iamq

if you have to ask... you buy the drinks

berlinlake

There was a Turtle Club a few miles from where I grew up and the password there was exactly what is posted above in post #237 by Dom. I never knew it was anything related to "flyers." It was just a floating bar on the river flowing into Lake Erie. Long gone now.

SloJo

You bet your sweet *** I am

LouieM

.... so you're saying good ol' Dom was right ............

oldskydog

I worked construction in heavy equipment in high school and graduated in 1961 and went to college one semester then joined the U. S. Coast Guard .
I served for a year on a ship as a diesel mechanic then attended a service school and became an aircraft mechanic and flight crewmember. In 1965 I entered the Aviation Cadet program and attended Navy flight training earning my Commission and pilot wings at NAS Corpus Christi in 1967. I flew the HU-16 Albatross amphibian in the states and C-123 out of Guam. In 1970 I got out of the service and returned to college for my second semester freshman year. In 1971 you couldn't get a job washing airplanes much less flying them and $175 a month on the GI Bill wouldn't even keep me in beer so having realized my mistake I asked to be recalled to active duty and never looked back.
From 1971 until retirement in 1985 I served at numerous air stations from the Pacific and Southeast Asia to Texas, Alaska, Florida, and California flying the HC-130 and HU-25 aircraft and 3 years as a flight instructor in the T-28 aircraft with the Navy.
In 1985 I retired from the Coast Guard with the rank of Commander (LT COLONEL for you non-seagoing types) and went to work flying civilian C-130's for Transamerica Airlines. This job took me to such interesting places as Ethiopia, where I flew relief operations in the middle of the Communist government's war with the rebels who finally prevailed. I was furloughed from this job after sevenmonths and was unemployed for one year before being hired in 1986 as a pilot for America West Airlines flying 737's as a Captain since 1987. In 2003 I was forced to retire from my airline job by government imposed age discrimination. The FAA would not let airline pilots fly after they reach age 60. A few years after I retired they changed the mandatory retirement age to 65....too late. I am still flying and working as an aircraft mechanic on small aircreft and warbirds. I have been in love with the Corvette since the late fifties and have owned many over the years. I still have two 58's and a 63 SWC as well as other old Chevy 33 to 68 projects and Cushman motor scooters.

ztheusa

Corporate pilot

SloJo

Yes! I had a high school friend who spent 4 years in the Air Force and he belonged to the local VFW. I went
with him one night and I joined the TURTLES! They told me if anyone ever ask me if I was a TURTLE to tell
them "you bet your sweet *** I am"!

LouieM

TTT
This thread is too good to die, so I thought I'd resurrect it before the year is out. Thinking of taking flying lessons to more fully embrace the Old Vette lifestyle.

AZDoug

http://www.srtarms.com




Doug

dleibman

don’t understand flying and old Vette lifestyle, please explain 👍

jim lockwood

Have you ever looked at what the original NASA astronauts did for a living and what vehicles they generally preferred?

LouieM

Please search this thread for "flying" and "pilot" and see what comes up.

DomL64

I worked in the sign industry from 1974. I started at West Side Neon Sign Corp in the Bronx, NY. In 84, I started my own sign company, LetteraGraphics, renting space in the basement of the same building. West Side Neon was sold in 1988 to the biggest sign company in New York, Artkraft Strauss. In 91, my brother sold his computer company and became my partner. We Called it Lettera Signs, and took over the whole building. About 2009, our boom truck had an accident and the insurance tripled. We shut the Lettera Signs down and started Infinity Signs. That lasted till I left in 2017when I retired..... sort of. My brother bought another building in the Bronx, and now has an electric company.
We did the signs for Chemical Bank which merged with Manufacturers Hanover Bank and then bought Chase Bank, ( we did all their signs in the tai-state area ) We also did signs for Citibank, TD Bank, Madison Square Garden, Shea Stadium, Yankee Stadium, the USTA stadium in Queens.
When the ball drops tonight, I, and my company, made the 2021 numbers, which we have been making since 96.
I now drive for Lincoln in Stamford, CT.
Here is a picture of my crew in my old shop. I'm taking the picture. lol

Westy R

Well, that surprised me ... another Defense Mapping Agency alumnus on Corvette Forum!

I started at DMA Topographic Center in Bethesda, MD as a GS-2 "cartographic aide" in 1973, moved up to GS-5 "cartographic technician" in 1975, and made the jump to "Cartographer" in 1980 ... and I also made a boyhood dream come true when I learned I could join Andrews AFB Aero Club. (My first solo was October 4, 1980, and I got my Private Pilot license in June 1981.) My proud stories of it reached the ears of a guy in our Production Support Office, who one day called me in to the PSO to ask me if I could plot aero data for one of our Division's bread-and-butter projects, the 1:250,000-scale "Joint Operations Graphic" shared between the ground troops and their close air support. As a new pilot, I had learned to navigate, and understood the symbols -- and in pre-assignment training, I'd learned how to plot points by latitude/longitude; so I gave it "the old college try" -- and DMA Aeronautical Center, who had been plotting the air data for us, approved of my work. So when a JOG came in to our Branch for final review, one of my jobs was to update (and later on, when I got a small team to help me with this, to edit) the air data. I also busied myself with taking the jumbled notes from DMAAC and writing a clear Standard Operating Procedure for plotting aero data -- at home, on my Commodore 64 computer, because it "wasn't my job" but I wanted and needed it done!

In late 1997, I left my GS-12 Senior Cartographer (non-supervisory) place in the Production Branch, for a teaching position at Defense Mapping School in Fort Belvoir. They hired me to teach their Aeronautical Cartography course -- and I saw it desperately needed re-vamping, so I got straight to work on that. Somehow, this work started going home with me, because my office Macintosh lacked the graphics programs that I needed for that re-working ... but I had Corel Draw on my home PC, and a color printer that did a lot nicer job on my overhead-projector graphics than the black-and-white LaserJet in my office. I also was sent out to provide Mobile Training Team courses to other countries' mapping services, teaching them how to make aeronautical charts "the DMA/NIMA/NGA way." After a few years, the switch from hand-drafting to computer-drafting made my course obsolete, and I was moved to teach a series of photo-interpretation "for cartographers" courses elsewhere in the School -- oddly enough, this took me back to Bethesda, where I was the "chief tenant" of a classroom space in the building where I'd started my career.

Along in the course of things, "National Imagery & Mapping Agency" crossed further into the Intel Community, with the new name "National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency." More important for me, another "head-hunter," from the National Photographic Intelligence School (now married with Defense Mapping School), sat in on one of my PI courses -- and asked me to join him in their school facility, teaching imagery analysis of industries. So I moved to the NPIC, downtown, and worked with him until I'd learned how to teach all of his lessons, lectures and exercises ... then we moved the course down to Fort Belvoir, where it became the backbone of the Geospatial-Intelligence Training Program. Unfortunately, I fell afoul of some high-level office politics (way above my pay-grade) ... and although I wasn't actually burned in the affair, I decided that it was time for me to get out, as soon as I was eligible to retire. That was the first of the month after my 55th birthday -- and I turned in my badge January 2nd, 2009, after 36 years of Federal service.

I'd effectively left flying after the "office politics" incident --enough said. I got fascinated with sailing after a vacation to Uruguay in early 2007, and after a Small Boat Sailing course at Washington Sailing Marina, I found a 19-foot MacGregor trailer-sailor and kept it at Fort Belvoir Marina until I bought a bigger MacGregor in late 2008 -- my retirement toy. Moved up to a regular keelboat, a Bristol 29.9, in 2011 ... and now I've worn out my interest in sailing.

And here I am, ready to jump to the Next Big Thing -- shopping for my first Corvette!

Floridasky

I was an Air Traffic Controller from 1978 to 2013. Now I look after a private car collection here Fort Worth, Assistant Editor of a Studebaker magazine, do some detailing and having fun.

corvetteed

Okay, I didn't feel my "story" was interesting enough, and so I let it slide. But, since the good stories have been told, I'll give the abridged version of mine, keeping other's stories in mind as guidance.
Born and raised in Pittsburgh, PA (I'm surprised to see so many others on here were too).
Paper route starting at age 10; kept it till age 18.
Worked in a meat & dairy products store while in College (Isaly's)
USAF from '68 to '73 (pilot and aircraft maintenance officer ; left as a captain)
Grad school - Kent State University
34 years with Westinghouse Electric ending as Director, Compensation & Benefits
Retired for 12 years now, doing lots of charity work, and managing my investment properties (apartments)
Spending time w/the grandkids and driving the "old cars" ('64 Vette, '56 Ford, '51 Dodge pickup)
Life is good.

JohnZ

Oops! With all the other stuff I was involved with, I forgot my civilian flying after I left active duty; I got my Type Rating in a Lear 23, and logged about 600 hours in a Mitsubishi MU-2K in the 70's-80's owned by our family aviation insurance business.

LouieM

And the list of pilots keeps growing and growing ..............

JF in MI

Yup

Cruzmeisters

Was also "born/raised in Pgh."; ISALY's Dairy age 15 -18, then Westinghouse R&D Center for 39 years until retiring in 1994. Spending time playing with the '62 Vette (since 1967) and original-owner '96 IMPALA SS in avatar plus '57 Lincoln Landau 4-door hardtop and '50 OLDS "88" with "factory to dealer use only" plexiglas hood.