Warbird Information Exchange

I learned, today, that Connie Edwards had made his last takeoff on Saturday, 3 May. It was a shock-to say the least. I had talked with him at length on the 26th of April, the day after his 85th birthday. We reminisced about our flying together, the first time being pilots in his PBY, flying the same route and calendar days that the Navy NC4 flew in May,1919, the first trans-Atlantic flight. When I first met Connie, early in 1986 and learned that he was going to do that, I asked if he knew that a Coast Guard pilot was the pilot of the NC4. He said, "Of course, Elmer Stone!" I then asked if he had a Coast Guard pilot in his crew, and he just said, "Would you like to join? Do you like beer?"

Amongst aviators, it is universally known that one really gets to know another if they spend some time together in the cockpit. I spent 30 hours in the PBY cockpit with Connie on that reflight. I joined the crew at Andrews AFB on May 6th, and we began the journey. The third pilot was Art Ward, Connie's long, long best friend, who was a Navy Reserve captain; he was with Connie the day we met, at the Air and Space Museum in DC that January. Our odyssey took us to Rockaway, NY....NAS South Weymouth, MA- and.Chatham, Nantucket, Martha's Vineyard, Hyannis for short stops out of NAS....NAS Brunswick...Shearwater, Nova Scotia...a 'splash and dash' in Trepassey Bay, Newfoundland, then landing in St. John's to spend the night before departing on the 17th, the date the NC4 departed. It was a 1,200 flight to Horta in the Azores; with the PBY cruise speed of 97 knots, we filed for 11 hours enroute after our 0415 takeoff. We made it in an hour less, did a splash and dash in the harbor before landing in front of a huge crowd awaiting our arrival.

I was on permissive orders, and the incoming Commandant had scheduled a meeting for all Flag Officers for the 22nd of May. There was a Navy P3 aircraft, departing for Pennsylvania shortly after we arrived; I had no choice but to take advantage of that opportunity, so bade farewell to Connie and Art. They continued, still on schedule, to Lisbon and, finally, Plymouth, England where the official reflight ended.

Connie and I (and Art, until his death in '02) remained staunch friends. He bought a former Coast Guard HU-16E (number 7226) out of desert storage in Arizona, in 1990. He flew it to Oshkosh for the big aviation annual airshow, then came over to Traverse City, MI where I was representing the Coast Guard at the annual celebration in Grand Haven. I went out to join him, and his son, Tex, and after watching one takeoff and landing from the radioman's seat was put in the left seat to fly as pilot. We made a number of landings, and it seemed like no time since I had flown a 'Goat' (it had been 15 years). The 7226 became Connie's favorite airplane (out of the near-dozen he had at his ranch, including the PBY.) I retired in June, '91, and that October I went to Texas for some time with Connie, and some time in that 'Goat', now call sign "N226CG", plus a few hours in several of his other airplanes (Beech Baron, Grumman Goose) and more than a few cold beers down at the hangar and in his unique home, named Toad Hall.

Now, it is time to stop and think about all the times we had together. His sense of humor was contagious....he looked for reasons to laugh. One example.....when he learned that I was six months older, he dubbed us "womb mates", and we laughed about that when I told him that I had been 85 for a while, and recommended it as OK. We talked about family, Brenda and Marlyn and grandkids. We made tentative plans for me to come down to Big Spring in October and we would go to his house in the Caymans, only a short flight in his Pilatus, for which he traded a spitfire a couple of years ago, as his all-time best deal, ever.

That was only ten days ago, and he sounded just fine. Wait for me, Connie, with a cold beer at the ready.

Howie