LadiesLoveTaildraggers

Pat Wegner owns and flys a 108 h.p. 1948 Stinson Voyager with a  Franklin engine based in Milwaukee, WI.  Please see her story provided by our friend, Ray Johnson, from the 2008 Marion, Indiana Flyin Drivein.

Bright House Networks, Inge Harte, speaks with lady taildragger pilots Pat Wegner & Marge Balaz about their flying activities.  Both of these lady taildragger pilots encourage other women to get into flying and aircraft ownership.

Melinda  flies her 1946 C-65 Champ out of a grass strip in St. Joseph, MO and is pictured with her twin sister, Melissa Adams, also a tailwheel pilot.

Melinda Hopper & Melissa Adams

Melinda Flying

My name is Melinda Hopper and I live at St. Joseph, Mo. I fly out of a lovely grass strip a few miles south of town, owned by a private individual. There are 14 hangars there, with mostly ultralights, and one or two homebuilts.I first fell in love with flying when I got on an airliner in October 1989 at the age of 37. A year later, a friend took me up in his Aeronca Champ, and then I WAS hooked!! I started saving my money, and a year after THAT, began flying lessons. (In the meantime, the friend was teaching me to fly the Champ, but he wasn’t an instructor, so I couldn’t log it.) I got my license in October 1992 at the age of 40, after training in a Cessna 172. I rented planes for several years, while saving up and looking for a Champ. I finally found one in 1998, bought it, and have had it for 10 years. It was rebuilt by the father of the friend who took me up for my first ride in his Champ. His Champ was also restored by his dad – his and mine were the last two of 16 planes his dad restored.

My Champ is a 1946 model, manufactured in January that year. It’s a basic Champ with a 65-horsepower Continental and no electrical system. Yep, I have to use the old “Armstrong” starter!

I have flown Cessna 172s and 150s, Piper Tomahawk, Cherokee, Warrior, Archer and Aztec – also a single-engine Piper retractable that I’ve forgotten the name of! I had some twin time and instrument training, but never got either rating. I did, however, get a limited commercial license in 2005.

I have flown many places in my Champ (and rented planes before I got the Champ) – fly-ins and fly-in breakfasts in Iowa, Kansas, Oklahoma, Nebraska and Missouri, trips to visit relatives and friends, and Oshkosh twice in the Champ (2006 and 2007 – or maybe it was 2005 and 2006). My most recent adventure was a trip to Middletown, Ohio, in June 2008, to attend the National Aeronca Convention.

Melinda departing her hangar

Getting ready to taxi out for takeoff.  A little of my hangar can be seen where the Champ’s tail is.

Landing Stehle's Strip

Kathy flying Rans 7

Kathy flies out of her family’s private grass strip near Liberty, Indiana.  She flies a Rans 7 with a 100 hp Rotax 912 engine.  Kathy and her huband, Wayne, built their Rans 7 from a kit, start to finish time just a few short months.  It’s the 3rd of 4 airplanes they have built.

Proud Owner

On ski's

Adventures: My trip to Florida

Thank you for visiting “LadiesLoveTaildraggers”  and checking out my personal profile.  I’m based in Indianapolis, IN at Mt. Comfort Airport (MQJ) and have found the perfect airplane in my 7FC/EC 90 hp Champ.  As you can see, she’s a beautiful blue & white bird that loves to fly and is happiest when I’m at the stick!

I snapped this photo the day my husband, Boyd and I  bought her in Maine.  She really is the same color as the sky!

My love of flying taildraggers started at a small grass strip in Evansville, Indiana in a 1946 Aeronca Chief.  My “future” husband, Boyd, had purchased it without ever having a flying lesson and we both learned to fly in it.  A little later I had a 1/3 partnership in a 1940 Porterfield and finally my very own 1946 Cessna 140.  I spent many hours flying those taildraggers and doing my favorite things – lots and lots of touch & go’s and chasing birds over the Ohio River.  Marriage and children put my flying on the back burner for many years but in July 2007 we bought N7569E for me to fly and I’m finally airborne again!

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My daughter and I decided to take an afternoon flight recently while she was home from college.

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Finally, a family photo in front of a taildragger I can only dream of flying;  a P51-D.  Taken at the Mt. Comfort Airshow, June 2009.  The wheel wells of this one look 10 times better than the outside of any airplane I’ve ever flown!