The Tin Goose Project

At the age of 16 I remember telling my parents that I wanted to build an airplane. I also saying I want my pilots license as well, so I can fly what I build. My parents response to that was, "you should save your money." Then a second response was, "It might be hard to get a license there is math involved and we know thats not your strong subject."

Eight years later if I told my parents that same thing there response would be completely different. After graduating high school I joined the Air Force, because I wanted to be around airplanes and serve my country. After basic training I ended up getting trained on being a fighter crew chief. My first assignment was overseas in Japan. About half way through my assignment I had recieved a letter from a friend of mine from back home. He was informing me that the local EAA chapter was going to be doing an aircraft build project.

The EAA chapter was chapter 1247 out of Port Clinton, Ohio. Being that the local airport that the chapter was based out of used to have flights to and from the islands of Lake Erie by Ford Tri-Motors they only saw it fair to name the chapter the "Tin Goose," chapter. When I had recieved the initial news of their project I was exstatic to take leave time to fly home to help build. Since the beginning of the project I have tried to make it over to the airport to assist with the build or at least see the progress.

Surprisingly in a couple of weeks my wife and I will be traveling back to our hometown before heading to my next assignment; which is taking me from Arizona back to Japan. It's funny looking back from when I was 16 wanting to work with planes and looking at what I do now. I've spent five years working on fighter aircraft, and at the same time taking college courses through Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University. It's amazing how my desire for aviation and many other factors have allowed me to accomplish so much. Maybe by the time we finish building the Tri-Motor I'll be the one flying it, you just never know.