This site is dedicated in loving memory of Howard Cigelske, husband, father, grandfather and great-grandfather.
Responses
Thank You to my son Tim for setting up this site on short notice…I appreciate it.
The aerial view of the farm fields in the picture above reminds me that we all forgot about his flying adventures. Going through old pictures shows the old Taylorcraft sitting in the farm driveway with me sitting in a stroller next to it.
Dad got his pilot’s license sometime in the early 50’s, bought a 2 seat Piper Cub, then the Taylorcraft. Eventually his family outgrew the bench seat for two Taylorcraft. The story goes, with me on a stool between Mom & Dad, and Roseann on Mom’s lap, and she pregnant with Steve, it became too difficult to pull out on the co-pilot’s wheel to take off.
Unfortunately for me, he sold it sometime in the early 60’s before I had a chance to attempt any piloting on my own, and did not replace it with a bigger plane. Perhaps fortunately though for all, as I had a penchant for taking things apart to see how they worked, and didn’t always get the parts put back in the right place!
The plane was an integral part of his farming operation, as he used it to survey his crops from the air, and to quickly travel to other towns to get parts for broken farm machinery in order to expedite repairs. As many of you know, waiting paitiently for anything was not one of Dad’s strong points.
Weekends were time to visit friends and relatives as Roseann cited in her story, and the use of the plane to travel, usually to Grandma’s house in New Glarus, afforded the most time available for visiting in the relatively narrow time between Church & morning chores, and evening milking time. As I recall, depending on wind speed, it would travel between 100 & 120 MPH, in a straight line between our hayfield and whatever friendly farmer’s field he knew of at our destination. Dad knew everyone.
I remember a few stories of near mishaps, and there are a few broken propellers still hanging on the barn walls at the farm, but the Lord was watching over him as always and we all survived the flying decade.
I’m not sure how old I was, and I do vaguely remember asking this, but he loved to tell this story. One day as we were taxiing down the hayfield to take off, and I was looking out the side window and saw the rear tail wheel lift off the ground long befor we lifted off, I asked how we could continue to travel along without that wheel on the ground. He pondered the question for a while, before he realized where I was coming from. There was no front wheel drive anything in those days, and I must have seen enough rear wheels spinning on vehicles and tractors to understand that the rear wheels always made something move. He had to explain to me that the wheels on an airplane never drive anything, the propeller moves it on the ground as well as the air.
Thanks Dad, for all that early mechanical training!
Thank You to my son Tim for setting up this site on short notice…I appreciate it.
The aerial view of the farm fields in the picture above reminds me that we all forgot about his flying adventures. Going through old pictures shows the old Taylorcraft sitting in the farm driveway with me sitting in a stroller next to it.
Dad got his pilot’s license sometime in the early 50’s, bought a 2 seat Piper Cub, then the Taylorcraft. Eventually his family outgrew the bench seat for two Taylorcraft. The story goes, with me on a stool between Mom & Dad, and Roseann on Mom’s lap, and she pregnant with Steve, it became too difficult to pull out on the co-pilot’s wheel to take off.
Unfortunately for me, he sold it sometime in the early 60’s before I had a chance to attempt any piloting on my own, and did not replace it with a bigger plane. Perhaps fortunately though for all, as I had a penchant for taking things apart to see how they worked, and didn’t always get the parts put back in the right place!
The plane was an integral part of his farming operation, as he used it to survey his crops from the air, and to quickly travel to other towns to get parts for broken farm machinery in order to expedite repairs. As many of you know, waiting paitiently for anything was not one of Dad’s strong points.
Weekends were time to visit friends and relatives as Roseann cited in her story, and the use of the plane to travel, usually to Grandma’s house in New Glarus, afforded the most time available for visiting in the relatively narrow time between Church & morning chores, and evening milking time. As I recall, depending on wind speed, it would travel between 100 & 120 MPH, in a straight line between our hayfield and whatever friendly farmer’s field he knew of at our destination. Dad knew everyone.
I remember a few stories of near mishaps, and there are a few broken propellers still hanging on the barn walls at the farm, but the Lord was watching over him as always and we all survived the flying decade.
I’m not sure how old I was, and I do vaguely remember asking this, but he loved to tell this story. One day as we were taxiing down the hayfield to take off, and I was looking out the side window and saw the rear tail wheel lift off the ground long befor we lifted off, I asked how we could continue to travel along without that wheel on the ground. He pondered the question for a while, before he realized where I was coming from. There was no front wheel drive anything in those days, and I must have seen enough rear wheels spinning on vehicles and tractors to understand that the rear wheels always made something move. He had to explain to me that the wheels on an airplane never drive anything, the propeller moves it on the ground as well as the air.
Thanks Dad, for all that early mechanical training!
By: Don Cigelske on July 11, 2008
at 1:38 am