Warbird Information Exchange

Should have washed those in exchange for one!


I hope you're digging now for those photos

Chunks

I'll get out in the shed this weekend. I've been thinking of those photo's lately. It's funny how I typed into google "Color Me Gone" and this web site came up and a group of you were talking about that very same airplane then. I have a '49 Chevy Truck I'm working on and I always did like the paint scheme of the Color Me Gone and it did come across my mind to see what I could to with it on the truck. I've been real busy but I'll go looking this weekend. I'm thinking that is where all my old airplane stuff got off to. I might even have that copy of Air Classics there with the crash of the plane. I'm retired Army and I think all that stuff had survived all the moves and chucking stuff out just to make weight allowances. I'm also a very mild pack rat and sentimental about some things. That stuff would have been one.

Eric

Wow! I was pleasantly surprised to run across this site. Thanks!

My uncle, John C. Williams, owned Color Me Gone in the '70s.
That's his paint scheme in the photos and he was very proud of this bird.
You can see his initials on the fuselage and as a owner and lover of horses, he added one to the tail.

The in-flight photo is John with his girlfriend sitting behind in a jump seat. My understanding is that he removed the comm gear from behind the seat and modified the space to carry a passenger.

One Thanksgiving in Savannah, Georgia, I witnessed this amazing aircraft making a vertical climb, with clearance from the tower of course. A full throttle pass down center field at 500 feet, and a then nose up! The 12-cylinder Rolls Royce engine was thundering and shaking the ground. It was the most impressive thing I had ever witnessed.

John crashed this plane in Mississippi when the engine failed, en route to pay my wife and I a visit. He never made it to my house but he fortunately walked away from a wingless Mustang after clipping some healthy trees. I have the news paper article from the accident and some in-flight photos that I will post as soon as possible.

He was not so lucky a few years later when he was killed after crashing a Hawker Sea Fury in Texas.
If any of you have information about that accident, I would love to know more about what happened.

Thanks again for keeping these aircraft and owners alive on the internet!

Perry

Welcome to WIX Perry! Look forward to seeing your pics. Still love that mustang.

Chunks

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Jack McDonnel

T-6/SNJ Hoarder

Dave Webster was a doctor that bought the airplane from Frank Sanders. Dr. Webster parked it in a hangar a few down from my father's hangar at Orange County Airport in Santa Ana, CA, KSNA. He had it painted white with a metallic blue tail with flowers of the seventies upon the blue field, kind of Richard Bach-esque. (Though I wonder now if Richard didn't get the idea from Doc as he was hanging around Frank Tallman's around that period and JLS, Richard's big hit, didn't publish until after Doc got the Mustang.)
I'll see if I can find and post some pics of it then.
Chris...

Perry,I worked the flight line at Tampa Air Center thru the '80's and was the last one to fuel your uncle's Sea furyin Tampa...Being a young kid at the time I was really shook up when I heard that he died.

Thank you for that info ballooniestampa.
We really miss him a lot.
Did you see or speak to him the day that you fueled the Sea Fury?
If so, did he look or sound well?
There was talk among the family that he was not feeling 100% at the time.

Perry

Was that the Sea Fury that crashed at the air show in Harlingen? Took off and turned to catch up with someone and stalled? Ober would know more than I...

Johnny was a friend of my dads. THe story back then was that he was doing a "dogfight" routine with the CAF's Me-109/Buchon and that he basically turned it too tight and it entered a stall spin (accelerated stall). Supposedly that was the second time that happened down there at the Harlingen show, the first time was with someone in a Mustang.
Also, I was down there at Herndon Field, in Orlando the day your uncle was picking out his Baghdad Fury. My dad had been called to see if he wanted to buy one. The word at the time was that they had been maintained well up until the transfer and a buyer need only bolt the wings and prop back on and go flying. YOu could pick out any one you wanted for $25,000!

Aircraftsman, I knew Johnny well. I remember this plane like it was yesterday. I 'borrowed' for a few weeks when I needed a high speed test bed for a project. In exchange, we designed and installed an autopilot in Color Me Gone. We were in Texas at the time and as I recall Johnny either lived or visited in Florida. In either case, when he would come to Texas to check on his lady, he always brought me a big bag of oranges from Florida.

After the lost the P-51, he has his eyes on an Air Force T-38. He had found an airframe sans engines but was looking for a pair of engines. As I used to fly the 38, he asked if I would teach him to fly it if and when he got one flying. I had to decline but that's another story.

Groovy man! .... as in scheme, but sad for the loss of life.


http://www.mustangsmustangs.com/p-51/im ... 373/5151/3

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45+47=Psalm 92:6

Just before Oshkosh I had some of my fathers slides from the early to mid 70's scanned. I have been going through them and there are some really interesting finds. Color Me Gone is in several, I will post more as I get to them.

I remember those days. (mostly )
I think that row is;
- Color Me Gone
- Miss Coronado
- Cripes A'mighty
- el Gato Blanco
- Miss Kit Kat

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remember the Oogahonk!
old school enthusiast of Civiltary Warbirds and Air Racers

Number two is N34FF, owned by either Scott Smith or Bill Clark, depending on which year the photo is shot. Name would have been "GeGe II" or "Dolly".

Just a note regarding Will Martin's P-51D. The name was "El Gato Rapido".

Meaning the list goes like this:
N117E
N34FF
N921
N12700
N988C

T J

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Make my day, punk!