Aviators rally to honor own

Charlie Byron of Hillsborough, whose love of flying was known to many, died at 79 on Nov. 3 at his home on Contention Pond. The Sunday before last, his wife Janet and about 150 of their friends, all either pilots or relatives of pilots, gathered at the Hawthorne-Feather Airport in Deering to share their memories of him.Charlie Byron (courtesy photo)

Several flew in from other airports, but it was a windy day, preventing some from arriving by plane. Friend, David Feather, pointed out that Charlie would have goaded them for avoiding flying in the strong winds, as he always did.

“I’ve flown with him when I had to lean into the wind after I got out of the airplane,” said Feather. “He had a real disdain for people who would let the wind keep them on the ground. It was like a joke. He was good-humored about it.”

Charlie was also known to tell his passengers not to worry if the door wasn’t latched while they were flying, “The wind will keep it closed.”

All the planes in the hangar were pulled outside for the Memorial Service and set in a semicircle nearby the doors, each with a black band around each of their left wings in memorial for Charlie. The only plane left in the hangar was his Cessna 172. His Aeronca Chief, a plane with floats, was at home on the pond. Inside, nearby his Cessna, amid displays of pictures and awards he earned set on easels, stories were being told.

One of Charlie’s community accomplishments was his dedication to the Experimental Aircraft Association’s Young Eagles program. Many local pilots are members who volunteer their time and airplanes to expose kids to their first experience with aviation.

“We have Young Eagle days for kids from 6 to 17. We take them up for their first time in an airplane. Charlie carried over a hundred kids on their first flights,” explained John Stahl, a commercial airline pilot with a penchant for aerobatics. “The biggest thing about Charlie, he was always there for everybody. He was free with his time. Charlie never kept track. It wasn’t: I did this for you so now you do this for me.”

Charlie was the sort of guy who could fix a plane with duct tape and twine. An avid aviator, a general contractor with the mind of an inventor, a land surveyor, a welder, Charlie was locally renowned for helping out everyone he knew with their planes and houses.

“He was a class act all around. Someone at the service said: Go out and do something nice for somebody you don’t know, because that was what Charlie did,” said Janet. “Our home phone was like the aviation/construction hotline.”

Charlie, nearly always the first to be at the airport on a snowy day to plow it out, spent most of his free time there.

“One of his favorite things was to fly out and have breakfast at other airports, like the one in Sanford, Maine. And he used to take his dog, Blaze, a Border Collie. Everybody joked that Blaze had more flying hours than most pilots in New Hampshire,” recalled Janet, who often compared him with a resourceful 80s television show character. “The other thing was his incredible ingenuity. He was a real MacGyver. He could fix anything with shoestring and duct tape. He was unbelievable.”

One friend, Gordon Webber, who pointed out that most of those who spoke at the service referred to Charlie as “a surrogate father, a mentor, a good Samaritan, and an instructor who taught many of them how to fly on floats,” recounted a story that reflected these traits in him.

“Charlie and Janet were flying in the Adirondacks. She was landing on a lake and pulled the throttle cable right out. So the engine is running with no way to slow it down. So Charlie, he turned the magnetos off, cutting the engine, and then when they needed power he turned them back on and sent spark to the engine, and so he controlled the throttle that way,” Webber explained. “Once they landed and hit the beach, Charlie made a fire and they had lunch. Then he rigged up some string through the firewall into the engine compartment and used two strings to control the throttle. They flew back to New Jersey with the strings.”

Janet said she “was in awe” on the flight home at his ability to fly under those conditions.

“I also felt some fear and trepidation about whether we would be able to land the plane back in Jersey at the airport,” Janet admitted. “But he flew it back and everything turned out fine.”

Paired with patience, Charlie’s ingenuity was never visibly foiled by frustration.

“He was always in control. He never lost his temper. I never saw him angry,” said Stahl, who pointed out that whenever Charlie found a new dent in his truck he brushed it off, shrugging his shoulders, rather than letting it get to him.

Perhaps the biggest testimony to his patience was the production of his Byroncraft, a project he worked on for over a decade in New Jersey, before he and Janet retired in New Hampshire. Janet described the Byroncraft as “an amphibious airplane with a cantilevered wing design.”The Byroncraft (courtesy photo)

Charlie worked on the Byroncraft for eleven years. When it was finally finished, he enjoyed one twenty-minute flight in it, only to have it destroyed by a tornado that passed through the airport the very next day.

“He was very depressed for a while,” said Janet. “They actually had a memorial service for the plane with all his friends. It really got to him, eleven years of his life down the drain.”

But, shouldering his disappointment, he went on with Janet to build their retirement home on Contention Pond, and a seaplane, and an iceboat – a craft with a sail and runners like a windsurfer on ice. The iceboat project was inspired by Feather.

“His generosity was as big as the hangar,” said Feather. “He was very kind to me as he was to everybody. Anytime I wanted anything connected to aviation, Charlie could solve it.”

Charlie also helped him build his Ultralight, a plane Feather described the construction of as “kind of like an erector set.”

Feather, a pharmacist not an airplane builder, worked on putting the Ultralight together with tips from Charlie until he came to the point where he had “to drill a few very important holes,” he recalled.

“So Charlie came with his transit and protractors and some other doohickeys,” Feather said. “He set up all that stuff around the airplane and told me just were to drill those holes.”

Even when the job was done, Charlie made sure it was airworthy. “I didn’t fly it until he test-flew it,” Feather admitted. Apparently, that wasn’t the first time Charlie took a plane on a test-flight for a friend.

Those who use the hangar at the Hawthorne-Feather airport feel his absence.

“He was always there, and I was always there, and now he’s not. It still takes a while when I pull into the airport and hangar to realize he’s not coming. Makes it kind of empty, a little bit of a void and a question mark,” said Stahl. “Charlie was really about living life. The whole world needs to take a lesson from Charlie.”