This year's Air Marking Project by the Scioto Valley Chapter of the Ninety Nines was to lay out and paint a Compass Rose at the Darby Dan airport (6I6), just west of Columbus on U.S. Route 40. Darby Dan is a privately owned airport belonging to the Galbreath family of Columbus, but the public has been welcome to use the airport since the early 1990s. Darby Dan has long held the reputation of being the finest private airport in the region. Here's a pointer to a nice article about John Galbreath, the family patriarch.
We originally had scheduled this project for the weekend of July 16, but thunderstorms scuttled the plans for that date. Therefore we rescheduled the Darby Dan Compass Rose for Saturday, August 13, with intent to complete the chalk-line layout on the preceding Friday evening, weather permitting. However, schedule conflicts changed the layout efforts to Friday morning instead, and five of us showed up at 0800 for three hours of measuring, crayoning, and the snapping of chalk lines. Hot and hazy weather threatened thunderstorms for the afternoon and evening, but they didn't materialize, so our chalk lines didn't get washed away overnight.
August 12, 2005
Myra Jamison, Jim Prater, Marilynn Miller (holding the steel tape at its center pivot point), and the Darby Dan Airport manager, Tom Beougher (pronounced approximately like Boo-ker). The location chosen for this compass rose was on a concrete pad just short of the approach end of runway 27, which in turn has a displaced threshold out of the picture on the right, behind Tom's back.
August 12, 2005
Jo-Ann Prater, Marilynn Miller, Myra Jamison, and Jim Prater, continuing with the layout of Darby Dan's new compass rose. This picture looks northward across a cornfield toward highway U.S. 40 in the distance.
August
13, 2005
At 0800 Saturday morning, the paint crew began to arrive, with hopes of finishing before the hottest part of the day, or before the thunderstorms arrived, whichever might come first. Marilynn is starting the 030˚ compass point, while Jann Bowne and Connie Copeland start near the inner portion of the 360˚ point. Jann is the only member of the group to have flown in this morning, mostly because her airplane had remained out of its hangar overnight at nearby Bolton Field. If she'd had the nuisance of dragging it out of the hangar this morning, Jann probably would have driven to Darby Dan, as did the rest of the group.
August
13, 2005
Brian Hopkins, Janie McIntire, Ken Scruggs, Jann Bowne, Connie Copeland, Ross Stowers, and Jo-Ann Prater are making great progress about midway through the panting phase. Brian, Ken, and Ross just happened along to see how the project was working out, and then volunteered their extremely welcome assistance. Ken Scruggs is also an aircraft owner/pilot and his company, Midwest Aerial Photography, is based at Darby Dan Airport. Thanks guys. We truly appreciated your generous help!
August
13, 2005
Connie, Jann, and Jim showing their customary attention to painting detail. The two "N" marks placed alongside the 360˚ point are in lieu of our usual single "N" outside the outer ring. There was insufficient clearance to the edge of the concrete for our usual placement, so this seemed like a good alternative.
August
13, 2005
Ross Stowers, Jim Prater, Marilynn Miller, Jann Bowne, Brian Hopkins, Ken Scruggs, Janie McIntire, and Jo-Ann Prater.
August
13, 2005
Ray Copeland, fending off criticism of "lying down on the job", inherited the task of filling in the stencil-lettered chapter signature, Scioto Valley 2005.
August
13, 2005
Ray could have milked this job for the rest of the day, except that he was under pressure to finish it so that the real painters could roll some white paint onto the area where he's relaxing.
August 13, 2005
Here's an overall picture of the progress to this point, which Tom Beougher took from a more elevated position on the top his vehicle, parked across the pad from the compass rose.
August
13, 2005
Connie and Ken gaze at their nearly completed handiwork, while a few of the others take a short rest break under the temporary shelter which Jo-Ann and Jim brought along for that very purpose. The air temperature was about 95˚ F at this point (35˚ C), and the noonday sun was strong. As it turned out, the thunderstorms forecast for early afternoon did not affect Darby Dan until late evening, developing instead both north and south of us during the afternoon.
August
13,. 2005
Tom Beougher climbed atop his van again to snap our traditional photo of the painters posed on points of the finished compass rose. From left to right are Jim Prater, Connie Copeland, Janie McIntire, Ross Stowers, Jann Bowne, Ken Scruggs, Ray Copeland, Brian Hopkins, Jo-Ann Prater, and Marilynn Miller.