Hello Julie,

I'd like to tell you of some Norseman aircrafts that used to be at my local
airport, for skydiving purposes, beginning about 40 years ago.  They
impressed me so much over the years that I have begun searching eBay and
other places for memorabilia, model kits, and so forth.

Perhaps you are already aware of the Norseman aircraft used by
Parachutes Incorporated (PI) at Orange, Massachusetts, Hemet,
California, and Lakeville (I think) New Jersey.

I've always lived within 5 miles of the Orange airport, and am 53 years
old and blessed with a pretty good memory.  The skydiving center,
perhaps the very first commercial one in the USA, opened in 1959 with
Cessna aircrafts to carry the jumpers, three or four at a time.  The
sport caught on quickly and they soon needed larger planes, and in 1960
or 61, two Norseman arrived, painted up in the blue and white scheme of
PI. Noisy yes, but I loved that sound (however, many residents didn't
and complained constantly for about the next 15 years.)

In 1962 they hosted the "Sixth World Sport Parachuting Championships"
and brought in at least three more Norsemen, maybe four. Probably had
200 skydivers here at once, made a very big deal of it for the summer of
'62. Souvenir booklet and many more things.

Two of those added planes stand out in my mind.  A red one, with yellow
stripe tapering from cowl to tail that was simply beautiful, and a black
with yellow wing plane, unusual in that it had a three-bladed prop, the
rest were just a two-blade.  The newspaper had stories about the
upcoming planes and I remember the day they arrived, they were paraded
through the skies in a nose to tail "Conga Line" and I begged my folks
to take me to the airport that night to see them up close.  Just as we
arrived, I saw the owner / president of PI, Jacues-Andre Istel, looking
over the black one proudly, yelled out loud "My God, she's a beauty!" and
planted a kiss on the side of that plane!  He is still alive, in
California, must be about 70 something by now, and one of my high school
classmates stays in touch with him. I saw my friend last year at out 35
the reunion.

Hope you already know something about this operation, I have one b&w
picture that I took in 1961, and know that many more exist in our local
libraries and newspaper archives.

Several enthusiasts remain in the area, another of my friends has
large-scale plans to build a flying model, I'd say about 1/16 actual
size, maybe bigger. Saw those plans about 12 years ago.

Bernie Brouillet
Athol, Massachusetts
5-18-01