Gordon Baxter has died - sad news from the USA

[G-KEST]

My all time favourite American GA journalist has died. Gordon was a long time feature writer for FLYING magazine in the USA and his Texan "good ole boy" style of writing was just my cup of java. His Bax seat column was the one I always first turned to and I will miss his down to earth enthusiasm for general aviation and its characters of whom he was one of the greatest. Here is the piece from Avweb -

"Gordon Baxter Dies At 81"

While his hometown media in southeast Texas remembered Gordon Baxter as a "local icon" and "legendary radio talk-show host," he was known to aviators around the world as the author of "Bax Seat," his well-loved column that ran on the back page of Flying Magazine from 1971 to 1998. Baxter wrote about airplanes, the people who fly them, the airports where they live, the romance and adventure of it all. "We'll all miss him," Flying Senior Editor Tom Benenson told AVweb on Tuesday. "He was always a gentleman and always knew how to tell a story. ... I enjoyed his work from almost the time I could read." Baxter died Saturday in Beaumont, at age 81, leaving behind his wife, nine children, 16 grandkids, and 11 books. Since 1998, at Oshkosh the Bax Seat Award is given every year to the EAA member "who perpetuates the Gordon Baxter tradition of communicating the excitement and romance of flight." A ceremony is held for the winner. Flying Magazine featured a tribute to Baxter in its June 2004 issue, and this week posted his funeral arrangements on their Web site. The September issue will feature much more about Baxter's life and legacy. And if you're not familiar with Baxter's work, here's a sample, just one of his hundreds of columns, chosen at random.

May he rest in peace and fly with the angels.

Cheers from a sad,

Trapper 69
:{ :{ :{

[Genghis the Engineer]

I never knowingly met the fellow, but I certainly enjoyed his columns when I came across them - one of the greats of aviation writing.

Everybody has to go sadly, but not many leave as much behind for the rest of us - a credit to his calling.

G

[Flyin'Dutch']

Hear, hear.

FD

[Final 3 Greens]

I loved his column, it displayed warmth and integrity.

[treadigraph]

A sad day indeed Trapper, I used to read Flying every month simply because of Bax and Len Morgan - it just wasn't the same without them...

Whatever the afterlife is, I'll bet there's a darn good flying club bar!

Treadders

[PA-28-180]

It's my understanding that Gordon had his pilots license but lost his medical several years ago...can't remember why though. There were a few articles of his that showed he was still flying once in a while with a CFI after that.
Rest in peace.

[MLS-12D]

Apparently Flying's September 2005 issue will include a special tribute to Bax.

PA-28-180 is quite correct: Bax had a license (including an IR), but lost his medical due to heart problems. :( Unfortunately, that happened within a year or two of his acquisition of the only airplane he ever owned (a Mooney). That experience should serve as a 'wake-up call' to the rest of us: carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero.

Bax's best columns are collected in two books: Bax Seat: Log of a Pasture Pilot (1978), ISBN 0871650169, and More Bax Seat: New Logs of a Pasture Pilot (1988), ISBN 0830694293. Those titles are somewhat difficult to find (especially the second one), but are worth tracking down. To whet your appetite, here (http://www.flyingmag.com/article.asp?article_id=331&section_id=12&page_number=1&preview=y) are a few of his columns, available on-line courtesy of Flying's website.

I feel a bit a sorry for the guys at Flying because the mag is not the same since Gordon Baxter (and Len Morgan) stopped writing.Yes, I agree. Nowadays it tends to focus on glitzy business jets, stormscopes, etc. ... flashy toys that have little or nothing to do with the grassroots flying personified by Bax. Although many of Lane Wallace's columns carry on the tradition, her writing is overshadowed by the bloodless prose of editors J. Mac McClellan and Richard Collins: mere technicians. :ugh:

[Final 3 Greens]

Reading Collin's provided some questions, answers, tools and techniques that made me a lot better pilot. Not a mere techician for me, but a guy who wrote in a way that helped me to think more carefully about flight planning, from a practical angle and thus be safer.

You're not normally mean spirited MLS, so I'll take your comments are praise for Bax's special style, rather than anti Collins.

[MLS-12D]

Hi F3G,

You're essentially correct; but I am no admirer of Collins.

I have a couple of his books (Flying Safely, Pilot Upgrade), and I find that he says a lot without really saying anything meaningful or memorable. And speaking of mean-spirited, he's made his fair share of bone-headed remarks (e.g., his comments regarding the Globe Swift (http://www.napanet.net/~arbeau/swift/flying.htm)).

Collins has all sorts of ratings, but spends virtually all of his time flying a Cessna 210 under IFR. Unlike Bax, he is not the sort of pilot that you will find flying gliders, floatplanes, warbirds, aerobatics, etc. For him, flying is a serious business! But if you like his style, that's certainly your privilege; my tastes are not universal.

Regards,

MLS

[G-KEST]

MLS-12D,

My thoughts precisely. I have always preferred the poaching role to that of gamekeeper. I think Gordon saw it that way too. It has been great to be back with my preference for the last seven years.

Cheers,

Trapper 69

PS - The inside of the cloud that frightened me in 1957 looks the same as the one that would concern me today. I have had my fair share of IFR in severe IMC and made good use of my IR from 1974 to 1999; but I do not miss it at all now. Its the visual pleasure I get from seeing our glorious British countryside that I get turned on by, not misty wingtips and embedded Cb's.
:ok: :ok: :ooh: :yuk: :ugh: :* :cool: :mad: :)

[MLS-12D]

Hello Trapper, nice to hear from you.I have always preferred the poaching role to that of gamekeeper. I think Gordon saw it that way too.I don't know his inner thoughts, but perhaps the following passages from Bax Seat: Log of a Pasture Pilot provide some insights:I was one of those lucky kids born in the Golden Age of Aviation. I caught the twilight of barnstorming. Paid a 1933 fortune of five dollars to ride with Clarence Chamberlain in a Curtiss Condor, a gigantic old fabric box kite. Filled out my log book with rides in an OX Robin, a Stinson trimotor that belonged to Billy Rose. Travel Airs, Wacos, a Lincoln-Page, a spin in a Fleet. Once at a recent product breakfast at the Reading Air Show an avionics company president introduced his new line by starting out with “Now that we can dispel all the romance and view the airplane as a useful tool …”. That’s all I stayed for… I really have no reason to stay in the same room with a man who believes there is no more romance in flying. Even if he just bought me breakfast.

...

Collins, who always looks as though he is about to get his picture taken, would never be found lying on the grass… Eagle Scout Collins is totally trusted by the aviation manufacturers and is one of the most knowledgeable writers about airplanes and how to fly them. And you can trust him with the women and the money.

...

The whole idea of flying an airplane when you can't see out the window seems self-defeating. I knew a few instrument pilots. Technicians. The type who would read the marriage manual on their wedding night, or sip Coca-Cola at a party when everyone else was being thrown in the pool. I have a friend - a doctor, a little steel-rimmed guy with bald pate and the strongest, coldest fingers, like foreceps. He flies his Mooney just exactly like in the book. His approaches leave a crisp dotted line in the clouds. He bugs me.Regards,

MLS

P.S. I was wrong about Bax having heart problems. At age 53, he experienced a seizure in his sleep, and "woke up" in hospital.What they found was a very slight malfomation of two capillaries, a defect that was old and calcified, but within the left occipital lobe of my brain. No operation called for, no growth, but it had flickered me lights. And might do it again.

[Ace Rimmer]

Ah now you see, Bax what a guy never had the pleasure of meeting the man to my great regret (As a scribe of things aeronautical he's the fella I most admired in style - gawd I wish i could write like he did). In my opinion Lane Wallace is a pale substitute (but that's a bit harsh on Lane anybody would be).

It occurs to me that much of the writing in Flying these days is marked by a distinct lack of joie d'vivre - but again I suspect that much of the editorial content is increasingly driven by bean counters - such is the case in most publishing houses. You on the other hand may think that the tone and content of the editorial is linked to the sparkling "life and soul" personality of the editor - I couldn't possibly comment...:E

[Meeb]

A talented writer, such a shame.

[MLS-12D]

much of the writing in Flying these days is marked by a distinct lack of joie d'vivre Yes, exactly!

"You might think that ... but I couldn't possibly comment".Nice to hear from you, FU! ;) Perhaps you need to pop over to Flying's offices and "put a bit of stick about"!

[Ace Rimmer]

MLS Just thinking about the Bax quote about romance and aviation. I've been spent the last few days esconced in a room with about 25 airline pilots all chuntering about matters technical and safety in aircraft design and operation. But what do they all talk about when coffee break rolls round?

Here's Mr gazillion hours NWA and former fighter jock showing Mr Boeing test pilot pictures of his RV-8 in fomation with a mate's Cherokee at dusk on their way back from an EAA fly in.

Or Herr Lufty Capt who is having an in depth discussion about the finer points of the breaking system of a Chipmunk (who flew one years ago when on an ETPS exchange from the Luftwaffe) with the bloke from Air Canada who did his ab initio on them and yours truly who still does.

Or the previous evening when Capt billion hours while drink in hand watches Zoltan the magnifcent do his stuff in a Extra over the Hapsburg castle in Budapest (well actually over the Danube) as the sun begins to set. Turns and says to no one in particular "Pre-supper entertainment just dosent get much better than this does it?"

Romance in aviation? I think it's still here and always will be while there are people still in love with it.

[MLS-12D]

That is wonderful to hear, Ace. :ok: :ok: :ok:

Thanks,

MLS

P.S. I have three friends who are or were longtime pilots for major international airlines. One hates his job (flying 747s) and has no interest in flying outside of work. One hates his job (flying 777s) but owns two private airplanes and is a better lightplane pilot than I will ever be. The third is retired (used to fly L1011s and A340s), but works part-time as a sim instructor, and is an active Harvard pilot. So I guess it is difficult to generalize about professional pilots.