CAF Airsho Photos From The Past

[Roger Cain]

Covered elsewhere on this board, unfortunately the A-20 was destroyed also, at the annual CAF show in Harligen 1988. I was at that show.......

[Chris M]

Covered elsewhere on this board, unfortunately the A-20 was destroyed also, at the annual CAF show in Harligen 1988. I was at that show.......

I was there as well, we went almost every year back then.

That A-20 would flat out boogie around the field. You could tell the pilot definitely enjoyed wringing it out.

I feel very fortuante to have seen it fly several times, it was one of my personal favorites along with Carolyn. (Carolyn would boogie too!)

My family stayed on South Padre Island, and every morning and every so often, CAF planes would come right down the beach. (Usually T6's in flights of two or four) I was actually walking in between the hotels when the Spitfire came buzzing through inbetween the hotels and went right over me. I remember feeling so lucky to be where I was at the time, even though it scared me when it happened. I was 16 then.

I sincerly miss the Harlingen shows, that was such a cool destination. I'd always know we were close when I started to see palm trees... it was an eight hour drive from our house in Magnolia. We'd always stay on the island and drive to the shows and back, so if it wasn't fun at the air-sho, it was fun at the beach. I still have an intact sand dollar I found that year- and I remember my parents giving me greif for getting up and out so early to go out and look for it. That was big fun for this country boy.

One of these days I'll hunt up my pictures and slides. When my folks divorced in 92, the pictures got scattered; I think most of them wound up with my Mom..... I don't know where all the slides went. One of my folks has pictures of me on the wing of Snoopy when I was around a year old. Snoopy was my first favorite, because I could relate to the nose art. Sadly, it's long gone as well.

[b29flteng]

We used to call it Dawn Patrol, we would drink until??? then get up at 0600 for a 0700 takeoff and fly down to Padre Island and buzz anything that was out on the beach. I did it in 1976 and 1977 in a B-25. Avgas was cheap back then, the CAF would give us all the gas we wanted, free. I miss those days.....

[Second Air Force]

The A-20 and B-26 did indeed put on a great show! We got to Harlingen in '84 on Thursday morning in order to snoop around, and were fortunate to see the P-82 and B-26 leave on training flights. The P-82 came back and worked the pattern for a time, but it seemed to be an interesting airplane to master in the flare. The Marauder came back with one engine feathered due to an oil leak, so the crew got in their single engine emergency procedure work for real. Even in the overall dark green primer, the B-26 was a gorgeous airplane to behold.

Scott

[Chunks]

I don't know if there will ever be any show like the Harlingen or Breckenridge shows again...The best I've ever been to.

Chunks

[Cripes A Mighty]

I was young when my shots were taken. I was at the 80 airsho but I was 2 My father and grandfather took the pics I posted. Since both have passed on they are mine now.

Those Airshos in Harlingen are some of my best memories. We also had a place on South Padre (@ the Isla del Sol) and we would spend at least 2 full days at the CAF when we were there. Digging up all these shots and seeing all the others sure takes me back.

Thanks to all!

[Chunks]

I'm drifting off topic here, but I'll bring it back in a second. I grew up near Harlingen, and saw some things that were awesome and sad. I still have my autographed photos from Dick Disney. That was the coolest bald headed fat framed glasses guy I ever met . I also still have the newspaper clipping from the PBY crash...I was there when the Mosquito arrived from England, when the twin mustang was to make its first flight (well, almost all of them. There were a lot of "first runs"! ) and saw it make it's last flight. I saw the P-47s from Peru before they were assembled and Tora was a one plane act. I could go on forever... (Moment of silence please)

OK. This is one of my favorite threads, next to the "old livery" thread. It made me get out my old photo albums and start going through them. I'm going to start trying to scan in some of the old photos this weekend. Some of them are old polaroids and 110, but some of them will still be worth it I think.

Thanks to everyone that has posted pics.

Chunks

[PeterA]

Not from a CAF Airshow as such, but CAF aircraft on their first major 'Sortie' out of Texas to Transpo in Washington in 1972.

This was my first visit to the US and at that time, then as now I was a 'print' rather than a 'slide' person. So b/w in the main but I did juggle a couple of rolls of slide through the one camera to capture some but not all of the CAF aircraft there.

Bear with me if I have posted some of these before.

PeterA

[Obergrafeter]

2 count em, 2 P-38s Mudge!!!

[Robbie Stuart]

Here a couple from Harligen 1983. Sorry about the quality.


Main Hangar




Robbie

[Second Air Force]

Robbie,
Don't worry about the quality, at least there are pictures to share! Like I said on the first page of this thread, I barely knew how to put film in a camera when I shot my '84 collection.

PeterA,
I used to sit in my room as a kid on the farm and study magazine photos of the airplanes you just posted. Those pictures really bring back good memories for me from a time when all I could do was dream about being near warbirds.

Since Chunks brought up the one plane Tora act, I decided to post some of the better action photos I took on Saturday and Sunday in '84.

Saturday:



Sunday:





Thanks, everyone, for contributing and keep up the good work!
Scott

Last edited by Second Air Force on Thu May 08, 2008 12:54 am, edited 1 time in total.

[Robbie Stuart]

OK, a few more. I went down several days early in 80, 81, & 83 before Airsho & helped out with aircraft maintenance. This was 83. We were doing the Annual on the Buchon.
L to R; Robbie Stuart, Herb Puckett, & up on the engine, ???







Walter Wooten In The Cockpit Getting Ready To Do The Post Annual Run-up with Herb on the wing.




Walter Doing The Run-up.

Robbie

[Robbie Stuart]

A few more from Airsho 83.









Robbie

[Django]

What's the story on the "Thunderbirds" Mustang?? Did they ever fly Mustangs?

[Robbie Stuart]

What's the story on the "Thunderbirds" Mustang?? Did they ever fly Mustangs?

I don't know the story on choice of paint scheme, but that was Lefty Gardners Mustang at the time.
Robbie