Interesting Goodies, Web, Photos, Writing, & More
Images

Images

Korean War MiG 15 – Old Photo

Korean War-era MiG 15 photographed at NAS Willow Grove in 1989
Korean War-era MiG 15 photographed at NAS Willow Grove in 1989

Admittedly, this is a fairly horrible scan of a print. But you don’t see a MiG 15 very often these days, so I figured the photo was worth the effort even if it was not as good as we might have hoped. Those interested in military aircraft history know that the MiG 15 was a formidable fighter during the Korean War. This one appeared at the NAS Willow Grove Air Show in 1989. It was there that this photograph was taken.

Every couple of years, as I recall, NAS Willow Grove hosted an air show. This image, and the two that were in the previous two posts, were taken during the show of ’89. At that time I was experimenting with Agfacolor color print film. Unfortunately, Agfa film of that time did not seem to have the same quality color as other films, not the least of which was Kodak’s Kodacolor. But, before one blames the old Agfa film for the problems with this photo, it is necessary to point out that the scanning was done using older Photoshop’s built-in WIA support. And that software, to be blunt, did not do a particularly good job. Acrobat X Pro creates a better scan, but there are other issues that I was not in the mood to deal with. Ah, well, we can’t have everything, can we?

Fuddy Duddy at NAS Willow Grove

Fuddy Duddy B-17 at NAS Willow Grove in 1987
Fuddy Duddy B-17 at NAS Willow Grove in 1987

This photo is a scan of a photo featuring the famous B-17, Fuddy Duddy. B-17s were, of course, Boeing bombers from WWII. However, according to the Lyon Air Museum Web site Fuddy Duddy was built under license by Douglas Aircraft. Lyon’s site further says that this bomber was used as VIP transport in the Pacific Theatre and appeared in several movies including Tora, Tora, Tora.

The picture above was snapped in 1989 at NAS Willow Grove during their popular air show. Since then, Fuddy Duddy has periodically flown in air shows around the country. It is interesting to note that the airplane has out-lasted NAS Willow Grove, which closed in 2011.

Chesapeake & Ohio #490

Chesapeak & Ohio #490 Hudson
Chesapeake & Ohio #490 Hudson

This photo of the famous Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad #490 Hudson was taken at the B & O Museum in Baltimore back in 1989. The locomotive is an L-1 class 4-6-4 steamer. It was built by Alco, but not in the Schenectady shops. At the time of this writing, reports indicate that this marvelous machine has been indoors at the museum for a long time, thus preserving it for the future.

Thacher Park View

Here is a 360o from the picnic area near the Haile’s Cave area of Thacher State Park. This is an experiment to find an acceptable panorama view plugin that works in WordPress. So far, this is the best one I have found. The others I have tried are terrible.

If you go about 1/4 mile farther along the road from this site you will come to the gate for the rock climbing access. The views from this entire segment of the park are fabulous. On this day we could see all the way to the Berkshires.

Not bad, eh?

Santa Fe Caboose at Lomita

Santa Fe caboose at the Lomita Railroad Museum
I snapped this photo of an old Santa Fe caboose at the Lomita Railroad Museum in Southern California a few years ago. If you are in the area, be sure to check out this fascinating little museum.  Visit www.lomita-rr-org.