Flying Boxcar Comes Home

[jlaird]

Ahhh, my Air America was at Udorn and points north and east.

 

[prb51]

Jack,
I wasn't SF at the time, that came later. In RVN I was just an Infantry squad leader (Buck Sgt) nothing sexy at all.

 

[PAUL161]

I just watched Flight of the Phoenix the other day!

The original or the remake?

The original Jimmy Stewart/Richard Attenborough (sp?) movie starred a Fairchild C-82, the predecessor of the C-119. They called it a "Skytruck", though. The Hagerstown Aviation Museum bought a C-82 at the auction of Hawkins & Powers equipment in Greybull and ferried it to Hagerstown last year.

It was at that auction that the museum crew saw the C-119. They had spent all their money on the C-82, so could not bid on the C-119. But a benefactor bought at least two C-119s and parts and donated one to the museum. They had two to choose from; one was in the remake of <span style="font-style: italic">Flight of the Phoenix</span> (the Dennis Quaid one) and the other, the one they chose, starred as itself (a firebomber) in <span style="font-style: italic">Always</span>.

In the original film with Jimmy Stewart, Paul Mantz and Frank Tallman flew the thing. Paul Mantz, was killed in one of the final scenes when he caught a skid on a hill and the aircraft crashed and broke apart.