Messing with spotters

I assume the person I spent some time talking to was Spencer Flack.

Over thirty years ago. 😮

It would not surprise me if he was a spotter. Spence was a great enthusiast. He certainly built models in his younger years and I know gave talks to local modeling clubs in the 80’s.

I have many fond memories of those times including getting ‘temporarily unsure of position’ in the two place Seafury transiting Elstree to Leavesden, about five miles away down the A41!

Mark

I assume the person I spent some time talking to was Spencer Flack.

Over thirty years ago. 😮

It would not surprise me if he was a spotter. Spence was a great enthusiast. He certainly built models in his younger years and I know gave talks to local modeling clubs in the 80’s.

I have many fond memories of those times including getting ‘temporarily unsure of position’ in the two place Seafury transiting Elstree to Leavesden, about five miles away down the A41!

Mark

I used to visit airfields with a friend whose sole aim was number crunching. He was the one with a car so he had most of the say about where we went and for how long.
I remember visting Elstree in the late 70’s / early 80’s. My friend had disappeared ahead of me into a hangar and hadn’t seen the small shed with “project mayfly” chalked on the door.
I peered into the gloom to find a big radial engine almost above my head. A voice said “come in” and I realised there was someone perched up there working on the fuselage. I recognised the underwing serial WJ244 as the second Sea Fury from the Southend museum which I had known well for years as a heap of bits lashed to the museum compund fence. I assume the person I spent some time talking to was Spencer Flack. At that time I had been spotting for best part of 15 years and he was the first person of very few people I have encountered on airfield visits who had ever made time to talk to me about aeroplanes.
I was a bit poorer than my friend in terms of number crunching at the end of the visit but I was left with experience of a pleasant encounter which I have never forgotten.
In contrast during a visit to France with a coach load of spotters I was the only one who could speak any French so I was given the job of asking for permission at each airfield as the tour guide spoke no French and simply had a letter in French which explained the reason for our visit but he couldn’t answer any questions from airfield owners. I think it was Meaux where the local flying club had been given a Fouga Magister. Once they discovered I could speak some French they went out of their way to welcome us. They pulled the Magister out of the hangar and insisted that I sit in the front cockpit while they took my photo with my camera and then generously allowed all the others to have photos in the Magister as well. At nearly every airfield they asked questions about the hobby which I did my best to answer.
I was a regular spotter at Southend for years but apart from my time with the Southend Museum no one on the airfield seemed to have much time for the spotters – a great shame as it might just have given me the local contacts I needed at that time to try to pursue the career that I always wanted in aviation.

I used to visit airfields with a friend whose sole aim was number crunching. He was the one with a car so he had most of the say about where we went and for how long.
I remember visting Elstree in the late 70’s / early 80’s. My friend had disappeared ahead of me into a hangar and hadn’t seen the small shed with “project mayfly” chalked on the door.
I peered into the gloom to find a big radial engine almost above my head. A voice said “come in” and I realised there was someone perched up there working on the fuselage. I recognised the underwing serial WJ244 as the second Sea Fury from the Southend museum which I had known well for years as a heap of bits lashed to the museum compund fence. I assume the person I spent some time talking to was Spencer Flack. At that time I had been spotting for best part of 15 years and he was the first person of very few people I have encountered on airfield visits who had ever made time to talk to me about aeroplanes.
I was a bit poorer than my friend in terms of number crunching at the end of the visit but I was left with experience of a pleasant encounter which I have never forgotten.
In contrast during a visit to France with a coach load of spotters I was the only one who could speak any French so I was given the job of asking for permission at each airfield as the tour guide spoke no French and simply had a letter in French which explained the reason for our visit but he couldn’t answer any questions from airfield owners. I think it was Meaux where the local flying club had been given a Fouga Magister. Once they discovered I could speak some French they went out of their way to welcome us. They pulled the Magister out of the hangar and insisted that I sit in the front cockpit while they took my photo with my camera and then generously allowed all the others to have photos in the Magister as well. At nearly every airfield they asked questions about the hobby which I did my best to answer.
I was a regular spotter at Southend for years but apart from my time with the Southend Museum no one on the airfield seemed to have much time for the spotters – a great shame as it might just have given me the local contacts I needed at that time to try to pursue the career that I always wanted in aviation.

Seems a spotter may have put a spanner in the works.

Glen Miller

One of the comments attached to that article is “interesting”: (those of you familiar with my views on conspiracy theorists will know what I mean!)

So why is Maj. Alton Glenn Miller’s name on the Madingley Wall of The Missing and Lt. Col Norman Baessell is not?
– splasher6, crackpot Yorkshire, 06/1/2012 19:02

Oh yes he is… Norman F. Baessell

Seems a spotter may have put a spanner in the works.

Glen Miller

One of the comments attached to that article is “interesting”: (those of you familiar with my views on conspiracy theorists will know what I mean!)

So why is Maj. Alton Glenn Miller’s name on the Madingley Wall of The Missing and Lt. Col Norman Baessell is not?
– splasher6, crackpot Yorkshire, 06/1/2012 19:02

Oh yes he is… Norman F. Baessell

With all the hours that I’ve spent with the polite ones, I have yet to have any positive feedback on aircraft, parts or anything else (Except Dave Welch)

He certainly gets around, he passes through our neck of the woods in NorCal from time to time.

With all the hours that I’ve spent with the polite ones, I have yet to have any positive feedback on aircraft, parts or anything else (Except Dave Welch)

He certainly gets around, he passes through our neck of the woods in NorCal from time to time.

it was before one of the ex-mob with his tape got at it…( see previous posts about the “fun” antics…

it was before one of the ex-mob with his tape got at it…( see previous posts about the “fun” antics…

…or ” Pennsylvania 6-8000″ jack…

It was Pennsylvania 6-5000.

…or ” Pennsylvania 6-8000″ jack…

It was Pennsylvania 6-5000.

Perhaps ” the little man who was,nt there ” or ” Pennsylvania 6-8000″ looks like one of the mob,s being playing again,with his tape…

regards
jack…

Perhaps ” the little man who was,nt there ” or ” Pennsylvania 6-8000″ looks like one of the mob,s being playing again,with his tape…

regards
jack…

Seems a spotter may have put a spanner in the works

Glen Miller

Seems a spotter may have put a spanner in the works

Glen Miller

Stan, that does sound familiar with some aviation groups we have had at the Boscombe museum and also after doors open at CockpitFest. Wish they had showed even a little interest but they normally do a fast pace to the next cockpit.

I once manned a display of crashed aircraft parts at an airshow (from a historic wartime loss). A spotter asked me if that was all that was left of Hampden serial No. P???? and I said yes….so he smiled at his friend and duly took down the number. Never understood it…but he did no harm.

Ah Spotters. Yes they do come out to the Antipodes. We were informed that a busload tour group of 54 aviation enthusiasts would like to visit. Having hosted a large group from British Aviation Enthusiasts Society (BAES) all of whom flew with us (96 bums in seats in one afternoon in Dragon Tiger Minor Auster Proctor Cub )we agreed. All aircraft were lined up outside, unfolded as reqd., primped and polished and a cadre of pilots on hand to fly and what did we get? Bus stopped, Door opened, Mad rush disgorged, notebooks and pencils at the ready and we were completely ignored. I had printed out history sheets on each aircraft etc but they weren’t in the least bit interested. As noted peering under the hangar doors next door, trotting off up the taxiway on an operational airfield towards the aero club,poking into the workshop etc and when asked if they wished to fly not one of them evinced the slightest interest. Then on the bus with “Oh where did you get that one’ and AH! Didn’t you get this one”With all the hours that I’ve spent with the polite ones, I have yet to have any positive feedback on aircraft, parts or anything else (Except Dave Welch)

I had books going back years with lots of good stuff in, types/serials/dates etc, I could’ve saved them, ie “hid” them, but IQW official-dom they all got destroyed 😮

Interesting pastime, spotting.

In a long professional flying career I never took the slightest interest in registration numbers, other than the chore of keeping my own logbooks and other paperwork legal. Most of the people around me were the same.

Yet I still have my ancient Ian Allan Locospotters books duly underlined and continue to take an interest in those locos, by number, which are preserved.

Even more strangely an old friend who I knew as an avid aircraft spotter all his teenage years, stopped when he began flying for a living, then the day after he retired he started being a spotter again – albeit an elevated one.

It seems spotting could be about wanting to be involved but being excluded. Those who are involved usually don’t have the time or inclination.

I agree with the poster who says if only a way could be found to involve spotters more the world of preservation would be richer (literally) than it is now.

So I never knock spotters. When I was flying I always tried to engage with anyone who took an interest in aeroplanes – and met a lot of nice interesting people as a result, with only relatively few disappointments.