| Wings ' n' Things/Aviation... column 314... August 9, 2004 by Judie Betz STILL IN LOVE WITH FLYING AFTER 70 YEARS How does it feel to be flying for 70 years? A good person to ask would be Leeward Air Ranch resident Bob Shambaugh. He started flying in 1934 when he was 16 years old and he's still at it! Born in 1917 Shambaugh says he's always had a love of aviation. As a teen-ager he worked as a line boy and flew with people whenever he could. He hung around the airport and worked without pay because of his love of aviation! This was at Sunny South Airport in Miami, which he described as "a big open grassy area. There were no runways, no hangars. Charlie Darnes and Rusty Herd taught me to fly. We'd fly into the wind. I could fly in an Aeronca C-2 for five minutes and still be over the airport!" Money was very tight in those days. Shambaugh took dual training in an Aeronca C-3 in 1936, soloing an Aeronca C-2 in two hours and 45 minutes. That's when it cost $6 an hour, wet, for the C-3 and $4.50 an hour for the C-2. It was also when he didn't want his shirt tail cut off in the traditional rite of passage when soloing "because it was my only shirt and I wanted to save it! I'd work for two weeks to earn the money to fly for 15 minutes." These were also the war years; by 1942 Shambaugh was at Keesler Field in Biloxi, MS teaching B-24 engine maintenance. "We'd do a four-week training program for 40 men, taking an engine completely apart and putting it all back together," he said. Because of a shortage of mechanics he was sent overseas, but managed a "delay in route" in 1945 to make a quick trip back to Miami to marry his sweetheart Margie. While finishing school, she waited anxiously for the war to end and Bob to come safely back home, but now she was waiting for him as her husband! Shambaugh was sent to New Guinea and the Philippines as an aerial engineer on C-46's and C-47's. One of his many wonderful stories involves an innovative repair he devised for a recurring plugged-up filter problem, a creative solution earning him official commendation. He frequently rode in the Air Corps planes, but not as a pilot. However, this changed when he was promoted to Line Chief. He became one of about 400 flying non-commissioned officers, because he was needed to ferry the big planes for maintenance. Thus he went from flying a diminutive C-2 to the behemoth C-47! He spent time in Japan, hauling supplies into Hiroshima, and was in Tokyo when peace was declared. After the war, the Shambaughs lived in Miami during a time when aviation was fun and growing. Famous names like aircraft designer Curtis Pitts and acrobatic champion Mary Gaffaney were among their circle of friends. Margie and Mary Gaffaney were long-time best friends. Bob wanted to get back into flying; this was at the time when Gaffaney was trying to get her aviation business going, but men were reluctant to train with a woman instructor. That posed no problem for Bob! Once he'd added to his flight training, he put his two aviation skills together and began acquiring a series of airplanes needing refurbishment. Margie's phrase was that "little junky airplanes started following him home!" First was a Taylorcraft, which he purchased for $125. "It was a wreck I found at Brown's Airport in South Miami," recalled Bob. "It had weeds growing through it." But he worked on it, even having neighborhood kids helping by sanding on it. Before long he flew it, and it flew beautifully. "I sold it for $ 1 200. 1 used $450 of that to buy an Aeronca Chief." That set the pattern of buying, rebuilding, selling, but always moving up the airplane ladder. The Chief was followed by a Piper Clipper, a Piper Tri-Pacer (Margie's favorite), a Cessna 140A and a Cessna 172. One Christmas Margie bought a set of plans from Curtis Pitts as a present for Bob. They were the third set of plans sold by Pitts; Bob turned them into an SI Pitts, N3S that he flew for many fun-filled years. Bi-planes attracted him; he built an Albee and flew it to Oshkosh. He sold it, but then started another. About that time the Shambaughs moved to Highlands, NC; the second Albee was started in Bob's shop in Highlands and completed at their next home, Leeward Air Ranch when they moved to Ocala in 1986. The little red bi-plane is still in the hangar. Since he has lived at Leeward Bob has built several planes. He and his friend and neighbor, John Bishop, built a third Albee, one for John to fly. Then he built a little yellow Cuby, followed by a major restoration of an Aero-Sport. These beauties went off to new homes, but last year he completed a beautiful rebuild of a Curtis Pusher and it's still with him. In fact, the Pusher and the Albee are hangar mates, and on a nice day one or the other can be seen overhead. Even after 70 years in the air Bob Shambaugh still gets a lot of pleasure out of flying! |