Wednesday, September 10, 2003
|
Wednesday, September 10, 2003 |
|
National Air Tour to visit Falcon Field By MICHAEL
BOYLAN It is hard to imagine a time when airplanes and airports were a rare occurrence, but in the late 1920s and 1930s air travel was just starting to be used for mail delivery and most cities and towns did not have airports but rather open fields or fairgrounds with a large enough area for airplanes to land. This changed and one of the things that prompted the changes was the National Air Tour. This year the historic national Air Tours are being recreated and 30 planes from that era will land in Peachtree City at Falcon Field today at noon. The National Air Tours, also known as the Ford Air Tours, traveled from city to city during the period of 1925-1931. as the airplanes and their pilot would come to town, residents would turn out in record numbers to see them. To accommodate the tour and to make sure their city got on the list, many cities and towns would enhance or build runways and airports. The idea for an air tour came about because in the early 1900s automobile tours popularized highway travel. By 1925, cars were very popular and the people behind the air tour wanted to make air travel just as popular. The 2003 national Air Tour began Sept. 8 in Dearborn, Michigan and stopping for the evening in Lansing, Illinois. Since then they have stopped in such cities as Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Wichita, Fort Worth and Little Rock. They are scheduled to leave Birmingham this morning and will land in Peachtree City at noon. They will head to Greenville, S.C., tomorrow. The tour is scheduled to end Sept. 24 back in Dearborn. There are 30 planes involved in the tour, many of which in airplanes that were also involved in the original air tours. Among the planes that are in the 2003 tour are a Bellanca Skyrocket, a Bell 47, a Buhl Sport Airsedan, Stinson and Bushmaster Tri-Motors, an Alexander Eaglerock Longwing, a DC-3, which will be piloted by members of the FAA, a Travel Air 6000, a Sikorsky S-38 and S-39 C and two Aviat Huskys as scout planes among others. The pilots flying the airplanes are from all over the country, from as far north as Maine to as far west as Arizona. The public is invited to come out and look at the airplanes and meet the pilots on Wednesday. For more information about the National Air Tour, visit www.NationalAirTour.org.
|
