Blue Star for the recommendation and a second one for being stuck in Lubbock.

the windmill museum is pretty cool

https://windmill.com/

German Luftwaffe had some pretty spectacular successes and very spectacular failures with gliders. Had the huge Gigant glider

I am in the CAF and the Alamo Wing. We restored a WWII glider back in 1986-87.
The covering is not a type of vinyl. In the 1940's it was a blend of silk fiber covered with a "dope" type of resin then painted.
For many years now restorations are done with a product called Ceconite ( a synthetic silk), coated with a nitrate or butyrate dope and then painted with polyurethane.
It holds up much better than the old silk coverings and is much tougher and resilient.

Gunny456 said:

---

I am in the CAF and the Alamo Wing. We restored a WWII glider back in 1986-87.
The covering is not a type of vinyl. In the 1940's it was a blend of silk fiber covered with a "dope" type of resin then painted.
For many years now restorations are done with a product called Ceconite ( a synthetic silk), coated with a nitrate or butyrate dope and then painted with polyurethane.
It holds up much better than the old silk coverings and is much tougher and resilient.

---

I should have said looked like vinyl even though that wouldn't have been invented yet - thanks for the explanation.

Roger that. I restored and owned/flew a WWII L-6 and took it to a lot of air shows. It was always fun when folks would come up to it and touch it. They would ask me. " OMG what kept bullets from hitting the pilots? It moves!"
Like aluminum skin would have made the difference.

Gunny456 said:

---

Roger that. I restored and owned/flew a WWII L-6 and took it to a lot of air shows. It was always fun when folks would come up to it and touch it. They would ask me. " OMG what kept bullets from hitting the pilots? It moves!"
Like aluminum skin would have made the difference.

---

I thought the space to move items was a lot bigger but when I looked inside it only had small seats for about 10-15 men and if transporting cargo only one Jeep. Very small and noticed all weight towards the front. So if in a nose dive there is no correcting.

One question - were the pilots in the glider when they loaded the Jeep as the cockpit swung upward or did they crawl over the Jeep to get into seats?

Fascinating part of history

We had an old guy in the wing that had been a glider training pilot. He said they would have to crawl over the Jeep.
They actually converted some Taylorcraft L-2's as glider trainers in WWII. We had one in the wing that had been restored by a guy in El Paso. He converted it back to a true L-2 with a Continental 65HP. I bought it from him in 1982 for $6500.00. Flew it a while and sold it.
I don't know where it is now.

Gunny456 said:

---

We had an old guy in the wing that had been a glider training pilot. He said they would have to crawl over the Jeep.
They actually converted some Taylorcraft L-2's as glider trainers in WWII. We had one in the wing that had been restored by a guy in El Paso. He converted it back to a true L-2 with a Continental 65HP. I bought it from him in 1982 for $6500.00. Flew it a while and sold it.
I don't know where it is now.

---

Are you in Houston confederate air force or somewhere else sir? My son (14) and I would be very interested in meeting you and touring the facility if in Houston. The Houston one is on our radar of places to visit.

The wife and I split our time between our place in the hill country and the other place in the Ozarks.
Most of my efforts is with the MO wing but I have not participated much over the last few years. I probably don't know anybody any longer in the Gulf Coast Wing.
Colonel by the name of Ralph Royce use to be the guy down there. I have not talked with him in many years.
They are a friendly group and would probably love to show you around.
You could contact the headquarters in Dallas and they should be able to get you some contacts.

Quote:

---

They actually converted some Taylorcraft L-2's as glider trainers in WWII.

---

It's my understanding that they used the little two place planes (Taylorcraft, Cub, Aeronca) as trainers by flying to altitude, shutting off the engine, and saying "okay, you're a glider now".

Besides Lubbock, there was a training field north of Plainview (Finny Switch), and one near O'Donnell, a tiny town between Lubbock and Big Spring. I haven't been to the O'Donnell field in a while, but there used to be a huge hanger down there, like 100x400 feet in size.

My dad grew up around Ackerly, Texas, and said a glider (probably a TG3-A) landed near their farm. The Army sent a jeep and a tow rope out from O'Donnell, and towed the glider back into the air, with Dad (age 15) running alongside holding the wing level on takeoff


EDIT: Here's a Google Map link, hanger still there in photo

https://goo.gl/maps/KgwYUy8k8KunL6Wu9

Article about Glider school near Plainview)

https://www.myplainview.com/news/article/Breedlove-s-Finney-glider-school-opened-June-1-8417397.php

What I've been calling the O'Donnell field, was actually the Lamesa field. I found a long thesis written about it

https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc849715/m2/1/high_res_d/GARNER-THESIS-2016.pdf

In it, the author talks about the Taylorcraft planes built for glider training. Though I was correct that some of the training was done with normal planes, and shutting off engines, Gunny456 is correct, that there were planes built specifically for glider training, with no engine, and three seats, instead of two.

Very cool information Canyon. I love hearing of history like that. Could listen to it all day. Thanks for sharing as usual.