will be held on

The goal of Chapter 54 having their very own building, or clubhouse, is almost a done deal. Several people have been working hard toward making that dream a reality. It has been a long, hard, drawn out, some time frustrating process, oft times fraught with seemingly insurmountable obstacles. And yet, our small group of Chapter members, persevered. It now begins to come together. The holes for the piers need to be drilled, the concrete needs to be poured and the building needs to be moved into place and bolted down. Jerry Sarracco started the ball rolling by discovering the building on a whim and thereby planted the seed of an idea, which grew into a challenge for Dave Fiebiger. Dave has exhibited enthusiasm and tremendous tenacity to get this building project up and running. He has spent many hours drawing up the plans and having them State certified, (I don’t know how much of this was done at his own expense) contacting the Building Inspector, attending numerous meetings, (along with Jerry) with the MAC and spending many a cold, wet day measuring distances and pounding stakes only to have to relocate them several times until the MAC agreed on the final decision for a site. His enthusiasm is contagious. Al Kupferschmidt caught the bug and went to work on the building removing some of the inside walls and doing some general carpentry on the outside trim work as well as installing some insulation, that was donated by Art Edhlund, on the under-side of the building. There is still a lot of work to do and it’s going to take a lot of volunteerism from the general membership who will be bitten by the enthusiasm bug to pitch-in and give a hand. Anyone that has some time and wishes to get involved, see Dave or Jerry or Al. At the last month’s general meeting the status of the building was discussed and the question was asked; “Who would be willing to volunteer?” The response was very heartening. Nearly 100% of the people present responded in an enthusiastic positive manner.

Speaking of positive responses; at one of the recent Friday morning informal breakfast meetings at Gorman’s restaurant in beautiful downtown Lake Elmo, the subject of cash donations was brought up. It was asked how many people would be willing to donate$100.00 to the building fund. Of the five people present, each one pledged that amount. Later, when I was told what happened at the breakfast meeting, I also pledged that amount. The same question will be asked at the next general Chapter meeting. So give it some thought and be prepared to make a pledge. I will be asking for volunteers to set up a committee for fund raising. We need some ideas. Any volunteers, Marlon, Ross? We can dedicate a wall in the Chapter building to display plaques with names of donors and the amount of the donation (?) similar to the brick wall in the museum at Oshkosh.

Monday, July 9^th is the date for the next general Chapter meeting. The time and place, as usual, is 7:30 at the Christ Lutheran Church of Lake Elmo. The program director, Nick Stolley, was still working on an idea for a program when I talked to him on Sunday, so I don’t know what it will be. Last months program, Flight Safety and Pre-flight Procedures-Open Forum, was well received. Due to inclement weather, attendance was slightly lower than usual, but the forum was interesting and probably would have lasted another hour if we hadn’t decided to cut it short and adjourn. We will do more of this type of forum in the future. Wednesday, the 4^th would generally be our scheduled directors meeting date, but it is a holiday and we will need to schedule it another day. I’ll talk to Tim Reberg, Events Chair, and we can probably combine it with a fly-in breakfast planning session. Stand-by the phone or check your e-mail for further information.

Money Market $5,676.35

Operations $1,309.31

Cash $ 25.00

=====================

Total $7,010.66

It's hard to believe with all the rain that we've had in June that so many of the nearby airports had good weather for their Fly-ins. In an effort to get to know my "new" (1941) J5 Cub, I went to as many of them as I could: Amery, Little Falls, Dodge Center, Stanton, and Aitkin. I logged dual instruction with our fearless leader, Bill Schanks, to Amery and Little Falls, and resorted to free-lance PIC Nick Stolley to make it to the others.

After finishing off 10 hours dual in type (for Avemco) Bill signed me off for solo last Friday so I hope to log some solo XC hours to a few of the remaining fly-ins this summer.

Amery was sparsely attended due to a slightly windy morning with scattered light showers. We saw Gene and Rosemary Frank in their RV at Little Falls, which was severe-clear for their flyin, but was also sparsely attended I think due to it's mid-day Saturday schedule. We found and parked next to a twin-sister orange J5 in Little Falls and attracted the attention of it's owner, who became our immediate best friend.

In Dodge Center, and at Aitkin the next week, Nick and I found Bob & Ileen Waldron and their Fairchild, Paul Liedl and his Outback, and Jerry Sarracco with the Lawn Boy Citabria, as well as two of my brothers from Mora with their Cherokee 140 and PA-16. The day for Dodge Center gave us perfect weather and a light tailwind both down and back; my brother Dave remembers clearly the last time he had that happen--in 1978. We also found Dan Bergstrom at Dodge Center in his Spezio Tuholer and Nick saw Gene Bergh with his Cessna 180. Dennis Hoffman took all of 43 minutes to fly to Aitkin in his Midget Mustang from Lake Elmo, about 43 minutes shorter than our flight there. We picked up one of my nephews in Mora on the way up and proved that the J5 with a C90 is perfectly willing to carry 3 people. Stearman Jack stopped at Mora on his way to Aitkin, leaving the same time as us, so we flew together, wishing we had a camera to capture him flying treetop level below us, or banking in at us for a close pass. A 20mph headwind made the trip back home just a little longer, and the mid-afternoon landing a little more interesting. The Rice pancakes were great at Aitkin as usual, and in addition to the usual tractor, steam engine, and classic car display, and flea-market, they also had choir music and a church service in one of the hangars, so there was a little something for everyone, and the organizers and line crew were as friendly and helpful as you'll find anywhere.

Annual Fly-In

Please post this at your chapter

A pair of Mcreary Air Trac 15X6:00 X 6 tires. Used for 10 test flight takeoffs and landings last month on Dakota
Hawk. Essentially new. Includes tubes too. Less than 1/2 price of Wag Aero. $65

EAA Chapter 54 NEWS Published monthly by Chapter 54 of the Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA) for the use, education and enjoyment of chapter members and others to whom it is provided. No claim is made for the accuracy of the materials presented. Editorial content is the opinion of the contributor and does not necessarily reflect the policies of Chapter 54 nor the EAA.

or emailed to: rjwaldron@mmmpcc.org

Permission for other EAA Chapters to use portions of this publication is granted, as long as credit is acknowledged.
Chapter 54 gathers at 7:30pm, on the Second Monday of each month, at an announced location (we lost our Chapter House during the storm).

Officers

Dan Parker 651-430-1532
Vice President - ParkerDc@quixnet.net

Wayne Asp 651-436-6868
Secretary - Wayne_Asp@HP.com

Bob Waldron 651-430-9178
Treasurer - rjWaldron@mmmpcc.org

Directors Class II
Jim Lund 651-645-1408
Publicity and Promo Lund@isd.net

Tim Reberg 651-730-8574
Events Tim2485@Juno.com

Nick Stolley 651-702-9331
Programs AirplaneIT@aol.com

Directors Class III
Art Edhlund 651-439-5912
Education aEdhlund@HotMail.com

Ed Peiffer 651-462-2517
Housing Peiffer21D@Prodigy.net

Scott Hutchinson 651-777-1872
Membership sHutch@lrData.com

Young Eagles Coordinator
Al Kupferschmidt 651-777-9257
RaeAndAl@usWest.net

Flight Advisors:
Bill Schanks 651-645-2420
Dale Rupp 651-653-1054

Tech Counselor
Bill Schanks 651-645-2420

Newsletter Editor:

Bob Waldron 651-430-9178 rjwaldron@mmmpcc.org

Visit our WEB site at www.eaa54.org