Texas Flying Legends

[Mark D]

I recently went camping in Wiscassett, Maine at a camp ground that is situated next to a small airfield. One morning I was taking some pictures when I heard what sounded like several prop planes coming right over the trees behind me. I looked up and snapped this picture:

Over the next few days there were several other fly overs of WWII era planes that I managed to get photos of:

It turns out that the Wiscasset air strip is the summer home of the Texas Flying Legends. You can visit their site here if you are interested in WWII era aircraft: http://www.flyingfreedom.us

I've never been a plane guy but these aircraft are absolutely beautiful. Btw, the Texas Flying Legends claim that the Japanese Zero is the same model number as those that attacked Pearl Harbor, and is the last specimen still flying in the world today.

 

[1930artdeco]

You are soooooooooo lucky! You even captured a shot of my baby protecting the B-25.

Mike

 

[Mark D]

You are soooooooooo lucky! You even captured a shot of my baby protecting the B-25.

Mike

Very lucky indeed! There were several other fly-overs that weekend most of which I missed with my camera. The picture that you commented on was taken on the third and final day that we were there. This time the planes, rather than taking off single file, came over the trees in a formation. One-by-one the smaller planes banked off to their right behind the B25. I was able to get to my camera and just started clicking away a fast as I could.

In this picture from that set (The first one of the series) you can see a trail left by the zero (already off camera) as the P51 begins its bank. Soon after the FG-1D began its roll and I got the shot that I posted earlier.

Btw, I played with that photograph a bit. I zoomed in on two planes and cropped it. The original perspective is like the one show here.

Of the entire weekend the very best photo was one that I missed though. In our group was a Japanese exchange student. We were swimming very near the end of the strip and the zero came in from somewhere to land. It couldn’t have been even 150 feet over our heads. If only I had a picture of the jaw-dropped expression on that teenage girl’s face when she saw that thing with those big ‘ol red circles on the wings. She came all the way from Yokohama to have a 70 year old zero fly right over her head.

With that plane coming in so low I got a sense of the perspective the men had on December 7th. Those guys could see the pilots that were bombing them.