List of Notable Warbird People

[Noha307]

Did anyone mention Doug Arnold in the UK ? Or Spencer Flak ?

Doug Arnold was brought up in a previous post, but I don't see any mention of Spencer Flak. Feel free to expound on both of them though, because I'm not familiar with either.

In a bit of news about someone already covered, EAA recently announced that Tom Reilly is being inducted into the EAA Warbirds of America Hall of Fame.

Finally, I recently was made aware of Don Stamp and, while I don't know much about him, an article about his passing seems to establish his notability for this list.

[Hooligan2]

Think I mentioned Spencer Flack quite early on; he owned several Sea Furies, G-AGHB which some one crashed at Munster after an engine failure, and G-FURY which Spencer was seriously injured in after another engine failure led to a crash landing short of RAF Waddington. He was quite badly injured. He also restored one of my favourite Spitfires, XIV G-FIRE, and a Hunter, G-HUNT. FURY, FIRE and HUNT were painted bright red and for a brief moment they were the Elstree Air Force. After his crash, Spencer sold the Spit and Hunter, both of which are now in the USA. He later owned P-51D N1051S which returned to the US and was destroyed in an accident. Spencer took up historic car racing and sadly died while racing in Australia.

Doug Arnold AKA Fairoaks Aviation Services and Warbirds of Great Britain was a scrap metal merchant (allegedly) who wheeler-dealered his way through many vintage aircraft trades and was responsible for some wonderful aircraft bring saved and many other purchases all too rarely gracing British skies. A list of his fleet over the years would be extensive to say the least. He moved his treasures around the UK from Blackbushe to Somewhere in the East Midlands to Biggin Hill and possibly elsewhere too. I believe his son David may still have a Spitfire or two squirelled away somewhere. A tricky character and not one to annoy by all accounts but I think we owe him quite a lot. Sadly noted British aerobatics and warbird pilot Neil Williams was lost ferrying a CASA 2111 from Spain to Blackbushe for him...

[Noha307]

Think I mentioned Spencer Flack quite early on

You were right, you did mentioned him in a previous post. My apologies.

Thanks for the short biographies. That is the type of information that is helpful when you're not familiar with these guys.

An individual who I don't believe has been mentioned yet is Jim Appleby. He is apparently known for building a large number of replica World War I aircraft.[1][2]

[Noha307]

Cutlass extraordinaire Al Casby was mentioned in a previous post, but Air and Space Quarterly featured him in a recent semi-biographical article.

[Hooligan2]

Think I mentioned Spencer Flack quite early on

You were right, you did mentioned him in a previous post. My apologies.

None needed, it's a long thread!

[Noha307]

Three different warbird organizations each have their own "Halls of Fame" or similar lists. While two of them have been covered in previous posts (1, 2), I thought it would be worthwhile to include them all here as a group. Furthermore, the complete roster of members was not included for one of the aforementioned lists:

Commemorative Air Force

• Neils Agather (YouTube)
• Victor Agather
• Wallace Athey
• Stephen W. Barber
• H. D. Butler
• Tom Cloyd
• Dick Cole
• Buddy Cooksey
• Bill Coombes (YouTube)
• Ollie Crawford
• Wallace W. Dillard
• Dick Disney
• Archie Donahue
• Tom Dutton
• Walt Estridge
• Tennessee Ernie Ford
• Chuck Francis
• Lefty Gardner
• Ronnie Gardner
• Bill Godwin
• Don Hinz
• Charles Hutchins
• J. W. Don Johnson
• Ray Kinney
• George W. Lodge
• Eddie May
• Lawrence Mullaly
• Lloyd Nolen
• Brad Pilgrim (YouTube)
• Ted Short
• Van Skiles
• Randy Sohn (YouTube)
• Robert Stenevik
• Robert Thompson
• Paul Tibbets, Jr. (YouTube)
• Jake Tryon
• Bob West
• James King “JK” West (YouTube)
• Randolph Wilson
• Charlie Wood (YouTube)
• Don Woodham

(Source: Commemorative Air Force)

EAA Warbirds of America

• Clarence E. "Bud" Anderson
• George Baker
• John Baugh
• Connie Bowlin
• Doug Champlin
• Mark Clark
• Lincoln Dexter
• Dr. Richard "Dick" Dieter
• William Grant Dodds
• Chuck Doyle
• Wilson Connell "Connie" Edwards
• John Ellis
• Richard Ervin
• Jeff Ethell
• Nelson Ezell
• Rudy Frasca
• Jack Harrington
• Bill Harrison
• Steve Hinton
• Lee Lauderback
• Daryl Lenz
• David B. Lindsay, Jr.
• Edward T. Maloney
• Charlie Nogle
• Lloyd Parker Nolen
• Walt Ohlrich
• Howard Pardue
• Preston S. "Pete" Parish
• Sue Parish
• Paul Poberezny
• Tom Reilly
• Tony Ritzman
• Jack Roush
• Frank C. Sanders
• Dennis Sanders
• Dave Schlingman
• Carl Scholl
• Randy Sohn
• G. L. "Jerry" Walburn
• Harold D. "Hal" Weekley
• Kermit Weeks
• Jay Wisler

(Source: EAA Warbirds of America)

National Warbird Operator's Conference

• Matthew D. Bongers
• Jason Capra
• Shane Clayton
• Nick Crofoot
• Amelia Hilsen
• Eric Nielsen
• David Oliver
• Ryan Parente
• Shawn Patrick
• Michael Porter
• David Reed
• Marco Rusconi
• Justin Spence
• Taylor Stevenson
• Joel Swager
• Samuel Walsh
• Tim Wiebe
• Ben Wilson
• Scott Yoak
• Matt Younkin

(Source: National Warbird Operators Conference)

A few notes:

• Two individuals made both the CAF and the EAA lists: Lloyd P. Nolen and Randy Sohn.
• There are either three or four sets of relatives: Victor and Neils Agather (father and son), Preston S. "Pete" and Sue Parish (husband and wife) and Frank C. Sanders and Dennis Sanders (father and son). Lefty and Ronnie Gardner may also be related, but I couldn't find confirmation of this.

[CAPFlyer]

It's quite a list. Charlie Wood is a very unsung hero of the Warbird community. I'm glad he made the HoF. I want to know who found my "off-the-cuff" pic of Charlie sitting patiently on the tug to put in his HoF video. Of all the pics I took over the years, I definitely didn't expect *that* one to make it into something as cool as that.

[Noha307]

Peter M. "Pete" Jones, through his business Air Repair, is probably responsible for more flying Stearmans - 145 - than any other person.[1] So extensive is his influence, that his name has become a byword for a certain subset of PT-17s and N2Ss.[2] (Although lesser known, his company was also responsible for building 19 L-19s as well.[1]) However, after many years of restorations, the Stearman business was acquired by RARE Aircraft in 2014.[3]

[Noha307]

A unique one is Roy Martin, who has been a curator and volunteer at the Royal Air Force Museum for 50 years! As a thanks for his service, he was recently awarded the Order of the British Empire.[1] (Compare with J.J. "Jack" van Egmond mentioned in a previous post being knighted.) Also recently recognized is Chuck Greenhill, who was inducted into the Warbirds of America Hall of Fame in 2023.[2]

Gary Velasco is responsible for recreating nose art on many warbirds.[3] In a similar vein, Matthew L. Hurd, who owns Bombs Away and has been making replica aircraft ordnance for over 30 years.

By virtue of his company, Strix Aero, buying out Bud Wheeler ACE Allisons, Cory Miller is poised to be eventually added to the list.[4] (A situation not unlike José Flores taking over Vintage V12s from Mike Nixon. Also, for more information about ACE Allisons, Warbird Digest wrote an article about the company in their March-April 2014 issue.)

While all of these individuals have been mentioned in previous posts (1, 2, 3, 4), it seems there is trend in profiling warbird collectors:

• Rod Lewis[5]
• Warren Pietsch[6]
• Jerry Yagen[7]
• Jack Erickson[8]

We've lost a good number of the "postwar generation" of aviation historians in recent years. This includes serial number gurus such as Geoff Goodall, R. W. R. Walker and Joe Baugher.[9][10][11][12] Not to mention photographer and longtime collaborator of Peter M. Bowers, William T. "Bill" Larkins.[13][14][15] (Although confirmation of his death couldn't be found, according to an article Victor D. Seely, another aviation photographer on the west coast, was 75 in 2003 and may have since passed away as well.) Other somewhat recent passings include David Price, founder of the Museum of Flying and Glyn Powell, the man behind Mosquito Aircraft Restorations and Robert L. Taylor, founder of the Antique Airplane Association.[16][17][18] (The latter is not to be confused with the aviation artist. What is it about aviation and multiple people named Taylor?)

EDIT (25-02-17): Added additional reference and renumbered references.

Last edited by Noha307 on Mon Feb 17, 2025 1:15 am, edited 1 time in total.

[Noha307]

The Winter 2024 edition of Air and Space Quarterly by the National Air and Space Museum has an article titled "Last Race at Reno" that briefly profiles a number of notable individuals involved in the National Air Races - and by extension warbirds.

Sam Graves, who serves Missouri's 6th congressional district in the United States House of Representatives, is described by one article as "aviation’s man in Washington" as he is chair of the United States House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure and, a pilot himself, is heavily focused on supporting general aviation. In and of itself, this would not necessarily be enough to merit a mention in this thread. However, he owns an AT-10 project and part owns both a BT-13 and T-6.[1] Furthermore, he sponsored legislation aimed at addressing the situation involving flight training in limited category aircraft.[2]

Doug Rozendaal, in his own words, has been "flying warbirds for almost 40 years" and is an active advocate for warbird safety, participating in multiple training sessions and ground schools. He profiled his path to flying warbirds, which began as a "freight dog" flying DC-3s in 1986, in an article.

John Lane, who was mentioned in a previous post, but never profiled, recently passed away according to another thread. Fortunately, it's not necessary to write such a profile, as one already exists as an article published by Airport Journals.

Lastly, mentioned in a previous post is Charles P. "Chuck" Doyle. Chuck is responsible for placing a number of important aircraft in the National Museum of the United States Air Force, including their A-36, Kittyhawk I and P-35.[3] Again, a new profile is unnecessary, as his life was covered in no less than four articles: an obituary from the family, another from the Minneapolis Star Tribune, a biographical sketch in The Aero Historian newsletter and an article by the Minnesota Flyer, which named him one of Minnesota's ten most significant aviators.

[Noha307]

Vintage Aviation News recently posted a pair of articles profiling or partially profiling Chuck Wahl, owner of Vulture’s Row Aviation (mentioned in a previous post), and Bernie Vasquez, pilot of the Dakota Air Museum.

Also, I realized that while the class of 2019 was mentioned in a previous post, the winners of NWOC's 2024 20 Under 40 award were never included. They are

• Keegan Chetwynd
• Bevan Dewes
• Garrett Fleishman
• Joe Greene
• Christopher Hicks
• Katrina Hodges
• Jennifer Kanakis
• Nick Kanakis
• Stephen Koewler
• Curt Lewis
• Lindy Linebaugh
• Ryan McNeill
• Zachary McNeil
• Josh Miller
• Andres Morales
• Job Savage
• Sean VanHatten
• Lain Wayman
• Savannah Weaver
• James Webb

[Noha307]

While it's somewhat light on biographical details, Vintage Aviation News has an article about Mike Potter's decision to step back from warbirds that is a good illustration of his impact.

Also, as mentioned in another thread, Scott Thompson has a page on his website dedicated to the people that worked for Tallmantz Aviation that may or may not be sufficiently notable for this list.

[Noha307]

Ted Inman, former director of IWM Duxford profiled his tenure at the museum in an article on Key.Aero.

Bernie Moreno of Vintage Aviation News interviewed a number of people at Oshkosh 2023 including Bernie Vasquez and Eric Trueblood.

[Noha307]

Ronald Lauder had a collection of at least five warbirds before they went up for sale in September 2024.[1]

Similarly, there were at least four fighters in Jack Croul's collection.[2]

Lastly, Michael A. Fopp was director of the Royal Air Force Museum for 22 years.