This here's a real prize: a Curtiss "Jenny" that although hobbled together from several airplanes, is pretty much all original. Cole Palen first bought 19 pieces of a Jenny in 1957, then ten years later, when he'd found everything else, including a rare Hispano-Suiza Model E engine, he put it all together. She flew regularly from '69 to '98, then was re-restored and put back into service in '01. She's now sporting US Navy trainer colors, and looking just wonderful.
Obviously a new take on an old idea: a very basic, easily-calibrated, reliable airspeed indicator. Though of course in a Jenny you need only listen to the wind in the wires...
There's a part of the scripted Sunday show that involves the kidnapping of a young lady; here she is being hauled aloft by the JN-4.
Quite a grip she's got- but it doesn't look good...
D'Oh!! She takes a mighty tumble (shades of "Waldo Pepper")... but it's OK, kids; the dummy falls behind a bush, and "Polly Pureheart", or "Trudy Truelove," or whatever her name is, emerges unscathed from the foliage to tremendous applause. This is just the kind of stuff that surplus Jennies were used for after WWI... but all too often it was a real lady on the wing...ulp.
Behold... the only "Hisso"-powered Jenny still flying in the whole wide world!! Gives me goosebumps...
So trustworthy, so predictable, so pretty. And that old "Hisso" engine sounds heavenly purring at idle as the pilot brings her in for a nice landing, with gentle bumping of tires then the unmistakable sound of a tailskid digging into turf. They really know how to erase the years here at Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome...
Well, that's all for tonight- more to come...
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