Barnstormer planes have rich history in Indiana

About 20 barnstormers flew over the Bloomington skies Tuesday, but each pilot and each biplane had a story to share if willing ears stood nearby to listen. \nThe 2006 American Barnstormers Tour provided community members an all-day visual feast and other "Golden Age of Aviation" fun at the Monroe County Airport. Both children and adults flocked to the airport to get a glimpse of living history from the 1920s through the 1940s.\nCalifornia resident Alan Buchner, a member of the American Barnstormers Tour, landed his 1929 Waco QDC closed-cockpit biplane on the runway sometime Tuesday morning to share his love of aviation with about 4,000 community members who attended the event. \nHe camped underneath one wing all day to avoid the heat waves and to mingle with people interested in either the history of the aircraft or his personal attachment to the biplane.\n"(A friend of mine and I) were looking at a Waco and I said 'someday I would like to have a Waco Cabin,' and he said, 'well, there's one in a barn down the street here,'" Buchner said as he stood next to a photo album stuffed with restoration pictures and other Waco memorabilia. "There it was, sitting in the corner with its wings off. They had put it in the barn for the winter."\nHe said the plane stood on its nose in the corner for about 15 years before a friend purchased the plane in 1969 and sold it to him in 1972. Upon joining the Waco Club in the hope of restoring the plane, Buchner said he learned from the history of ownership that he was the 17th owner and the fifth owner was his father, Les, in 1938.\nBuchner said the 1929 Waco QDC was one of the first closed-cockpit biplanes manufactured, and his plane was one of only 37 of its kind built. He said his is only one of two of that model remaining -- the other can still fly, but it was restored in the 1950s so it's in "pretty sad shape."\n"It says you can now fly in the comfort of a cabin and still see out all the way around, even to the rear. So that's why they had the back windows in it," he said, reading from the original 1929 sales brochure. "It's just a neat little airplane. It'll take off and land in less than 60 yards, which is really good for most airplanes." \nSimilar to professional race car drivers who have tinkered on cars since childhood, Buchner said his professional flying career began at the age of 14 when he worked for his father's charter airplane service. \nHe said he earned his license to fly in 1950, and he owns his own charter business in which he shuttles about 50 people across California and the country for a fee.\nConsidering he has spent most of his life high above the earth, Buchner said America looks a "whole lot better" from the air.\nAlthough the drive from California to Indiana by automobile might take 14 hours or more, Buchner said it took about nine hours to fly here in his biplane. \nHe said he followed the ground traffic on Highway 80 for most of the route, which resembled a "freight train going down the highway" because of all the cars and trucks, and because he saw only one other airplane in the sky during his trip.\n"I fly around California all the time, and when you fly across the farm country and the backyards you've got all kinds of farm equipment and old cars. Even downtown, in the backyards of houses there's old cars and all kinds of junk and stuff," Buchner said. "Around here it looks like a painting because every yard is just clean as a whistle. It looks like it's been mowed -- I mean it's just beautiful"