
International Model Airplane
Championships, or Internats, which he
attended in 1949 and 1950. They set off
recollections that I’ll share with you—not
just because it was such a huge, widely
publicized event, but as a way to reflect on
modeling specifically and American industry
in general in those years compared to today.
When I brought up the subject at the
10sig3.QXD 8/24/06 10:50 AM Page 87local hobby shop, I was astonished to find
no modelers younger than 70 who were even
aware of the Plymouth events or of their
sponsorship. It seems that a significant part
of our history has been forgotten, but it was
full of successes.
The Plymouth division of the Chrysler
Corporation and its dealers sponsored local
contests (at least 175 in 1950) to select the
entries for a national event in Detroit,
Michigan, in the summers of 1946 through
1953. In most instances the local dealers
paid all expenses for the entrants to get to
Detroit, and then Chrysler provided food
and housing at the Internats.
All contestants were housed together in
the Fort Shelby Hotel, where breakfast and
dinner were provided. The hotel also served
as event headquarters. Imagine the fun and
chaos a hotel full of 500 or more young
modelers must have enjoyed.
Selfridge Air Force Base was used for
the FF and some of the CL events. Belle Isle
athletic fields (see photos) hosted Speed,
Aerobatics, flying Scale, and carrier-deck
events. Sunday was reserved for the Combat
and Team Race activities.
On Monday a program of sightseeing
included a trip through the Plymouth plant
on specially conducted tours. Buses then
carried the contestants and their families to
the docks of the Bob-Lo Island amusementpark
ferries. This was followed by a huge
awards banquet (see the pictures) with
hundreds of trophies.
Originally limited to modelers who were
less than 21 years of age, the Internats was
expanded in the last years to include older
modelers who had been active leaders in the
local Plymouth Aero League: a local club
program also sponsored by Plymouth
dealers. The categories were Junior, Senior,
and Leader, following the AMA rule book.
Internats events were Hand Launch
Glider; Outdoor Rubber; Free Flight Gas
classes 1/2A, A, B, and C: CL Speed classes
A, B, C, and Jet; Aerobatics classes A, B,
and C; Scale classes A, B, and C; and
Combat classes A, B, and C. Three special
events were open to all age groups, in
competition for a single set of trophies.
They were Team Racing, Carrier Deck, and
Radio Control.
I can’t establish how many entrants each
event had, but the 1953 issue of the
newspaper lists winners through 10 places in
each event including Juniors. The results
listed the contestants’ names and the
dealerships that sponsored them.
Each contestant was given a special Tshirt
and hat, which became prized
possessions. Examples of these are on
display in the AMA museum in Muncie,
Indiana.
Many local Plymouth contests were
staffed with volunteers from local civic
clubs such as Civitan, Rotary, Lions,
Optimists, etc. Each state and some
Canadian provinces held at least one
qualifying contest, while the more densely
populated areas had multiple contests. This
truly was an international competition,
requiring qualification at local contests to
enter.
This event received lots of media
coverage every year, including newsreels at
the movies. The local Plymouth dealers
advertised the local events and received
much newsprint. It is difficult to even
imagine a promotion of this size, success,
and scope in the present. For that reason
alone I felt it necessary to educate
contemporary modelers about it.
I’m sure the reasons for the demise of the
Plymouth Internats are diverse and not
clear-cut. But in the immediate postwar
years US automobile manufacturers could
sell everything they manufactured and at a
reasonable profit. The car factories were
making lots of money and ran three shifts a
day.
And then things began to change for the
US automobile industry. In 1956 the first
Volkswagens were imported, and a sort of
VW “cult” began. At roughly that same time
a few Toyotas and Datsuns were appearing
on the West Coast, but no one—most
notably the US builders—took them
seriously. The original appeal was low cost
and good quality.
Within 10 years the US factories were no
longer highly profitable. Their sales volume
had declined and they were cutting down on
workers, closing factories, and even
dropping names including the Plymouth
line.
Do you remember Packard, Nash,
Studebaker, Hudson, and Kaiser Frazier?The former cash cow had gone dry, and
the factories were running in the red.
Funds were no longer available for such
high-minded promotional activities as
sponsoring kid-type activities, no matter
how successful they were.
Throughout our hobby’s history,
leaders were able to enlist the support of
businesses by selling the concept that
“busy kids don’t get in trouble.” The
nation was concerned about juvenile
delinquency and was willing to combat it
with private funds.
Many firms and organizations have
been involved in promoting modeling as a
wholesome activity for youngsters.
Consider the Navy sponsorship and the
fact that it provided facilities and sailors to
staff the Nats.
There were also several newspaper
publishers that sponsored modeling events,
such as the huge New-York Mirror meet.
Then there was the Jimmie Allen promotion
on the radio and local contests sponsored by
Skelly, Marathon, and BP oil companies. I
attended FF contests in the 1960s that had
sponsorship from local civic clubs, and the
timers and administrative staff were
members.
Pan American airlines, with the
leadership of Dallas Sherman from its
marketing program, sponsored FF weightlifting
events at the Nats; they were
cleverly called PAA Load and Clipper
90 MODEL AVIATION
Cargo. The prizes were watches with the
PAA logo on their faces.
I’ve touched on the economic factors
involved in the loss of these sponsorships,
but an even more revealing factor is the
declining number of youngsters involved in
them. That’s a harsh judgment for sure, but
it’s true.
The last few years of the Navy Nats
featured royal treatment of kids, mine
included, in an effort to attract more of them
to the events. That didn’t work, and the Navy
withdrew its support in 1973.
It’s unfortunate that the Navy had no real
way to measure how successful its
sponsorship of the Nats was as a recruiting
tool. The wonderful way the Navy personnel
treated the kids is bound to have influenced
at least some of them to “Go Navy.”
My oldest son Mark did, and he ended up
a carrier officer serving on nuclear
submarines. That was in no small way a
result of the kindness shown to him and his
little brother Bruce.
Checking back in my old magazines, I
found articles published as early as 1959
about the “Junior Problem.” In spite of heroic
and good-intentioned efforts by AMA, local
clubs, and individuals, we still have the
“Junior Problem” 47 years later. I can only
diagnose the persistence of this dangerous
trend; I have no treatment plans to offer.
Many of us have enjoyed model aviation
in its many forms for a lifetime and feel deep
concern that our heritage will go the way of
the wheelwright, wooden-boat builder, and
blacksmith.
As Dave Brown wrote in his “President’s
Perspective” column in the July issue of this
magazine:
“Look around and see all of the gray hair.
Our average age is increasing ... That new
blood is banging at the door; all we need to
do is to welcome it.”
In the words of poet John Dunne, “No
man is an island. Ask not for whom the bell
tolls; it tolls for thee.”
I’ve written this in a feeble attempt to
point out the tremendous advantages we all
might enjoy again if we could attract more
young people into our beloved hobby.
Edition: Model Aviation - 2006/10
Page Numbers: 86,87,88,90
86 MODEL AVIATION
Flying for Fun D.B. Mathews | [email protected]
Lockheed Little Dipper lovers are in luck
Also included in this column:
• Cox history with Dale Kirn
• 1946-1953 Plymouth Internats
• The 47-year-old youth problem
Pan American airlines ad for PAA Load and Clipper Cargo events
at the AMA Nats. Watches and cash were awarded.
Announcement of the Plymouth Internats contest and photos of
CL Speed, Jet, and Combat contestants and their models.
FOR THOSE who do not have access to the
Internet, my mailing address is 909 N.
Maize Rd., Wichita KS 67212.
Do you remember the Lockheed Little
Dipper I featured in the June column? I
mentioned a short kit with cowl, canopy, etc.
by P&W Models.
Frank Healey, at 189 Columbus Dr.,
Archibald PA 18403, read the piece, which
sent him on a search. He finally found his
old kit, complete with construction
drawings, among the Christmas decorations.
He is willing to sell it if you’re interested.
His E-mail address is [email protected].
The telephone number I gave you in that
column for the Radio Control Modeler plans
service went out of service shortly after I
wrote about it. The Web site—www.rcm
magazine.com—is still functional at this
time.
Old Friends and Good Memories: I recently
visited with Dale Kirn at the one-day “Just
Plane Fun” exhibit at the Smoky Hill
Museum in Salina, Kansas. This marvelous
and well-done display centered around
Dale, a local boy, and his lifetime activities
and achievements with model aviation.
I enjoyed a wonderful visit with Dale.
We reminisced about our modeling
adventures in the long ago. He and I are
contemporaries, and our paths crossed many
times in the late 1940s at local contests.
I’ve always secretly envied Dale for
managing to carve out a career in modeling,
which many of us longtime modelers
dreamed of doing in our youth. When he
finished his tour with the Air Force (and he
was on several Air Force national modeling
teams), he went to work for Victor Stanzel
demonstrating Mono-Line (single-line)
flying across the country.
Dale would show up in cities and towns
in a Chevy Bel Air station wagon. It had a
large Stanzel sign on the roof, with all sorts
of Stanzel and Mono-Line graphics on it.
Dale would then fly at the local CL circles.
Most memorable was his flying a .35-
sized model on a 120-foot line. No joke! I
distinctly remember the lines actually
dragging the ground. This was astonishing
to us since slack lines were the nemesis of
the two-line-system flier.
Later, after earning a degree from
Kansas State, Dale went to work for Leroy
Cox as an industrial engineer. Most of the
Cox line of engines and ready-to-fly CL
models have his touch on them.
Dale and a gang of young boys would
show up at important contests, particularly
the Nats, to run a “fly a model” circle for
the kids in attendance. They enclosed a
circle with snow fence and would put any
kid on the lines for a free introductory
flight. The line often had 50 or more
youngsters in it, waiting their turn.
10sig3.QXD 8/24/06 10:24 AM Page 86October 2006 87
My sons, who were young at that time,
got a kick out of Dale’s method of handling
the inevitable crashes. He and his crew
would pick up the pieces and toss them into
a 55-gallon barrel! They salvaged the pieces
and reassembled the good parts in the
evenings, but my boys didn’t know that!
Shown are contestant charter bus and Chas. Siegfried (center L):
a nearly forgotten RC pioneer and future column subject.
You can see the Fort Shelby Hotel, which served as contest
headquarters, and a long registration line.
An overview of the Selfridge Air Force
Base field, Belle Isle athletic fields, and
Bob-Lo Island amusement park.
There was a large awards banquet and
tons of trophies for the huge number of
entrants in the Plymouth Internats.
Dale and I were chatting about this
activity when we met, and I asked for an
estimate of how many young boys and girls
got their first exposure to modeling at the
Cox circles. Dale didn’t have an accurate
count, but we estimated it to be in excess of
200,000.
That led to a question of how many of
those kids went any further with the hobby.
We concluded that there was no way to tell.
Was this promotion successful? Cox sold
a ton of ready-to-fly PT trainers, etc. for
sure. For years the things were included in
the Sears Christmas catalog. But kids could
fly CL on school playgrounds, parks, and
baseball diamonds then.
Dale and his crew conducted a training
session each year between Christmas and the
new year for youngsters, and there were new
CL ready-to-fly presents on the parking lot
of the Anaheim stadium.
In later years Dale restored models and
developed displays for the Stanzel Aircraft
Museum in Schulenburg, Texas, which I’m
told is excellent. For many years he
manufactured and sold accessories for Cox
engines—most notably a fine-thread needle
valve and body which greatly simplified
setting a needle on the TD engine series—
especially when using fuel pressure.
Plymouth Internats: Dale loaned me some
newspapers he saved from the Plymouth
International Model Airplane
Championships, or Internats, which he
attended in 1949 and 1950. They set off
recollections that I’ll share with you—not
just because it was such a huge, widely
publicized event, but as a way to reflect on
modeling specifically and American industry
in general in those years compared to today.
When I brought up the subject at the
10sig3.QXD 8/24/06 10:50 AM Page 87local hobby shop, I was astonished to find
no modelers younger than 70 who were even
aware of the Plymouth events or of their
sponsorship. It seems that a significant part
of our history has been forgotten, but it was
full of successes.
The Plymouth division of the Chrysler
Corporation and its dealers sponsored local
contests (at least 175 in 1950) to select the
entries for a national event in Detroit,
Michigan, in the summers of 1946 through
1953. In most instances the local dealers
paid all expenses for the entrants to get to
Detroit, and then Chrysler provided food
and housing at the Internats.
All contestants were housed together in
the Fort Shelby Hotel, where breakfast and
dinner were provided. The hotel also served
as event headquarters. Imagine the fun and
chaos a hotel full of 500 or more young
modelers must have enjoyed.
Selfridge Air Force Base was used for
the FF and some of the CL events. Belle Isle
athletic fields (see photos) hosted Speed,
Aerobatics, flying Scale, and carrier-deck
events. Sunday was reserved for the Combat
and Team Race activities.
On Monday a program of sightseeing
included a trip through the Plymouth plant
on specially conducted tours. Buses then
carried the contestants and their families to
the docks of the Bob-Lo Island amusementpark
ferries. This was followed by a huge
awards banquet (see the pictures) with
hundreds of trophies.
Originally limited to modelers who were
less than 21 years of age, the Internats was
expanded in the last years to include older
modelers who had been active leaders in the
local Plymouth Aero League: a local club
program also sponsored by Plymouth
dealers. The categories were Junior, Senior,
and Leader, following the AMA rule book.
Internats events were Hand Launch
Glider; Outdoor Rubber; Free Flight Gas
classes 1/2A, A, B, and C: CL Speed classes
A, B, C, and Jet; Aerobatics classes A, B,
and C; Scale classes A, B, and C; and
Combat classes A, B, and C. Three special
events were open to all age groups, in
competition for a single set of trophies.
They were Team Racing, Carrier Deck, and
Radio Control.
I can’t establish how many entrants each
event had, but the 1953 issue of the
newspaper lists winners through 10 places in
each event including Juniors. The results
listed the contestants’ names and the
dealerships that sponsored them.
Each contestant was given a special Tshirt
and hat, which became prized
possessions. Examples of these are on
display in the AMA museum in Muncie,
Indiana.
Many local Plymouth contests were
staffed with volunteers from local civic
clubs such as Civitan, Rotary, Lions,
Optimists, etc. Each state and some
Canadian provinces held at least one
qualifying contest, while the more densely
populated areas had multiple contests. This
truly was an international competition,
requiring qualification at local contests to
enter.
This event received lots of media
coverage every year, including newsreels at
the movies. The local Plymouth dealers
advertised the local events and received
much newsprint. It is difficult to even
imagine a promotion of this size, success,
and scope in the present. For that reason
alone I felt it necessary to educate
contemporary modelers about it.
I’m sure the reasons for the demise of the
Plymouth Internats are diverse and not
clear-cut. But in the immediate postwar
years US automobile manufacturers could
sell everything they manufactured and at a
reasonable profit. The car factories were
making lots of money and ran three shifts a
day.
And then things began to change for the
US automobile industry. In 1956 the first
Volkswagens were imported, and a sort of
VW “cult” began. At roughly that same time
a few Toyotas and Datsuns were appearing
on the West Coast, but no one—most
notably the US builders—took them
seriously. The original appeal was low cost
and good quality.
Within 10 years the US factories were no
longer highly profitable. Their sales volume
had declined and they were cutting down on
workers, closing factories, and even
dropping names including the Plymouth
line.
Do you remember Packard, Nash,
Studebaker, Hudson, and Kaiser Frazier?The former cash cow had gone dry, and
the factories were running in the red.
Funds were no longer available for such
high-minded promotional activities as
sponsoring kid-type activities, no matter
how successful they were.
Throughout our hobby’s history,
leaders were able to enlist the support of
businesses by selling the concept that
“busy kids don’t get in trouble.” The
nation was concerned about juvenile
delinquency and was willing to combat it
with private funds.
Many firms and organizations have
been involved in promoting modeling as a
wholesome activity for youngsters.
Consider the Navy sponsorship and the
fact that it provided facilities and sailors to
staff the Nats.
There were also several newspaper
publishers that sponsored modeling events,
such as the huge New-York Mirror meet.
Then there was the Jimmie Allen promotion
on the radio and local contests sponsored by
Skelly, Marathon, and BP oil companies. I
attended FF contests in the 1960s that had
sponsorship from local civic clubs, and the
timers and administrative staff were
members.
Pan American airlines, with the
leadership of Dallas Sherman from its
marketing program, sponsored FF weightlifting
events at the Nats; they were
cleverly called PAA Load and Clipper
90 MODEL AVIATION
Cargo. The prizes were watches with the
PAA logo on their faces.
I’ve touched on the economic factors
involved in the loss of these sponsorships,
but an even more revealing factor is the
declining number of youngsters involved in
them. That’s a harsh judgment for sure, but
it’s true.
The last few years of the Navy Nats
featured royal treatment of kids, mine
included, in an effort to attract more of them
to the events. That didn’t work, and the Navy
withdrew its support in 1973.
It’s unfortunate that the Navy had no real
way to measure how successful its
sponsorship of the Nats was as a recruiting
tool. The wonderful way the Navy personnel
treated the kids is bound to have influenced
at least some of them to “Go Navy.”
My oldest son Mark did, and he ended up
a carrier officer serving on nuclear
submarines. That was in no small way a
result of the kindness shown to him and his
little brother Bruce.
Checking back in my old magazines, I
found articles published as early as 1959
about the “Junior Problem.” In spite of heroic
and good-intentioned efforts by AMA, local
clubs, and individuals, we still have the
“Junior Problem” 47 years later. I can only
diagnose the persistence of this dangerous
trend; I have no treatment plans to offer.
Many of us have enjoyed model aviation
in its many forms for a lifetime and feel deep
concern that our heritage will go the way of
the wheelwright, wooden-boat builder, and
blacksmith.
As Dave Brown wrote in his “President’s
Perspective” column in the July issue of this
magazine:
“Look around and see all of the gray hair.
Our average age is increasing ... That new
blood is banging at the door; all we need to
do is to welcome it.”
In the words of poet John Dunne, “No
man is an island. Ask not for whom the bell
tolls; it tolls for thee.”
I’ve written this in a feeble attempt to
point out the tremendous advantages we all
might enjoy again if we could attract more
young people into our beloved hobby.