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Hi Jim, You have hit the nail on the head, young people (most people for that mater) are not welcome at airports, we have big fences with mean signs that say if you do not belong hear we will put you in jail. When we were younger you could ride your bike to the airport and just wander around until you found an open hangar with some great airplane in it (it did not mater what kind it was) and someone working on it. We would say hello and if at all encouraged (most of the time we were) we would be allowed to look it over and talk to the person with it who would tell us about the plane and about how much fun flying was. Like you we washed aircraft helped in any way we were permitted, we were line boys (in college I had a line boy job where I made minimum wage and had to put half of it towards flying and I loved it). This is for the most part gone now, we have (when we have them at all) self service pumps. FBO's do not want to see anything less than a Lear Jet or students with cash. We need to put the fun back into light aircraft. In the 70's I lived and worked in N.Y. and spent most summer weekends at a very nice glider field about 90 miles north west called Wurtsboro. It was very special because it provided great flying and most important it had a very fine social club that had a fine enclosed barbecue facility and we did great steak dinners every Saturday night as a team effort. There was a beer refrigerator and we rented cabins across the street for only $ 400 per person per year. You did not have to fly to have fun. Kids and wives had a place to go to have some fun together during the day while we flew our gliders. We need to make flying fun for everyone or only us old fools will continue to do it. Have a good day. Best regards, Vern ----[Please read http://ercoupers.com/disclaimer.htm before following any advice in this forum.]---- Wow! What an interesting series of discussions and food for thought on why young people don't fly! I was first exposed to airplanes at the tender age of 11 when I started washing them for two bucks a pop at Morgantown, WV's airport (now Hart Field). There is a key to this discussion in what I just wrote: I was 11 and I was allowed to hang around the airport and do pickup jobs that allowed me to get to know the surface of an airplane as intimately as possible for someone that age. Can you do that now? Many medium to large airports today are shut off to young people who want to learn. Unless you come with cash in hand, you are not going to get close to something that makes your eyes sparkle and heart beat faster. We keep our airplanes tucked back in their hangars, out of touch and out of sight. Maybe we need to "advertise" more. I've lamented this change for years..it's tragic that a kid can't get close. Of course, it may be that things have changed a lot in other ways: many of us "old farts" came from the WW2 period, which had airplanes with propellers. Big, muscular machines that smelled like oil and gasoline. Think of the contrast offered by today's corporate aircraft..the kind we see most on the flight line. Sleek, horribly expensive, businesslike, inaccessible to all but the rich..and frankly, dull. When flight is common, what's the attraction? Not to put too fine a point on it, but our kind of airplanes are the attraction, Ercoupes or Cessnas or whatnot. What we have to do is find a way to make them accessible..and in this day of supersecurity, that's a real trick. Jeez, it sounds like I wrote an editorial. Sorry about that. But let's talk about this a lot more. Jim Jim Slade 1 304 292 2466 1 304 685 9386 (Cell) [EMAIL PROTECTED] ========================================================================== ==== To leave this forum go to: http://ercoupers.com/lists.htm Search the archives on http://escribe.com/aviation/coupers/ ========================================================================== ==== To leave this forum go to: http://ercoupers.com/lists.htm Search the archives on http://escribe.com/aviation/coupers/
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