Philip A. Stelzer (@phillyhipower)
Like you I really enjoyed watching the "Blacksheep" with my Dad as a kid when it was on TV as a brand new show. We also had a local gentleman named Harry Doan who was in the process of restoring an early F4U a few miles from our house.
This scrawny looking kid was me standing next to the Corsair he restored. I was stoked to say the least!
My Dad and I made regular visits to check up on the progress. Harry actually owned 3 full sized Corsairs, (a bunch of helicopters and other War Birds), but he only restored one of them. He sold off the F4U-1D (it might actually have been a Goodyear plane) and the ultra rare F2G "Race 57". Later on this one was restored fully by Bob Odegard.
Harry died in an airshow crash when he flipped his Skyraider over on landing at the Ti-Co airshow in the early 1990's. He gave me free tickets, but something came up and I didn't get to go. Now I'm glad I didn't, as I would have watched a friend get killed that day.
I'm especially stoked about the decal choice on this one. One of Harry Doan's Corsairs was actually in storage at NAS Jacksonville for quite some time before he got it.
I will definitely be looking out for updates on this one. Thanks for joining us as we honor Jim.
