jlkonn

My Feedback: (1)

Does anyone remember when Cox had control line demonstrations at Disneyland.
It was back in the 1950's and was near the white space rocket that had TWA on it.
Did anyone get to be picked from the audience to fly?
JLK

gcb

I did not get picked in 1961, perhaps because I was a young sailor just out of boot camp.

George

Merco 35

Hello all.
Please check the final picture in the article, I believe you refered to this.
http://www.mh-aerotools.de/airfoils/...erformance.pdf
Nice age, I think.
Regards from Spain.
Manuel.

jlkonn

My Feedback: (1)

That's it...
TWA "spaceship" in the background and everything.
Around 1960 my family went from Ohio.
I was 9 and got picked out of the spectators to fly!
Somewhere at my parents there is some 8mm film of it!
JLK

Sport_Pilot

What? Nobody complained of noise?

build light

Somewhere at my parents there is some 8mm film of it!
JLK

Oh! you must get that converted to a mpeg and post it!!!!!

Robert

Lou Crane

JLK,

A fellow Cholla Choppers club member, Bart Klapinski, used to work at Disneyland doing the CL flying. Could have been as long ago as when you were there...

Heckuva job, no? Getting paid to fly CL...?

injunnut1

Hey, That's too cool JKL! Do you remember which plane you flew, was it the brown P-40 by chance? And did you get in an entire flight with-out crashing?

Donald Garry
__________________________________________________ __________________________

jlkonn

My Feedback: (1)

You know I don't remember but if I ever dig out the old 8mm I am sure I'd be able to ID it.
It was all kind of a blur...
It happened very fast.
I had the feeling the Cox guy that was with me was very good.
I don't think I did more than a few laps...they had to maintain spectator interest.
I remember one of them flying two models at the same time with two handles.
I also remember from a practical standpoint they didn't have to wait for the fuel to run out to end a flight.
They had a pool...seemed like it was sidewalk width and a small segment of the circle.
They would fly them in to the water...not really crash...to end a flight and start another part of the show.
All this is making me curious...
About the line length, etc...
My Dad flew control line in the '50s.
He was most active when I was still too young.
He flew the ignition .60s on planes he and a loose group of guys scratch built.
I still have some of the engines.
Later when I was probably 10 or so he bought a Cox Civil Air Patrol Piper Cub for me to fly.
I couldn't do it...
Just didn't have the knack for it.
He later started a scratch built plane for me but we never finished it.
His job transferred him to Europe and with the family move that ended my model flying days until I was in my early 30's and started flying RC.
Coincidentally my "home hobby shop" in Texas where I started RC is run by Don Stills...multiple control line aerobatics champion back in the '50s...about the time I was at Disneyland!
That's probably more than you wanted to know!

JLK

Merco 35

Nice memories!!!!!!!!!

FreeFlier

There's a full color shot of the Disney circle on the September, 1956 cover of Flying Models magazine; that cover has been one of my favorites. There's also a smaller shot of a youngster launching a Guillow's Reactor, a model I was flying at the time.

Memories.

Stew

SDM

My Feedback: (9)

I was there for one of the demos but didn't get to fly. Seems like they flew a P 40 and something else but I can't remember what it was. I do remember them landing into the drink however. That was a pretty cool thing that probably got me interested in planes but it is too long ago....
Sam

Randy W.

Hard to believe, but Wen Mac was the first to fly at Disneyland! My old boss in Customer Service when I worked at Cox was Don Hatcher. He was the one that flew 2 models at once! Later he flew 3, holding a handle in his teeth. A closer look at the 1956 FM cover reveils a track for the Shrike car and a circular pond for the Water Wizard boat.
Don worked for Wen Mac and when Cox took over, LeRoy Cox himself interviewed him then took him for a ride in his full size Shinn lightplane!

Those were glorious days. Noise was never a problem. Kids could own and fly models with gas engines and fast turning props! Lawn darts, cap guns and bows and arrows were common. Now we have video games and Sponge Bob!

jlkonn

My Feedback: (1)

My mother passed away last Sunday.
All the family together at her home for the funeral.
I was in charge of the 8mm home movies we showed the evening of her funeral.
All from the '50s...all for the benefit of her kids and grand kids that were assembled.
I found the reel from Disneyland.
I could not make out the model I flew other than it was low wing.
The gentleman in the circle with me let me fly for much longer than I remember.
He was crouched down out of the way and let me "solo".
Was fun to watch again after all these years.
JLK

Wild Foamy

ah fond memories eh?...

Too bad Health and Safety has shut all that down now, i was too young to witness the flying at Disneyland

Ghostship

wow what a great thread. I never made it to disney when I was a kid but I did have a cox P40 warhawk. I can remember my father starting it at the kitchen table (he did everything at that table) then he would take it outside so I could try to fly it. I would plant the cone in the dirt before I made it ounce around. I'm trying my hand at helicopters now but I would like to find a old p40 for my collection.

CoxPilot

Hey Randy,
I'm a new member, and all because of you mentioning Don Hatcher. I worked for Don and Keith Palmer (for Cox) at Disneyland, along with Bart Klapinski, George Molitor, and seveal others I can't remember.
The plane that was used for the student pilots was the PT-19 Trainer. We gave a show every hour on the half hour, ten times a day. No breaks, no lunch, just a half hour between shows to do what we wanted.
The show consisted of the following, in this order: the Little Stinker, Curtis Pusher, Piper Comanche (very short steel lines, and needle valve set to full-rich to keep the speed down) 2 Prop Rods and 2 W-196 Mercades cars and 2 Water Wizards all at the same time, the "guest pilot" with PT-19, dog fights with super cubs (two pilots and paper streamers, and finally the P-40's. Don didn't fly in my day (1959 to 1966), he did the anouncing. Kieth Palmer would fly 3, and when not around we would fly 2. Count them; 15 engines all in 30 minutes of show. What other engine would start that fast.
The trick was to leave the needle valve at full speed setting, and spray the exhaust port with a fuel bulb until it was hot and running at full speed. No adjustments, just whack the prop, spray a couple of times, and let go. When starting the P-40's at the end, we would be sure to top off the fuel while running, starting from the back plane (count 5), and then to the middle, (count 5) and then the front. That way the real plane would run out first and could be landed first.
Sometimes we would see the engine was running in reverse, and let go. It always got a big laugh. One time the Comanche lines broke, went over the fence, did a purfect half-role, and crashed into the Monsanto display on the otherside of Tomarrowland.
I lost track of all the people I knew then. I think Bart is in Placentia, CA; Keith is in Chicago, but Dale Kern is still around and has a web site. ( http://kirn.hypermart.net/ )
I finally ended up working in the plant on Warner in Santa Ana, for the Art Dept., until the whole place went belly-up.

I'll be interested if anyone comes up with film from the time. I have very little pictures myself, and would love to see some. I do have a pic of the Circle, and I'll bet that's either Don, Keith or myself in the photo, just before the first show of the day. (You can tell by the shadows of the time, and only one person in the Circle.)

Lee H.

CoxPilot

Photo of the old Cox ThimbleDrome. The big building behind is Monsanto.

http://davelandweb.com/tomorrowland/...s_KT_TLand.jpg

injunnut1

Here is the cover photo from 'Flying Models', August 1959 ........ the caption is as follows:
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Cover Photo by Leroy Cox showing Keith Palmer, George Molitor and Don Hacher warming up three L.M. Cox P-40 'Flying Tiger' ready-to-fly plastics at Disneyland flying circle. Site is in the Anaheim, Calif. area.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Would someone please post the 'Flying Models' Sept. 1956 cover as described in this thread elsewhere, I would really like to see it too, as I am sure we all would, yes? THANKS much!

Donald Garry (aka injunnut)

build light

Lee and Donald, great pics! What a wonderful experience this must have been. I was born in 1957 so I never got to see this, much less have the opportunity to participate.

Robert

CoxPilot

Check out more old phots of Cox . http://www.mh-aerotools.de/airfoils/cox_frameset.htm

Lee

CoxPilot

Hi Gang,

I just talked to both Dale Kirn and Bart Klapinski yesterday, and all because of this forum. I had not talked to them in years, and they are both doing well. We went down memory lane a bit, and will keep in touch. We are all making plans to try to put together a copy of the "Wally Wins His Wings" move, but 16mm is expensive to convert. The film is 600 ft, and about 1/2 hour. Dale loaned out a copy of his movie, and will try to get it back, but does not have a projector. Bart is still very active in clasic stunt, and was did not know that his reputation was far and wide. I remember when he took the wheels off of our plastic PT-19 trainer (added a double port cylendar) and did a wing-over to inverted flight. Keep in mind, the plane did not have airfoil on the bottom. He also did the first test flights of the Cox "Spook" (designed by Dale K.) at the Circle, and made some suggestions to the flight controls. As far as me; I have not flown a plan since those days, but will never get it out of my system.

Later, Lee

ps: have more photos, and lots of copies of Cox instruction sheets from all the products. I worked in the Art Department at Cox after Disney. However; I do not seem to be able to upload any photos. Format? Using jpg from photoshop. Have a Mac. Any suggestions?

merugo

Lee, maybe you are using the form in the bottom of this page? It does not work for loading imges. You must use the RE botton at the beginning of the last post of the page.
Ugo

da Rock

If you reply to any posted message, the Reply-to-Message window will include a line directly below the fill-in box. The line says, "Click here to upload images and files!"

If you use the Quick Reply box that shows up at the bottom of the thread, it won't have the capability.

Hope to see your pictures here soon. About the only thing you need to consider about them is their size. Normal size photos are usually no problem, but the native sizes of some scanners is pretty large. Since this site handles the problem with it's thumbnailing, even that isn't really much problem. One thing I do that saves everyone, is to change the print's resolution to 72ppi for ones I post here. I got in the habit back when I was on dialup. It saved me upload time, and it saves everyone on dialup when they click on the thumbnails. And most monitors don't show detail any better at the higher resolutions anyway.

CoxPilot

Thanks for the info in regards to posting photos, but I've since found the the problem is with Safari web browser with Mac. It's the latest and greatest, but just a bug. They say I should use Foxfire to solve the problem, but everything is working so well otherwise, I hate to change. Soooo... no photos. I'm still working on getting a copy of "Wally Wins His Wings", which includes the gang from Disneyland. Disney did not allow the filming, so they produced the 30 min film at the same demonstration at the L.A. County Fair in Pamono.

Later, Lee