WHY I SPONSOR VINTAGE AIRPLANES - A Rant!
The spirit of giving is wonderful - yet some still choose to condemn it. Why? Because if the giving is not directed at something that person believes in, they consider it to be invalid.
For the past couple of years I have sponsored a couple of vintage airplanes belonging to various museums. By "sponsor" - contributed to fuel and maintenance costs. It isn't cheap, but it is something I believe in and enjoy. The airplanes are something I can see, touch, and hear. I can touch the smoothness of a canvas wing, hear the roar of a radial engine and cast my eyes skyward when they fly. When that airplane participates in an air show or community event and thousands of people can also touch, hear, and see same, I do glean a lot of satisfaction from that because I have helped make it possible.
Incredibly, I once was criticized for this by a relative because I was not interested in contributing to her campaign to "Save the Grizzly Bears."
It's not that I don't care about the bears - but they are for all intents and purposes, intangible. I have never seen or heard a grizzly in "real life," much less touched one. If I did, the bear would probably devour me.
The epitome of that person's arrogance (and ignorance) was when she accused me of "war mongering." "You should give to a peaceful living creature instead of a war plane!" she accused.
Yes, every flight museum is peppered with civilian and military aircraft, and every one of them is entwined with a thousand stories involving the sweep of human emotion and experience in war and peace: love, hate, adventure, courage, joy, pathos, exhilaration and tragedy.
The average lifespan of a WWI pilot was six weeks. Those pilots are gone. What remains are some of their airplanes. The legacy of those pilots lives on through those tangibles - what we can touch and hear -
and when we look up to see it fly toward the heavens.
....toward the heavens.
Is there any greater reverence?