Warbird Information Exchange

I was looking thru the special section in Fly Past Magazine devoted to the 70th birthday of the Spitfire when I came across information indicating Kermit Weeks has not one but two Spitfires under restoration in the UK. This is in addition to the Spit at his Fantasy of Flight in Florida. Just how many Spitfires can one person have and does he intend to fly them all?

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Ain't no sunshine when she's gone!

Pat, have you been to Fantasy of Flight yet? We took the behind the scenes tour a couple of weeks ago. The guys giving the tour in the engine bay said Kermit has about 2 or 3 DOZEN R-2800s in cans and almost the same with 3350s. He has about 2 DOZEN V1710s still in the crates. There is a complete Lancaster disassembled in several shipping containers sitting just outside the shop door ! An amazing guy to say the least. Multiple Spitfires are just the tip of the iceberg.

Ok, this will be a dumb question - where did Kermit get his funding?? Once you have things rolling its not too bad if you have a decent head on your shoulders but there had to be a BIG pile of cash to start out or was it just being in the right place and buy this, sell that and trade for something else until you have a "fantasy" stash?

Tom P.

From what I understand, Kermit inherited about $80M when he was 21. He has probably turned it into a good deal more than that since. I believe that his money came from his family's inventions designing drilling components for the oil business.

Cheers,
Richard

One thing I learned about Mr Weeks is before he came to his wealth, his first job was being a bag boy/cart collector at a food store. He started as a regular joe.

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Michael Luther
Yankee Air Museum's
Air Show Director
THUNDER OVER MICHIGAN

Just going on memory, but his family made BIG money in the offshore oil industry. I can't remember if it was drill bits or if it was something else, but I do remember that the ball got rolling that way. It has been a long time, but I believe that his Grandfather had a company that had a real speciality, and then went on to drill on its own, and then eventually it was bought out, and with the patents still bringing in money, they thrived. I believe that the family, if not his Grandfather was responsible for money to build a research lab or some such at the University of Wisconsin. I also think that his parents donated money or scholarships at the University of Miami. I will claim no facts as my mind will not latch on to any specifics I have heard in the past, but this is the most I can give you.

dave

I was watching a show that showed his brother, and he had one of the worlds largest privite collection of classic cars. From what I understand his grand father had maped out oil sites during the depression, later he sold the rights for a cut of the oil pumped on the sites for as long as they produced, at that time he made very little, but after his death is when the deal worked out. the grand kids haft to spend a certin amout of the money on a collection, each year.

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Michael Luther
Yankee Air Museum's
Air Show Director
THUNDER OVER MICHIGAN

As dave said I make no clam to have the facts.

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Michael Luther
Yankee Air Museum's
Air Show Director
THUNDER OVER MICHIGAN

'bout a year ago ...I think I remember our Oz-'n-Nz friends making
reference to Weeks holdings in oil in their part of the world as well. I don't
"need to know", but I am just a bit curious....

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He bowls overhand...He is the most interesting man in the world.
"In Peace Japan Breeds War", Eckstein, Harper and Bros., 3rd ed. 1943(1927, 1928,1942)
"Leave it to ol' Slim. I got ideas...and they're all vile, baby." South Dakota Slim
"Ahh..."The Deuce", 28,000 pounds of motherly love." quote from some Mojave Grunt
DBF

Last seen the Spitfire projects were stored in the UK

As posted in another thread.... Kermit is in the latest issue of FORBES magazine... and is even on the cover. This explains how his Grandfather did well in the oil industry.

He sold one of his flying Spitfires to another collector in FL. So at this point I think he has one flying... low back... Spitfire. Pictures are on his web site.

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Blue Skies,
Dan
http://www.flytoanothertime.com

The way Kermit explained it the other day was that his grandfather developed a new way to find new oilfields. He took it to the US majors at the time and he was turned away. He then decided to do it on his own and went to Oz where he found the current Australian production fields. The technology did not exist to extract the oil at the time. As Kermit put it his grandfather was pretty sly and a clause was included in the contract that insured a royalty would be paid to his heirs when the necessary processes were developed to produce the oil. When Kermit was about 25 the oil and royaltys began to flow. Don't know if the royalty is affected by market price or is strictly based on the volume of barrels produced.

Here is a link thats tells more about Kermit http://www.forbes.com/business/forbes/2 ... 6/110.html

Tim

Greetings all,

Are the new hangars up yet? I haven't been there in quite some time and the website has not been updated on the construction progress for months.

Dave C

I visited F.O.F. last month.

One large "new" hangar, located across the runway and adjacent to the new entrance to the property, has been completed. It had several aircraft inside, but was not yet open to the public.

The "Behind The Scenes" tour takes you to the (many) storage and restoration buildings behind the two large main display hangars.

There is at least one more large storage building located across the road from F.O.F. hangars & runway, also not open to the public.