Travel’s with Torn Henry

By Lee Toy
Vol. 3 No.2 – Mar. – Apr. 1980

kite workshops.

Margaret Greger, author, teacher and excellent kitemaker is coming to Cal-ifornia to give some kite classes.

From her letter;

“I will be in Calif. the week of April 6-13. Kite workshops are scheduled for April 9 and 10 evenings in Sacramento. People should pre-enroll through the Learning Exchange (916) 452-3919. April 12 and 13 will be another one-credit workshop at Chico State University at Chico.
The Center for Regional and Continu¬ing Education, CSUC, Chico, CA 95929 are the people to contact about this.”

Margaret goes on to mention that she may drop by the Bay Area either before or after the workshops. We all hope that she can come by and fly with us and show us some of her beautiful patchwork kites she has been working on.

announcement

Happy 13th birthday to Geoffery Paris who celebrated the day with kites,kake and kongratulations by his many friends at the Marina Green who speed him on his way to becoming a responsible kite flyer “get off my line”

Me exhibition:
“skyrishing°
(getting hooked on kites)

That’s the name of the upcoming kite exhibition in the Junior Arts Center Gallery in Los Angeles open-ing April 1■1980. Art Curator – James Volkert is organizing the exhibit and a number of other kite related events to be held in a near by park. “For The Benefit Of MR.
KITE” is the theme for a kite festival to be held and kite making workshops will be held each weekend. Call
the Junior Arts Center for further information as to exact dates of the events. (213) 666-1093

As the rains of January headed in, i headed out for Florida. The Delta L-101l charged into the midnight sky loaded with its sleepy passengers and tons of cold grit food. We disembarked in Atlanta and I roamed the airport in search of a connecting terminal which was finally found at the end of endurance aisle #54, just after the low hurdles and to the left of the six closed snack bars. The departure was highlighted by a 30 minute taxing tour of the Atlanta airport. After waiting for a Ford “Thunderbird” to take off, we departed and within an hour arrived in sunny Fort Lauderdale. 73 degrees at 3:30 a.m. and bikini kites sunning up and down the beaches greeted me upon arrival.

My good friend and fellow kiteflier, Bill Shapiro of Kansas City, was there at the air-port to pick me up and off we went. Bill and his Lady had found a good spot outside of Boca Raton for resting the bones. The beach was a little narrow but the winds were perfect. After a relaxing day of flying, we telephoned Dom Jal¬bert and set up a time to visit him at his Aerological Laboratory and to do some flying. The following day we net Dom and he took us into the lab, treating us to the history of his aerological inventions.

WASHINGTON KITEFLIERS ASSOCIATION NEEDS YOUR HELP

The WKA has been asked by the Pacific Science Center to expand their 7th annual Kite Fair from a one weekend show to a Three Month exhibition. (that’s what he wrote!!!!)

President of WKA-Bob Mc Cort sent us a letter requesting that we invite any interested kite maker to display his or her work in this show. Anything to do with kites is what they are after and they are interested in photos as well as actual items. Perhaps we as a group can get a package together to send up to represent the various kite interests in the Bay Area.

Individually you may also participate by sending what you wish to : Bob Mc Cort, 6706 162 P1. S.W. , Lynnwood Washington,98036 USA.
They would appreciate if items could be sent by May 15 so that they can prepare the show and also a catalogue.

Ed. These people really know what they are doing and have real experts in all facets of the showing – lets pitch in and help out!
I believe the Kite Fair will be held in June.

american kitefliers association update

The AKA is alive and well with 905 members world wide. Currently there is work being done to make the Association a Non-profit Organ-
ization (That shouldn’t be too hard)

There has been interest to establish the dates of May 3-10 as NATIONAL KITE WEEK. The AKA’s involvement in this will be geared to school and scout groups as well as to the general public.

The 1980 AKA annual meeting will be held in Seattle pending the selection and acceptance of a CHAIRMAN. This is a result of Ballots sent in by AKA members and Board menbers representing members at large.

If held the tentitive dates are to be Oct. 3,4&5,1980. This would provide a great opportunity for us WESTERNERS to attend. Dave Checkley as aggreeded to Host the meeting.

The AKA video tapes of the first meetings are being hunted down and returned to the organization for safe keeping. We have one copy here that has yet to be seen,before we send it back,if anyone out there knows of a machine that can handle a Panasonic Video Cassette NV-T60 please contact me immediately.please.

AKA is offering a throphy at the Smithsonian Kite Fly, or at least appropriating funds for one.

Minutes are available to those inter-ested, just send a self-addressed stamped envelope and your request.

coyote hills 2nd annual kite fly,

Jan : SOUTH-WORTH the naturalist at the Coyote Hills Regional Park has invited all interested kiters to come out to the Park for it’s Second Annual Kite Festival to be held on April g201980. As you who attended last yearAit was a beautiful day to fly kites and explore a most wonderful park. Don’t forget to pack a lunch. The Coyote Hills Regional Park is located near Fremont off of Patterson Ranch Road near the Dumbarton Bridge.

dear kite flyer……

Dear Kite Flyer,

Bay Area kiters might be interested in a unicue kiting activity going on every spring in the Santa Clara valley. It merits the interest and participation of serious kiter kiters.

Every year the YMCA Indian Guides and Princes¬ses hold kite flies at several locations.

The flies are a parent – child c000erative effort and the kites are homemade. Some “Y” directors say these events are THE OUTSTANDING parent – child activity of the year.

The events are held in several areas with lots of kites and enthusiasm, food is available on the site and a grand picnic feeling prevails. Its a good Place for serious kiters to show off their creations to perhaps inspire others to the grand folly of kiting.

The following are scheduled events I know of but, I think that the activity is also carried out outside the Valley as I have heard of Belmont doing it. Perhaps members in the various peninsula localities and East Bay could inquire what is going on in their areas.

East Valley – March 16 – Location to be anno announced – ph. 258-4419.
North West Branch – March 23 at Perterson”s High School, Santa Clara – Ph. 257-7150
South West Branch – call 356-7126
South Valley – Santa Teresa Park on various dates, call 356-7125

It’s a lot of fun to attend one of these events and the “Y” would probably appreciate You pre¬scence. They always give me a great welcome.

people like that in this area, although we aren’t doing badly with 50 members since start-up in May.

Even though there are so many books on kite-making, we still get requests for plans and construction tips. It seems there are still many secrets to the art and science of kite building. You have such a nice blend of local news, anecdotes and building infor-mation.
Eventually, we would like to do theme newsletters such as:THE DELTA: an aero dynamic exploration of swept-wing air-foils, how various shapes affect it’s performance, how to make them out of plastic, paper, and cloth, how and where to attach keels,etc.

another one:AERIAL PHOTOGRAPHY FROM KITES: how to do it successfully. If you have any information on these that you would like to share, we would be grateful.

Keep Up the Good Work

Garry Woodcock is the man behind the Toronto Kiteflier’s News. He is an active kiter who has worked hard in bringing together the kiters in the Toronto area and also keeping us informed as to news of the East. Garry is also on the AKA Board of Directors as the Canadian representative. We hope to keep in contact with Garry and hope his projects in his future newsletters become realities.

Great work Garry!!!

JUST WHAT THE DOCTOR ORDERED

Garry mentioned something about aerial photography and we recently received this from Dale Fleener:

Neil’s kite was featured as one of Kite Flyer’s “KITE OF THE MONTH”. Neil is an active kite maker and flyer as we can see by his involvement with the community – keep up the good work!!!
•

Dec. 20, 1979
Dear Kite Flyer,
Thanks so much for your very enjoyable
“Kite Flyer”. What an active bunch of
Kite Nuts you are. I wish we had more

Hi,

In case anybody there is interested in photography by kite, here’s a circuit for an intervolometer I use. I haven’t had the wind to try it after building it, but it works great on the ground. The DIP switch varies the time between con-tact closures according to the various combinations of “OFF’s” and “ON’s”. (SEE iLt.u.STRATiON-17.3)

This plugs into the winder of my 0M-1 but other winders should work as well.
KEEP FLYING,

Dale Fleener

I am not quite sure what Dale is talking about but if anybody does please let us know. Any pit’s Dale? (of the unit

…and now a word

We have as a community of kite enthusists been recently “FOUND” by museums, Art Galleries and Science Centers. We have been in contact with the Los Angeles Junior Art Center Gallery, The Maple Hill Pottery and Craft Gallery in Auburn, Maine, The Art Gallery of the University of Central Michigan and by our friends in Seattle – The Wash¬ington Kiteflier’s Association for a show at the Science Center in Seattle.

so….for you kitemakers and collectors who wish to gain recognition and have a few kites laying around that you wouldn’t mind having exhibited in some far off land, then you are in great demand.

It’s great to have you kite on exhibit, but only if You are assured that it will be properly presented and well looked after. it’.4s a lot of hours of loving work to be entrusted to someone who may not know the first or last thing about what a kite is.

With the increasing demands placed upon us as kite builders I think it would be help¬ful to develop some guide lines for exhibitors to keep in mind when displaying someone’s kite. It would also be helpful to set out guidelines for people interested in constructing kites for display, with tips on size and compactness, shipping and identifying.

Since exhibitors and our publishing schedule are rarely in sync and we are sometimes made aware of exhibits without time to contact you, it would be helpful for those of you who have kites you wish to exhibit to Let us know so that we can send you in¬formation as soon as we get it.

There are many types of exhibits. Some are juried shows Like the one in Central Mich. (Tal Streeter is the juror of that one). Some, like the Science Center in Seattle and the Jr. Art Center in L.A. are exhibits to help spread the growing interest of kites to the general public.

So if you’re interested in fame and re-cognition, drop us a line on the type of kites you would be interested in exhibiting and we’ll send you who to contact when the need arises…

tails of the city.

Here’s an interesting excerpt from the Sunday Examiner. It seems that in 1974 San Franciscan Judith Auda, a conceptual artist and sculptor, “…made the first serious attempt to lift San Francisco off the Peninsula by having everybody fly a kite at the same time. As physics the event was a flop; she didn’t even stir an earth¬quake. 3ut as art the event was tremendous.

Ten San Francisco hills, 50 kites from each hill. What an image — and everybody had a wonderful time participating in Art.” !.1s. Auda is present¬ly attempting a Pacific Ha. Between 7:45 and 7:46 a.m. on May 19th some 20 million West Coast residents from 3ellingham, Wash., to San Diego are going to take one minute out of their Lives to have a good laugh.

After the casual tour, we went to that famous back lot of his and flew parafoils of all shapes and configurations. Dom, who is a very strong, healthy person of only 75 years, de-lighted us in his demonstration of his way of holding the flying line bare-handed, using a closed fist and the top of your thumbnail. We tried it, but we were quick to reach for our Leather gloves.

We were told he is cutting back on the produc-tion of parafoils to only the J-15 model and the new J-7.5, which is now made in Hong Kong. Inci-dentally, we flew the new nylon J-7.5, and if anything, it flys more stable than the old model. The best part of all is the price and availability Do you retailers remember when everybody wanted a parafoil, but the availability was nil? Well, thanks to Hong Kong labor, plenty of foils are now available and they cost less.

We wrapped up our visit with Dom and spent most of the rest of our stay flying and eating stone crab.

My friends from Kansas City departed, and stayed on for a couple of days more to visit with Dom Jalbert and to look up Hod Taylor in Del Ray 3each. I had read about Hod many years back in Kite Tales and I was really anxious to meet the Tia—wirE—Yrrst attached the coyne cell to the Delta kite! Hod doesn’t make your ordinary delta; his are from 30 to 40 feet wide at the base and he flys them in a train. I found Hod and his wife wintering in Del Ray Beach, as the story in Kite Tales had said they would be.

I had brought along my kite photo album and we had a great time looking over each others photos and sharing delta kite stories. After we had visited for a while, Hod asked if I would like to meet Mrs. Walter Scott. We called her up and soon the discussion turned into a session of the Taylors and Mrs. Scott telling wonderful stories of how they used to fly with Ben Blinn and on and on, until I felt as if I didn’t really need to go back to San Francisco.

Well, 1 did return to San Francisco, but with a new perspective on kiteflying. If you want to feel, see and hear what it was that started the kite revolution in this country, don’t go looking for it in Hamamatsu or the wall of China — go and visit with some of the founding members of the American Kitefliers Association.

marina green report

Rain — it’s refreshing, and, gee, look how green everything is becoming; things certainly do look clean. There will be no water shortage this
year, but there is mold growing on the inside of the windows. How many weekends has it rained now? Is Los Angeles becoming an island?
The second weekend in March finally brought the sun and warmer temperatures to the glorious Marina Green. The place is looking like every kitaflier’s/jogger’s dream. With the advent of the beautiful weather came cords of happy kite-fliers.

New kites to make the “Green Scene” are George Ham’s 2 new parafoils, one being a 35 square foot American flag which was given to Marty Dowling to match his famous straw hat and orange coat. Lee Toy has made two new parafoils and several Nishi kites in nylon. Geoffrey and Roland Paris have had good success with a num¬ber of oriental designs in mylar and silk span. Raymond Lee flew his 3-band hummer kite — THUNDERGOD — on a 40 m.p.h. windy day (which incidentally sounded like a 747). Tom Henry has introduced two new parafoils to the Green flyers and a bouquet of 12 different colored hearts that look like a flock of butterflys in flight. On his trip to Florida Tom was able to bring back a J-50 Delta Parafoil on loan from Bill Shapiro. The delta-shaped foil has a very different way of being flared and pulls harder than a rectangular J-70.

attention

Roland Paris (Geoffery’s dad) passed by the Bonanza Inn Book Shoo at 650 Market St. S.F.
and spoted the BARGAIN of the month: Another Kite Book-“Kites and Kite Flying” by Ambrose Lloyd and Nicolette Thomas . Hamlyn publisher 1978. The book is imported from England and is priced at only $3.98 . pp.96 with many color photos of some very good looking kites and kite making instructions a real beauty of a book to add to your collection.

It’s even a hardcover.

NOTE
Word of financial success or gloom travels fast in the kite business, so r doubt if anyone hasn’t heard that the company named Kite World has gone bankrupt. What many kitefliers are concerned about is how they can now secure those beautiful WHITE 3I RD Kites from Chris and Heloise Lochman. Well, all one has to do is to pick up the tele¬phone or write to them in Sebastopol, CA 95472. they would love to hear from you.

EVENTS

MARCH 2 – April 6:EXHIBIT -Maple Hill Gallery, Auburn Maine. (207) 782-8768

March 19 – April 6: EXHIBIT
at Central Michigan University (517) 774-3800

March 29 – Smithsonian Kite Contest (Unconfirmed) Washington Monument Grounds in D.C.

May 3 – 10 (tentative) National Kite Week. Phil Cline, 7900
E. Riverside Dr. ■Pasadena, MD. 2112

By way of standard reference–KITE FLYER NEWS is available six times a year (weather permitting) at the minimal cost of a trip to Doggie Diner–$5.00 a shot. Send all money, trading stamps or gold bars to 861 Clara Drive, Palo Alto, CA 94303.