howardwhite

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Everything posted by howardwhite

  1. howardwhite
    In a word, yes (Or if the plane has been assigned a new number.) HW
  2. howardwhite
    This was the January, 1972, Parachutist cover photo. It was taken by M. Anderson Jenkins, one of the most frequently published skydiving photographers of the time. The accompanying article, also by Jenkins, notes: "By the completion of Round 2, it was clear that a 10-man put together in anything over 35 seconds was simply not going to cut it. This is a good indication of the progress of relative work within this country; four years ago several groups were considering going to 15,000' just to attempt a 10-man." HW
  3. howardwhite
    I now have the following from Kim Emmons Knor, D-223. I scanned the picture from her collection last fall. " This one .. was taken at Taft, California where I was jumping in 1962. We used that for a jump plane and the pilot was Art Armstrong. The man hanging below to photograph our exits was Don Molitar. We used to load the plane with jumpers in Van Nuys and fly up to Taft trying to get as much altitude as possible and then jump in to Taft and continue jumping for the day. I logged my longest delay up to that point ...85 sec...there on April 8th, 1962....just 45 years ago today. Probably on a Sunday too." HW
  4. howardwhite
    Travis Jumptown has pretty good number of both AFF and Tandem instructors, but only a few are full-time (Jumptown is a club, operating Thurs-Mon.) So I expect an additional experienced instructor would be welcome, especially on busy weekends (40+ tandems scheduled for next Saturday.) Call and ask to talk to Dick Spates, the chief instructor. Jumptown has a Strong Tandem course director on site, so getting cross-trained would not, I think, be a problem. HW
  5. howardwhite
    skratch... You would know and I wouldn't....though I think Gary Patmor was in "Masters of the Sky," doing something. But anyway... I am looking through my vast archives to find more stuff about Chuck Alexander, an engineer for Pioneer, who jumped out of one plane and deployed. His canopy bridle was then snagged by a hook from another plane and he was winched back into it. Don't know what year -- mid-sixties sometime -- though I did know him slightly. It was not a stunt, but done for a military contract, as I recall. The same half-vast archives also disgorged the attached picture of a jumper being towed under a Beech 18. I don't know the story about it, but will ask the person I think it came from. HW
  6. howardwhite
    Is it "Masters of the Sky" that has scenes of a jumper towed behind a Cessna? I think the jumper is Gary Patmor and he also had a movie camera on his head. HW
  7. howardwhite
    Well, it's not Google Earth, but Google has just launched "My Maps," which lets you make a personalized map and append pictures, YouTube links, and all sorts of stuff. Maps can either be Listed, which means that a some point they will show up in a Google search, or Unlisted, which you can keep out of searches and share with friends. I just did a quick and dirty My Map of the first few places where I jumped, and will eventually, maybe, expand it to everywhere I've jumped. Pretty neat; it even has a little button which automatically creates a KML file you can then import into Google Earth. HW
  8. howardwhite
    It calculates out to about 5 mph, unless my arithmetic skills have deteriorated still more than I thought. HW
  9. howardwhite
    1. Go to Google -> Maps 2. Get Directions: London, UK -> Zephyrhills, FL 3. Note especially step #37 Google Maps does not have similar help if you need directions from continents other than Europe. HW
  10. howardwhite
    I have them, but won't post without asking Al and Beth, who are still happily married after all these years. In any case, I wouldn't put the "Sport Beth" ads in the same category as the SSE ads I posted. I see Al frequently, most recently last weekend. HW
  11. howardwhite
    Maybe the single most important historical loss to the archives of U.S. parachuting is the original freefall footage, shot by Lew Sanborn, used in A Sport is born, a short subject nominated for an Oscar in 1960. It was among the earliest, if not the earliest freefall footage -- certainly the first used in a commercial film for theater distriibution. Lew told me last year that when PI shut down its operations in Orange in 1984, the footage was moved to an old storage barn on the Orange Airport. It was in movie cannisters marked "Original - do not project." And it's gone -- who knows who took it, or when, or why? Is it in someone's garage now, or was it just thrown away? That's an extreme case of the kind of loss that everyone who has good old stuff needs to think about before trashing. HW
  12. howardwhite
    Ad from Skydiving, Jan.2001. HW
  13. howardwhite
    My collection of old magazines is heavyweight but incomplete and disorderly (to describe it kindly.) Bill Ottley had all Parachutist issues professionally bound. His collection is now in the USPA HQ library and is in better shape than the official USPA collection, which has over the years been vandalized by people with scissors. Mike Horan also had great bound collections of old publications; his, too, are in the USPA library. Dan Poynter says he has all issues of Parachutist, Spotter, and other publications. I hope all of these -- and others as they are discovered -- will eventually end up in the Skydiving Museum, where they can be properly cared for, available to researchers, and maybe even indexed sometime. HW
  14. howardwhite
    If you decide to throw out the pre-1980 or so ones, I can find a nice warm home for them. I'll even pay shipping. HW (archivist/packrat)
  15. howardwhite
    It might be nice if your pilot told ATC there will be an open canopy at 13,000 feet AGL. In many areas, it's possible there will be planes, maybe fast ones, maybe IFR, whose pilots would not likely be looking around for small, slow-moving nylon targets, especially targets without transponders. HW (who, many years ago, looked down under canopy at 12 grand or so to see a DC9 or somesuch passing under him)
  16. howardwhite
    Since a couple of ads in "questionable taste" from Spotter have showed up here recently, (I'm glad to see "smooth" also treasures his archives), I though it appropriate to post some from Parachutist, these from the December, 1974, issue. Two issues later, Chuck Ryan, the editor, printed an apology which said in part: "... I have not received so many letters on any subject during the two years I have been the editor of Parachutist—and all of them were against the ads. They were characterized as 'in poor taste,' 'degrading to women,' and even as 'pornography.' But most of the writers (about half of them men) objected to the ads as 'sexist'." Maybe my cultural timeclock is not set properly, but I find it a little surprising that in 1974 a substantial number of male skydivers would have used the term "sexist." On the other hand, I also find it a little surprising that SSE thought the ads would sell altimeters or Sentinels. HW
  17. howardwhite
    See http://www.google.com/analytics/
  18. howardwhite
    And I remember spending a night at Dean's house. We went down the hill into what would now be called a gated community, parked, put on our SCUBA gear, and swam to a rock just off shore. The rock hid a cave; inside, with a light, you could see the walls covered with abalone, rock scallops and other delicacies. We took enough for dinner, and feasted that night. He said he believed only he and his kids knew about the place I returned the favor a couple of months later, taking him on a boat dive in outer Boston Harbor. I told him where I had seen a big lobster the week before -- one I couldn't quite get. He came up with it; it weighed 18 pounds! A wonderful guy and a life cut much too short. HW
  19. howardwhite
    Why do some reserve containers have one closing pin and others have two? Answer this, and you'll have your answer.
  20. howardwhite
    You are obviously not a prime candidate for a position in Product Marketing. HW
  21. howardwhite
    Well, there was Point Break and there was Terminal Velocity, and then there was The Skydivers. If you've seen it, most likely you saw it on Mystery Science 3000, a 1994 TV series mocking really bad movies. The movie's creator, Coleman Francis, is remembered this way in a Wikipedia entry: "He has become known in recent years for the abysmal production quality of his three self-produced 1960s films. His trademark style includes murky black & white scenes with poor acting, usually in desert locations, a preoccupation with light aircraft and parachuting, and coffee serving as a prop or a center of conversation. " Attached: -An ad for the original movie; -Two clips from one of a number of web sites mocking the movie; -The cover of the VHS tape of the MST 3000 parody. Apparently most of what passes for skydiving action was filmed at Quartz Hill Airfield in Palmdale, CA. HW
  22. howardwhite
    This picture of RW over Arvin, CA, is the centerfold from Sky Diver, July, 1966. The caption is "Why no, I thought you brought the baton..." It was taken by Tom Schapanski. The same issue reports that at the 1966 Nationals in Tahlequah, he won first place in accuracy. Wonder if today's top competitors also have careers as photographers.... The same issue also reports: "...several mooners had been observed in the (Nationals) dormitory area. One was identified and asked by the Board to leave the competition, as others will be in the future." HW
  23. howardwhite
    It would help if you would learn to use the "Quote" function here when you're quoting, as in this case, from a three year old message. It took a little bit of head-scratching to figure out that it was not you who were concerned about Bill Ottley's health. For the record, Bill died in late 2005 and was memorialized in great style in an event held in May, 2006, in conjunction with the dedication of the new USPA headquarters in Virginia. The celebration of WHO's life took place in a tent on the site of the future skydiving museum. Its construction will fulfill his long-time dream. HW
  24. howardwhite
    Since my last post, in January, I've climbed to eighth place, and will probably hit #7 in the next day or two. Six is in easy reach. Keep on folding! HW
  25. howardwhite
    Prolly right. Prolly 207.