My Grandad, CJ "Shank" Shanklin before his retirement flight in 1981. He turned 90 today and has the distinction of being the oldest Texas International Airlines pilot still living.
For my Grandad’s 90th birthday we went out for BBQ and a museum outing with my mother’s family here in Dallas. The Frontiers of Flight Museum is located on Love Field and has a fantastic amount of Texas-centric aviation stuff. The Braniff exhibit is awesome and is THE definitive collection on the planet. Texas International, Muse Air and Southwest are represented as well but the Braniff memorabilia steals the show. The BI 747 SP pictured above piqued my interest as a future depron project for sure!
My Grandad,"Shank", Mom, and myself posing in front of the BI Concorde model. Just slightly larger than the RC Braniff Concorde I built last year.
Give my congratulations to your Grandad. Happy 90th! (And yes, I would LOVE to see a BI 47 project!) I see you’ve never done a 47 before (or I haven’t found it yet.) The 47 has always been my favorite transport category aircraft. A historic and storied aircraft worthy of your skills as a modeler and pilot. I would love to see the sky’s over aeromodeling fields filled with 747’s! Build it! Two ducted fans at #2 and #3 should be enough and placing them there will make the electrical a breeze, eh? You’ll have to work out the thrust reversing on your own, but after seeing the wicked brilliant thrust reverser’s you put on your 9 (717) I have complete faith that you’ll succeed. Excellent, Mike. Well done…
Congrats to you guys. What a great opportunity for a 90th birthday. I like the retirement -9 cockpit pic with your grandfather, a real classic!