Nostalgia ain't what it used to be...
Remember that big old starter motor up in the wheelwell that drove the unfeathering pump? It was from some sort of ancient automobile, I was told, a Buick or something.
We had a veteran DC-3 pilot in Miami lose one right at lift-off when the best he could manage was to pancake it right back onto terra firma half out of control, writing the aircraft off but walking away. Okay, perhaps he didn't do his whole 12-Point Program correctly but it might have been a case of running out of airspeed, altitude and ideas all at the same time, the sort to thing that can happen to almost anyone, really.
I flew one as an FO with a Navy veteran, a nicotine and caffeine fiend who could make that old bird sit up and talk. To watch him do a X-wind landing was quite something, when I was just left with the straight-and-level and a bit of talk-talk as my contribution to the group effort, with which I was cool, having already booked an Africa extended holiday, far from the Colombian Mafia.
Lots of folks nowadays forget the standards the old DC-3 was certified to, nothing like FAR-25.