crowd funding a train restoration

In 1903 the North Eastern Railway developed a train that challenged steam, and is the forerunner of modern trains.They are engineering to make it environmentally friendly in terms of economy, emissions and noise thanks to a new Cummins engine that has been adapted to run the old motors.

 Called the ‘autocar’ it was powered by a petrol engine supplying electricity to electric motors. In 1930 it was withdrawn from service and the body became a holiday home in Yorkshire. Rescued ten years ago, restoration is well underway thanks to the support of Heritage Lottery Fund and other grants.

Found on http://www.electricautocar.co.uk/  and  http://www.getnews.info/turn-of-century-british-traincar-to-roll-again-with-help-from-crowdsourced-funding_6170.html

Johnson's Flying Service (if you've watched Planes 2, you might like to read this) invented the Smoke Jumpers in 1940

photo by Michael Gallacher of the Missoulian newspaper http://missoulian.com/news/local/wwii-era-bomber-retrofitted-for-firefighting-lands-at-missoula-museum/article_d0b607da-f3c0-11e0-8c43-001cc4c002e0.html

The proud museum's newest addition, a retrofitted, single-engine World War II torpedo bomber, is one that pilots flew and mechanics got in the air and kept there for Johnson Flying Service in the 1960s and '70s.

 The  aircraft that was one of six Grumman TBM Avengers closed out of the Missoula-based flying service in 1974 and sold to Forest Protection Limited in New Brunswick, and spent most of the last four decades spraying Canadian forests for bugs and dropping retardant on forest fires. A-13 first came to Johnson's in 1964 as a replacement slurry bomber http://missoulian.com/news/local/wwii-era-bomber-retrofitted-for-firefighting-lands-at-missoula-museum/article_d0b607da-f3c0-11e0-8c43-001cc4c002e0.html

in the movies Planes and Planes 2, Skipper is a Corsair... not an Avenger, but similar in that they were both warbirds... and I find it cool that they used Avengers as fire patrol airplanes



1917 - At the age of 24, Missoula resident Bob Johnson enlists in the army and is sent to Camp Lewis, Washington. Johnson is discharged less than a year later. Johnson goes into business for himself, opening an automotive service station

1920's 1923 - Missoula’s first landing strip is laid out in May. The field is located near the base of Mount Sentinel, roughly between what is now the University of Montana and South Avenue 1926 - Bob Johnson purchases a Swallow bi-plane for $2500 and continues his flying lessons with instructor Nick Mamer, believed to be the first pilot to ever fly over Glacier National Park. Bob Johnson decides to start Johnson Flying Service to teach others how to fly

 1927 - Bob Johnson, in an interview with a University of Montana journalism student, says he believes airplanes will eventually make regular stops in Missoula. Decades later, that same journalism student, who thought Johnson was crazy for making such an incredible statement, would eventually fly out of Missoula International Airport aboard a large passenger airliner; a group of men meet at the Palace Hotel to discuss Missoula's future in aviation. Missoula, it was felt, needed an airport to succeed. City businessman Harry O. Bell was elected president of the Missoula chapter of the National Aeronautic Association. Their first act was to secure an airmail route to Butte and Salt Lake City; Walter Beck secures a 60-day option on eighty acres of land just east of the Missoula County Fairgrounds. The County officially purchases the 80 acres of land, as well as an adjacent strip to construct an east-west runway. Total cost was $5000. A northwest-southeast runway was later built.

1934 - Northwest Airways inaugurates regular mail and passenger service to Missoula at the Garden City Airport

1938 - President Roosevelt authorizes W.P.A. funds for the construction of Missoula’s third airport. The Missoula County Airport Board purchases 1300 acres of land seven miles west of Missoula adjacent to Highway 10 West as the site for a new airport. Since the Forest Service needed access to an airport, and Missoula County needed heavy equipment to build the new airport, a deal was struck between the two parties. The airport board gave the Forest Service a perpetual easement at the airport site, while the Forest Service granted the use of their equipment for construction. The agreement eventually led to Missoula becoming a major center for aerial firefighting and research. The new airport would feature four runways each a mile or more in length, capable of accommodating any airplane in service at the time. Total estimated cost, including the land, for the new Missoula County Airport: $1.5-$2 million

1940 - July 12, Rufus Robinson and Earl Cooley become the first firefighters to parachute from a Johnson Flying Service airplane to extinguish a fire in the Pacific Northwest Region. On that day, the legendary Smokejumper program was born

1952 - Congress authorizes $700,000 to construct a new aerial fire depot west of Missoula near the new airport; Red Skies of Montana is released in theaters. The film portrays the dangerous lives of Smokejumpers who battle fires in the Pacific Northwest by parachuting into the flames below

1980 - Bob Johnson passes away. "When Bob Johnson was just getting started flying in 1923, aviation and airplanes were considered absolutely a thing for fools, daredevils and irresponsible playboys," said aviation historian Steve Smith of Missoula, whose book Fly the Biggest Piece Back chronicles the history of Johnson Flying Service. Johnson had accumulated over 17,000 hours during his flying career

Info from http://www.flymissoula.com/About_Us/Airport_History

A good thing to read is "What it means to be a Smoke Jumper" from the only survivor of the 1949 disaster. http://www.nifc.gov/safety/mann_gulch/memorial/documents/What_it_Means_to_be_a_Smokejumper_by_Robert_Sallee_1993.pdf

One of the first aerial fire patrol pilots in the northwest was Nick Mamer, a legendary pilot, who had served with the U.S. Air Service during WW I, and later settled in Spokane, establishing the Mamer Flying Service. He taught Bob Johnson of the Johnson Flying Service of Missoula how to fly.

During the time that he flew aerial fire patrols he never experienced a forced landing.  During the period 1925-1935 Forest Inspector Howard R. Flint and Nick Mamer were inseparably connected with the pioneering of aerial activities in the Northern Rocky Mountain Region. Then while flying as a chief pilot for Northwest Airlines on a Lockheed Super Electra during a flight from Seattle to Minneapolis, parts of the tail section were torn from the aircraft about 15 miles northeast of Bozeman, Montana and the plane went into a dive.

Mamer, the copilot and eight passengers died instantly. Later, an investigation revealed that the tail structure had failed on the new design from what is known as "natural resonance, or period of vibration". So ended the life of one of the very first aerial fire patrol pilots in the northwest, a pilot who at one time was known as "Mr. Spokane Aviation".  http://www.fs.fed.us/fire/people/smokejumpers/missoula/History/General/

Maiden Detroit... clever name, with an interesting and notable story

See, they were racing boats before they were making airplanes, and with the customary way of calling ships and planes in the female vernacular, but having to come up with a new way of doing that since Gar Wood had already named his racing boat Miss Detroit, it was only possible to call the Stout Metal Aeroplane Co airplane with a Liberty Engine airplanes "Maiden" as it was a clever pun for the city it was manufactured in as well as a female term.

Photo and info from http://home.earthlink.net/~ralphcooper/pimagb17.htm

A good story about the pioneers of airplanes involving the Maiden Detroit:
 It was a great day when we first took the plane out to Selfridge for its trial flights. The new field al Ford's was not ready yet. It was early spring and ice was still on the lake. Walter Lees was the test pilot. He took off against a light wind and headed out across the lake. Then, something happened. A couple of dips and down he came, landing on the ice which was fortunately thick enough to hold.
     It took us ten minutes to run out to where the ship stood on the ice and find what was the matter. Walter was furious.
     The windshield had blown in against his control wheel and he had to push the celluloid back in place with his foot before he could free the controls to land. Windshields, from then on, were made much stronger.
     A few days later he took off again---this time over land.
     Frost in the carburetor brought him down once more---in a swamp! All was safe, but the ship had to be taken apart to get it out on dry land again.

Ford later bought the Stout Metal Aeroplane company, and evolved the above into Tri Motor airplanes  http://www.nifc.gov/safety/mann_gulch/organization/equipment/docs/Evergreen_Ford_Tri_Motor_%20Aircraft_and_Crew_Information.pdf

Johnson's Ranch and trading post on the Rio Grande, from 1929 to 1940, also had a small landing strip

The Johnson Ranch airfield was the first permanent installation by the Air Corps in the lower Big Bend. It was distinct from other airfields in the area in that it was neither an auxiliary nor emergency field. It was established solely due to its strategic location, where combat troops and aircraft could be deployed in case of a border emergency. It was also unique in that the ranch house became the airfield headquarters, and Elmo Johnson—with neither rank or authority—provided a quaint civilian dominance over the field's operations.

The closure of the Johnson's Ranch airfield ended an era of military aviation. The era of the members of the “order of the white scarf”—those who built America’s aerial armada, trained the pilots, and led them to victory in World War II—was forever past. The jet age Air Force that followed bore scant resemblance to the Army Air Corps that established Johnson's Ranch.

photo and info from http://www.nps.gov/bibe/historyculture/johnsonsranch.htm

the airplane is a DeHaviland, and was the first to land at the Johnson's

the beautiful art in the Studebaker brochure

Found on http://aacalibrary.tumblr.com/

World War 1 equipment on public roads... nearly 100 years ago, this was the way most equipment was moved, slowly

Post by Vince Young.

Skip the first 45 seconds

Evolution of the bicycle

A 1 min animation of the bicycle's evolution, all the way from the wooden horse to the modern racer. The video was made in combination with an application to the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, 2013. Animation : Thallis Vestergaard Music : Flying Home by The Benny Goodman Sextet

The bicycle has changed a lot from its beginnings in Germany as a pedal-free "dandy horse," which is basically just a plank of wood with two wheels (you move by running along like a Flintstones car). The animation shows the two-wheeled vehicle's design from the dandy horse as it gains pedals and gears, as the wheels change sizes (with a brief stop at the penny-farthing, the ultimate in absurd modes of transport), and finally to our modern road bike.

Found on http://www.fastcodesign.com/3028191/a-visual-history-of-the-bicycle

not only was 1906 a year of a lot of transportation killings, but there was a lot of ways to get from A to B

The point of this illustration must be that cars are safer.

Found on https://www.facebook.com/92272678293/photos/a.111905863293.121151.92272678293/10153065890218294/?type=1

the variety of ways a Harley with a sidecar were used

Above says Ben Walker and the City Bloodhounds, Fort Smith Arkansas

All found on http://harleydavidsonfactoryphotos.tumblr.com/

the Baby Vanderbilt Cup racer with an Indian motorcycle engine at the Dan Rouit Flat Track museum

Found on https://www.facebook.com/marc.tudeau

"old 79" is a "Dain" John Deere (1918) found in Minnesota, the owners weren't aware of it's historic significance

Images found on http://forums.yesterdaystractors.com/viewtopic.php?t=851953

The Dain, which pre-dates John Deere’s first 2-cylinder tractor (the 1923 Model D), was put on permanent display at the John Deere Collectors Center in Moline, Ill., March 13, 2004.

Joseph Dain – a company vice president, board member and head of the patent and experimental department – began work on an “efficient, small-plow tractor” in 1914. Building on the failed attempt by C.H. Melvin, and later Max Slovsky, to develop a 3-bottom motor plow a few years before, Dain set to work on his own model.

Unfortunately, Dain died of pneumonia on Halloween 1917 after spending a wet, cold week field-testing the tractor, just before the Dain’s production began. Even as the first 100 Dain tractors were built, Deere Co. bought the Waterloo Gasoline Engine Co., which manufactured both stationary engines and tractors. Deere  Co. suddenly had no reason to continue developing the Dain, and quickly fell in love with the Waterloo Boy kerosene-burning tractor, which was more affordable, equally advanced and already successfully in production.

The Dain was well-advanced, sporting features that John Deere tractors didn’t utilize until the 1960s and some not even until the 1980s. Many of those features include a gear-driven water pump, key ignition, on-the-go shifting, shiftless speed changing and positive traction. These features, however, made the Dain too expensive for most farmers to afford its $1,500 price tag.

This particular Dain tractor’s history started like any other. Emil Obitz of Stockton, Minn., bought the tractor from a John Deere dealer in Winona, Minn., in 1918. He used it for about a decade until he traded it for a Model D in 1928. The receiving dealership’s owner, in turn, loaned the Dain to his brother, who used it for a year then parked it in the trees because of an engine malfunction.

In 1930, Morris and Erwin Timm, who lived in rural Minnesota, purchased the Dain. The Timms bought it for the tractor’s chains, with which they wanted to repair a feed mill. Evidently, the brothers never got around to using the chains, and the Dain languished outdoors until 1962 when Frank Hansen purchased it for $1,000.

Hansen had known about the tractor’s whereabouts as a boy, and after he returned from military service, he researched and confirmed the special nature of the Dain. Hansen then restored the neglected Dain tractor from pure rust and displayed it at antique tractor shows until he died about a year ago.

text from  http://www.farmcollector.com/company-history/slipping-through-the-cracks-of-history.aspx#axzz37kDHjYwx

The John Deere company has an event every even numbered year in Moline, called the Gathering of the Green

Jeep family tree

Found on http://unibodyfoldsinhalf.tumblr.com/

book review, The Arsenal Of Democracy by A J Baime

In a word, terrific.

291 pages, 21 photos, and took about 8 hours to read

the story of Edsel Ford is the thread wound through this incredibly deep thoroughly researched history of how the Ford motor company began and was a success in the assembly line method of building cars even in the depression, and then when Hitler attacked other countries for conquest, and England implored the US for military assistance, events progressed to where President Roosevelt changed the course of American history from it's trend to neutrality and drawing down it's military to less than that of an ability to defend itself from hostile military takeover (Germany and Hitler) because of it's safe zones of the oceans to either side, and friendly neighbors to the North and South.

The sheer amount of history I learned from reading about the military status of the USA in the late 1930s was shocking. You'll probably find that to be true for you as well, as the high school history education in the 1980s I had in Michigan was useless in most aspects, and certainly about the years and events between the great depression and the onset of the USA's involvement in WW2. You might like reading this book just for that. But that is only a couple chapters.

You might value it for the extraordinary education about Henry, Edsel, Henry II and the way that family operated the Ford Motor Company before WW2, and how Edsel as president of the company had to fight his dad Henry, who never did loose the reins of the business, who was a pacifist and didn't want the company to make machines for war to kill an army that wasn't attacking the USA.

You'll likely never before have considered how the Ford family had to deal with their factories in Germany, France, etc that they had friends and business colleagues managing, were getting into a no win situation in enemy territory, and forced to build and sell Ford trucks and vehicles to the Nazi army, and communicating with those managers now making producing for, and collaborating with the Nazis.

Once the determination was made to stop making cars, and shift into production of B24s, they had to create an assembly line production for making airplanes... and no one was doing that. B24s were being made individually, and not very well... and for those of you that have ever worked in a factory, with engineering drawings, you will probably grasp the difficulty of starting to build a 4 engine bomber. I believe the book said the number of drawings for individual parts, and some of you will know that you have to make every single nut, bolt, rivet, and washer to the drawing spec, and the number of drawings was something like 5.9 million individual drawings. That's just for one plane.

The plant to make the bombers, Willow Run, was so enormous, it took 156000 lights in the ceiling to make it lit well enough to work, and keep in mind it was a dark out building so it wouldn't be seen at night in case of a bombing run by the Nazis. No windows. There are a couple chapters on how they had to design the factory to make so many different machines, foundry processes for a half dozen metals, chemical processes to treat the metals, x ray machines to check for bad forgings and castings, and the list just keeps growing of all the many things under that one roof it took to make the B24s. It's fascinating. And that's just the machinery, consider the people, the workers, and all the variety of things to make it a place that thousands of people could work together. Hospital beds, nurses, doctors and operating rooms for the workers injured on the job. Cafeterias for eating, bathrooms, break rooms, and all the rest. Training rooms for riverters, welders, mechanics, and the other specialist jobs.

Throughout the book are stats, facts and figures that I just found incredible, but a couple in particular are amazing. Like the way the author explained the interior size of Willow Run to be so large, every major league baseball team could have played 8 games simultaneously, with a crowd of 30,000 spectators for each game, and there would still be enough room left over for a football stadium and another 30,000 spectators. Ponder that.

The book is the best education you'll probably get on what it took to win the war from the standpoint of raw materials made into war machines. Of all the nations iron, 1/2 went to Detroit, as well as 3/4s of the plate glass, the leather, rubber, etc etc

A chapter or two go into the difficult problems they had with hiring thousands of people and not having anywhere to house them. Tent cities with no water, laundry, showers, or sewage systems. Once getting people to Detroit, training them and then little by little finding them leaving due to being drafted, injured, or moving on, they had to search farther out for workers, and went through the south on hiring trips to keep up the number of workers. It was the twelfth year of the great depression and 17 million people left home to find work in a war factory int he first half of the 40's, and Detroit grew to be the 4th largest city in the USA. The book also goes into the race riots, brought on by the racist southerners, the strikers, and the antagonists that wanted it all to fail. Ever hear about the Battle of the Overpass? You're going to get an astonishing amount of history in this book.

You'll be amazed at the pivotal moments that the Henry and Edsels wife made in keeping Henry in check. Blown away. You're likely already aware that Henry Ford is credited by most of  history as having changed the world. He was stubborn enough to accomplish about anything, and there were times when he had to have his mind changed about a couple of things. I'll leave it a mystery you can get to when you read the book.

Throughout the book the author has brilliantly placed excerpts or condensed versions of the diaries of people that kept a journal of their arrival at the factory, how they coped with the complete change of civilization, from normal life to ration stamps for food and gas.

It's one of the most amazing books I've read.... and you regular readers probably recall the other book reviews I've done, and you have no idea how many books I've read... before becoming a blogger I was an avid reader.

You can read a far briefer review at http://travelforaircraft.wordpress.com/2014/07/07/the-arsenal-of-democracy-write/ though it seems far more professional than my own way of writing and describing the book.

http://www.amazon.com/Arsenal-Democracy-Detroit-Quest-America/dp/0547719280/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1404917634&sr=1-1&keywords=arsenal+of+democracy

National Historic Vehicle Registry

The first was the 1964 Shelby Daytona Coupe, specifically CSX 2287 which won the FIA championship for Shelby / American racing team for the first time.

The Meyers Manx  prototype, 1964

And the 1938 Maserati 8CTF Boyle Special that won Indy in 1939 and 1940

the short list of cars on the list to be next include the 1907 Thomas Flyer that won the 1908 New York to Paris race, a 1919 Pierce Arrow owned by President Wilson, and a 1952 Hudson Hornet

https://www.historicvehicle.org/nationalregister

Draft Criteria for Historic Significance
Criterion A: Associative Value – Event
A vehicle associated with an event or events that are important in automotive or American history.
 1903 Packard “Old Pacific” – early transcontinental traveler
 1953 Ferrari 375 MM – President’s Cup winner Andrews AFB race

Criterion B: Associative Value – Person
A vehicle associated with the lives of significant persons in automotive or American history.
 1932 Duesenberg SJ – Fred Duesenberg’s personal car
1909 White Steam Car – first US Presidential automobile

Criterion C: Design or Construction Value
 A vehicle that is distinctive based on design, engineering, craftsmanship or aesthetic value.
 1948 Tucker (design/engineering)
1925 Doble (engineering – steam)

Criterion D: Informational Value
 A vehicle of a particular type that was the first or last produced, has an element of rarity as a survivor of its type, or is among the most well-preserved or thoughtfully restored surviving examples. 1953 Corvette EX122 (prototype)
1899 Packard (first Packard built)

Cunningham 1950 LeMans entry, a series 61 Cadillac

obviously an odd choice for a sports car race, but the only way to get the choice Cadillac engine for racing in Le Mans where they weren't allowing a mix of engines from Cadillac and cars from Ford.

Averaging only 8 miles an hour slower than the winner, and placing 10th, it was a surprise to everyone I believe

Info and photo from http://revsinstitute.org/the-collection/1950-cadillac-series-61/

1939 hot rod racer of Briggs Cunningham, the Bu Merc

irritated that so many cars in the ARCA (Auto Racing Club of Amercia) were not American, Briggs Cunningham assembled a 1939 Buick chassis under a SSK Mercedes body, with the help of a Indy 500 Buick racer.

IT was ready in time for the last race at the New York World's Fair, in October of 1940, but due to brake fade, ran into a lamp post. Then racing was cancelled until after WW2, and when in 1948 racing resumed at Watkins Glen, with the SCCA, the car was improved to mods suggested by Buick's VP of engineering. It placed 2nd behind an Alfa... and seems to have triggered Cunningham to make his own sports cars.

Photos and info found on http://revsinstitute.org/the-collection/1939-bu-merc/ the Rev's Institute which seems to be the car collection of the Collier brothers ( Miles and Sam) who were drivers for and friends of Briggs in his Le Mans and SCCA racing. They are also the sons of the founder of Collier County Florida.

colorized 100 year old photos.. I love it

The top image is one in a book of colorized civil war era photos, very easily seen in Time Lightbox at http://lightbox.time.com/2012/10/25/a-vibrant-past-colorizing-the-archives-of-history/#1 and complimented and featured on Time magazine online, or see a couple stills (remarkable!) at http://www.redbubble.com/people/sannadullaway

wow, those drive wheels

Camden et Amboy railways, 1850

Found on https://www.facebook.com/groups/yachtclubdesavionsdelaroute/?fref=nf

That's a Crampton locomotive...the idea was to put the drive wheels behind the firebox so the builder could use larger wheels, and lower the center of gravity. (thanks to Jeff F)

John Deere Farmers Pocket Companion, 1904, bought at an estate sale

Found on https://www.facebook.com/kegan.ousley?fref=nf

the 1935 Riley Ford dirt track champ race car... the Red Lion Special #16