Guru312

Yes, that's what I thought, too. Although maybe the uniqueness is the lack of an apex. Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

That sure doesn't look like the Ridgely I remember!!! Those pictures depict a "real" airport. It looks like they solved the water problem with a 'catch basin' design. What a pain that place was after a very heavy rain. Never the less, without the old farmhouse and Maureen riding herd on the masses from the manifest it's not the same place. I understand there is a 'tandem only' jump operation there now, is that correct? Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

My first experience with The Pelicans was at MEPA meets. There was a long multi-year rivalry between the Pelicans and United. If I recall correctly, the insanity shown by the Herd stemmed from Pelican/United rivalry. Does anyone else remember MEPA meets? They were a way different kind of expression of what jumping is about compared to RW boogies and such. Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

I recognize at least two dozen people in that photo, maybe more. What a group of crazy and wonderful people. What a place that was! I had my own DZs for a few years and flew at another half dozen over the years but Pelicanland was always my favorite. Thanks for this pic. Post more, folks! Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

Well, I'll be damned! Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

What happened to "How"? I want to know how the jumper is able to defy gravity and fall up. Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

Thank you for a very enjoyable few minutes, Nick. That was very funny. Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

What a wonderful voice of compassion and reason, Kim. A wonderful breath of fresh air amid the smell of old people. When accessing DZ.com just now, before reading Kim's comments, I saw predominately displayed on the DZ home page an article headlined "Skydiving and the recession". The second sentence in that article is this: "The student numbers are down, and we are blaming it on the economy." We can probably blame the recession to an extent but we also must blame attitudes similar to that espoused by Jerry. To do anything which will separate us from our roots and those who came before is a major error, in my not humble opinion. I saw a similar attitude in the most obnoxious of ways in the DB Cooper thread. There one can read the words of many "old timers" who wanted the thread closed down because of too many non-jumpers posting to the thread. The old farts...many of them...did almost all they could to ban the thread and postings by whuffos. How dumb is that?! We NEED whuffos asking dumb questions. If we answer correctly and with compassion we may be able to make an airplane payment because the answer was given without an aloof attitude. Maybe, because I have less than 1000 jumps in nearly 50 years I shouldn't be taking such a sacrilegious, anti-skygod position. Maybe I should be groveling and shuffling my feet before the exalted two or three digit Ds. Truth be told, had I cared about such things, I would be displaying a two digit D. When I started, PCA was allowing people to pick a D of their choice. I was more interested in learning about jumping than I was bragging with a patch on my jumpsuit. I never applied for any license until I wanted to become a DZO...and "legal" instructor. Let's realize that we are a weird breed. All of us. We don't have much to brag about with the few USPA memberships numbers. Many of you are driving people away because of the SkyGod, "limited access" to the holy inner circle mentality. I was seriously thinking about using the Pioneer Reunion as an excuse to take my 16 year old daughter to Bragg on our way to the reunion. I don't think I will, now, after reading some of these comments. We need inclusion in the sport; we do not need exclusion to the detriment of DZOs, pilots, mechanics...and whuffos who are working on having the courage to do something as counter-intuitive as jumping out of a perfectly good airplane. Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

When I was a DZO we had a very cute and sexy woman who most of "dated" doing manifesting and general help on the DZ. We got her a T-shirt that said: "Staff Only" Talk about the old days... Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

Not me! Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

What a thrill those pics were! Thanks for that, Howard. I'm amazed how many DZs that I think I recognized. Plus, all the people who I knew from so many years ago. The one of Steve Snyder was particularly moving. I introduced my younger daughter to him a few weeks before his tragic accident. Thanks, Jerry! Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

Given some of the comments in this thread I thought today's Quote of the Day on Slashdot.org to be particularly appropriate: Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

I googled and found a few pages of interest. Here is a page with pics of the "overseas cap" http://www.angelfire.com/md2/patches/other/airborne1.html Here is a page from the Ft. Lee quartermaster museum with links to lots of interesting jump wings and insignias: http://www.qmmuseum.lee.army.mil/airborne/ I didn't know about the really cool military freefall wings. They were issued long after my time. I like them. The hot tip for finding stuff relatively easily is to put as much in double quotes as you can and then add words which narrow the search. I searched using this without the brackets: ["overseas cap" airborne] Google will return pages which have the words in quotes in that exact order. Google allows for up to ten words in a search. The more that can be put in double quotes the easier to sort through the hits returned. Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

I agree. As ex-82nd I found it worth reading. Thanks for that link. It's interesting to note from the comments that the decades old leg/non-leg, attitude/arrogance discussions still exists. During my 3-year enlistment, I was lucky enough to be assigned to Headquarters Battery of the 82nd Division Artillery. Although my MOS was as a radio operator, I talked my way into being a writer and photographer for the Public Information Office, which was really 'press and public relations.' My photos and articles were meant to keep the 82nd in the news...and in a favorable light. I once flew from Ft. Bragg, NC to Yakima Firing Center in central Washington. There was a very big maneuver taking place and many thousands of troops were at the base. I was the only paratrooper. There were a number of sergeants and officers who wore jump wings but 99% of the troops saw me as some sort of strange freak. It was pretty funny, actually. With my tailored and bloused pants, mirror-finished, spit shined Corcoron jump boots and cunt-cap I stood out big-time at the PX... in the midst of a bunch of legs. Dozens of guys would come up to me and ask about jumping and jump school. Then again, some guys would almost jump out of the way when they saw me coming down the street. I always thought that was funny. The smug attitude and cocky demeanor that I had at Yakima disappeared very fast a few months later when guys from UDT 21 stayed in our barracks while going through jump school. UDT/SEAL teams would be billeted with 82nd units when attending jump school. We were all quite humiliated by those guys. They ran circles around us. Literally! On our morning runs, the entire 82nd Airborne would run--minus a few clerks, cooks and security personnel. The UDT guys didn't run with us: they ran around us, actually, physically, around our formations...at a speed much faster than our speed. Paratroopers are tough, with an attitude, but they don't compare to frogs. Ex-airborne and folks interested in Division stories may find this funny... and me stupid: [URL]http://www.aicommand.com/General%27s%20Driver.htm[/URL] Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

I went through jump school at Bragg in 1960. We didn't sing that "funky, funky leg song." The term 'leg' is a put-down of non-airborne, for sure. The term comes from "straight leg" which describes the unbloused trousers worn by non-airborne troops. Airborne troops created the "pants in boot tops" which than made them non-straight. That's the history of 'straight leg' as I remember it. It doesn't explain why or how the airborne began doing that in the first place. Oddly, only MPs and airborne were permitted to do the 'pants leg' tuck thing into their boots. When I was in airborne troops took great pride in how their cap was worn. As you know, we ripped out the 'stiffening' material in the cap so we could push down the ridge. Gave us that cocky look. Which is kinda weird because we called the modified cap 'a cunt cap'. [No offense meant, politically correct ladies reading this.] As I understand it, all Army wear a beret now. When I was in only Special Forces were permitted a beret. I stoop in a review at Pope AFB when President Kennedy visited and decreed that SF troops could wear the beret 'legally' Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

In '63 or maybe '64 I made a few jumps at a DZ run by Steve Snyder---before he opened the RipCord DZ in New Jersey---that was somewhere in eastern Pennsylvania. The only jumper I can remember by name is Dave DeWolf. Dave and I made our first 15 second delays out of the same plane at that DZ. Can anyone remember just where it was? Nitro, you may know. There was another DZ in eastern PA near Downingtown. Not really a DZ, more like a farmer's field and a grass strip. A number of folks from the United Parachute Club came to jump there when their plane was down. Yet another DZ that lasted less than a year was near Newton Square. That DZ was really a horse farm. We called the place "The Troop Farm" but I can't remember why. We had to commute 15 miles to the West Chester, PA airport because there was no landing strip. A guy named Ken Morrison was a part of the operation. I remember the name Tony Shepard who was a Navy rigger and made a few jumps with him. He put his cousin, Bruce Foster, out for his first jump... at night! Those were the days. Strangely, I can't find my logbook for that period or I'd know the locations and have some meaningful signatures. Of course. back then not too many people had a license. I never bothered to get one until 1970 or so. Somewhere in my attic I have a PCA patch from that time period. I'd really like to find that and my log. Does anyone remember when the name was changed from PCA to USPA? Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

The Woodbine where you jumped was in Maryland. I flew for that DZ a few weekends while their plane was being worked on for something. Pelicanland was the most fun DZ I ever frequented. I got my I and JM rating there in '71. What a place! I met Mac a few times, He was stationed at Navy Lakehurst, if I remember correctly. He and Bob Kubler owned a 182 together...or something like that. My Woodbine was about 25 miles from Atlantic City. Somebody mentioned how much fun this thread is: I agree. Is anyone actually keeping track of what we are dredging up? Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

Anyone who could remember my "D B Cooper skydiving" advert from way back then doesn't have a memory problem. Yes, I remember them both. Don was a senior rigger who jumped with Bucks County Skydivers and did repair work for me. Al's connection escapes me at the moment but I remember his name. Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

Nitro-- You also did not include my DZs. Woodbine, NJ 1968 to 1975? Fiarton, NJ 1975 to 1976. And one in Bucks County, PA 1975 to 1977? All three were very famiily-oriented where I encouraged people to bring children... After the above DZs, I began flying at Pelicanland and a few other east coast DZs. Flying Jumpers was more fun that jumping. Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

I have no knowledge of the operation other than having heard about it MANY years ago. Maybe 40. Interestingly, I Googled the airport and the only hit was this DZ.com post of yours. I think that's sort of odd. I know the the operation existed and the airport existed. A mystery. Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

And I should have looked more closely at my post before hitting "post reply" because I would have caught my mistake. WTF! I teach people how to use these stupid machines: I know better. Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

Wow!! That's about the most amazing video that I've ever seen. Do you have a link to explain more about the logistics--uphill walk, downhill walk after opening...stuff like that? I'd love to read about the whole "process" of getting to the take-off point and recovery. Truly, amazing! Thanks for posting! Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

Me too. See this: http://www.dropzone.com/forum/Skydiving_C1/Skydiving_History_&_Trivia_F21/aerial_drug_delivery_P3077525/ I spoke with Steve Snyder often about this system. If I recall correctly, the SSE system has been used since the early years of the Viet Nam war to pinpoint deliveries to remote SF locations. Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

I just read this article about a study done on thrill seeking and risk taking. I think the research was done at a Herd Boogie. From the article: "It's also responsible for the high we feel when we do something daring, like skiing down a double black diamond slope or skydiving out of a plane." http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20081231/hl_time/08599186910600 Guru312 I am not DB Cooper

Haven't done that one, but DO have a B-29! I was in the 82nd when the division used C-119, C-123 and C-130 jump aircraft. My favorite was the C-119. It certainly wasn't sport jumping but it was a very fun jump aircraft. Both a tailgate and a side exit. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C-119 Guru312 I am not DB Cooper