THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, December 18, 1994 TAG: 9412180055
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY LANE DEGREGORY, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NAGS HEAD LENGTH: Medium: 94 lines
More than a half-century after the Wright brothers flew the first powered airplane over North Carolina's Outer Banks, Dr. Ed North declared the world was wrong.
``Birds fly. Men drink,'' North said over a martini or two one night. ``Men don't fly. Never will.''
The idea took off.
On Friday night, more than 350 skeptics gathered in the Comfort Inn here for the 35th annual ``Man Will Never Fly Memorial Society'' banquet. The imbibing event is held the evening before the area's anniversary of flight celebration. Participants from across the country think, drink and debunk aviation until the glasses run dry.
That way, they're usually too befoggled to witness the harsh reality of the next morning, when scores of planes are supposed to soar above the Wright Brothers National Memorial - less than 10 miles from the hotel.
Society members don't want to see such a sight. They don't believe in human flight.
And this year they didn't have to. The scheduled flyover Saturday never took place; it was called off, officials said, because of bad weather.
Try telling that to society members.
``Air travel? Who wants to go any place where the enterprise BEGINS at a TERMINAL?'' asked Larry Maddry, a columnist for this paper who emceed the three-hour mind- and elbow-bender.
``And who knows what an air pocket is anyway? If the entire universe is shaped like a pair of pants, where are the belt loops? And I don't even want to think about the fly!''
With speech-writing consultants like Jim Beam, Jack Daniels, Old Mr. Boston and Old Granddad, Memorial Society gatherings usually involve as many highballs as highbrows.
Revelers wear suits and shining shoes to the $25-per-plate fund-raiser. But their silk scarves are embroidered with a society emblems: smiling birds sitting in empty martini glasses.
The birds already have eaten the olives, and appear to be flying high.
To give their gathering a firm grounding, organizers try to select a theme each year.
Alternative methods of transportation were featured for a while, as members praised the pogo stick, winged horse, flypaper, yo-yos - even the cow that jumped over the moon.
This year, throwing everyone for a curve, they chose boomerangs.
``These things will never fly,'' one Doubting Thomas in a blue blazer said as he sat down to supper. On the pressed linen tablecloth beside his plate, a plastic propeller-shaped boomerang - with three prongs - was propped up with instructions. Lemon, raspberry and orange sherbet-colored swirls with black dots decorated the door prizes.
``Go ahead,'' the yellow leaflet urged.
``Throw a Tantrum.''
With the help of keynote speaker John Koehler of Virginia Beach, the entire society did just that.
``These party favors might be a little over your heads. But the elementary school kids love them. So you might grow into them, too,'' Koehler told the crowd of mostly middle-aged men - who seemed enchanted with their new toys: Tantrum Genuine Returning Boomerangs.
``Stop picking your teeth with it, Sir, and twist the wings counter-clockwise. Then, hold it between your thumb and forefinger and throw it vertically.''
With those words of encouragement, Koehler launched chaos.
He won the 1991 World Boomerang Championships in Australia. In 1992, he got the silver medal in Germany for his tosses. Friday night, his simple wisdom worked wonders on society skeptics.
Birds fly. Men drink. Boomerangs come back.
When you've been drinking, and you've never flown a plastic propeller, that concept can be slightly staggering. ILLUSTRATION: Photo
DREW C. WILSON/Staff
A Coast Guard helicopter circles over the Wright Brothers Memorial
Saturday as onlookers observe the 91st anniversary of the Wright
Brothres' first flight. Fog canceled the flyover of a number of
fixed-wing aircraft and moved the unveiling of portraits of former
President George Bush and aviation pioneer Eugene Barton Ely
inside.
by CNB