12 I The Lovell Chronicle I October 7, 2010 www.LovellChronicle.com
A dream come true
II
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in
Pilot Todd Nunn (left) helps D.W. Harry into his L-16A Champion Tuesday
morning for Harry's own local "honor flight."
Right, Todd Nunn and D.W. Harry
taxi on the runway at the North Big
Horn County Airport just before
liftoff on their flight honoring Harry
for his service during World War II.
The flight was a dream come true for
Harry and his daughter, Darla.
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BY DAVID PECK
A Lovell man who
fought for his country in
World War II received a
special treat this week - a
flight in a vintage airplane
courtesy of Lovell pilot
Todd Nunn.
David W. "D.W." Har-
ry, 88, who a few months
ago moved to Lovell from
Riverton and is a resident
at the New Horizons Care
Center, fought in the South
Pacific as a top turret gun-
ner in a North American
PBJ-1 bomber, flying for
the U.S. Marine Air Corps
as a member of 443rd Ma-
rine Bombing Squadron.
The PBJ-1 was the Navy/
Marine Corps version of
the famous B-25 Mitchell
twin-engine bomber made
famous by Jimmy Doolit-
tle's morale-boosting raid
on Tokyo in April of 1942.
As the turret gunner,
Harry fired twin 50-caliber
machine guns.
One of his Marine Air
Corps buddies was Bill
Stanbaugh of Cody.
Nunn, an EMT at
North Big Horn Hospital,
befriended Harry at the
care center and borrowed
his books about the war in
the South Pacific, he said.
"We visited about flying
and said to each other, We
need to go flying,'" Nunn
said. D.W.'s daughter, Dar-
la Kleiner of Lovell, had
tried to get someone in Riv-
erton to take her father up
for a flight when they lived
there - with no success.
After plenty of talk
about a flight, Nunn decid-
ed to make it happen.
"D.W. and his genera-
tion did more for this coun-
try than people want to ad-
mit," Nunn said. "We have
a fellow in our community
it's quite an honor to know.
D.W. and others left their
country and went through
hell, and I thought it was
time to get him up in the
friendly skies."
Nunn, a veteran of 15
years flying for the Civil
Air Patrol and 23 years of
flying overall, had a perfect
airplane for D.W. - a vin-
tage 1947 Aeronca L-16A
Champion. The L-16A was
a two-seat, high-wing liai-
son airplane that served
extensively in the Korean
War and was used for ob-
servation, search and res-
cue, forward air control, ar-
tillery spotting and more,
Nunn said.
Built in Middletown,
Ohio, Nunn's Champion
has been restored and is
now painted in Air Force
colors.
D.W. arrived at North
Big Horn County Airport
north of Cowley Tuesday
morning with Darla and
Tom Kleiner. Fellow hos-
pital EMT Steven Hecker
came along to assist. Nunn
had the plane ready to go
and gave D.W. a leather
flight jacket to wear. D.W.
took the back seat, was
strapped in and proudly
donned the headphones
and mic to talk with Nunn
during the flight. After a
brief warmup and an ai-
leron and rudder check,
Nunn and Harry took off
with plans to circle the
hospital and care center
and see some of the coun-
try around Lovell.
Daughter Darla's eyes
filled with tears as her
dad took off into the clear
blue sky. For her, it was
a dream come true. For
Todd Nunn, it was a good
deed that just needed to
be done, a way to honor
a member of the Greatest
Generation.
Since the start of recent re-
cycling efforts in Lovell, marked
by a drop-off location at Lovell
Middle School in mid-2007, more
and more materials have been
making their way to a recycling
center each year, instead of being
dumped in a landfill.
About 51,880 pounds, nearly
26 tons, of material has been re-
cycled using the two trailers at
the Red Apple parking lot in the
past year, according to Christy
Fleming of the National Park
Service.
"The recycling trailers are
an example of true community
pride and effort," Fleming said.
The recycling program start-
ed with former hospital employ-
ee Del Weinhold with containers
at LMS and today is now main-
tained by the NPS, Forest Ser-
vice, Town of Lovell and recy-
cling volunteers Will Wipf and
Bob DeRocher.
In the early days of the pro-
gram the trailer was hauled ev-
ery other week with an aver-
age of 1,500 pounds per load. In
June of 2010 a second trailer was
added just for cardboard. Since
that time the trailers have been
hauled on an alternating sched-
ule. The cardboard trailer av-
erages 600 pounds per trip and
the recycling trailer has been be-
tween 1,500 to 2,000 pounds or
more per trip.
"We have seen the recycling
trailer continue to be full and
overflowing on the new sched-
ule," Fleming said.
In November the cardboard
trailer will be hauled every other
week on Wednesdays and the re-
cycling trailer will make a week-
ly Thursday trip. The addition
of the cardboard trailer has cut
down the amount of recycling
left as overflow around the trail-
er by opening new spaces in the
recycling trailer, Fleming said.
"The new schedule will hope-
the volume of materials has in-
creased. She said recyclables
dropped off at the Lovell Post
Office are also trucked to the
Powell Recycling Center in the
recycling trailers.
Fleming said they have been
receiving a lot of cardboard and
that the paper and plastic bins
are almost always overflowing by
the time of the semi-weekly trip.
"It's exciting to see the com-
munity continue to use the re-
cycling trailers and continue to
make the program grow," she
said. "I hope to see it get bigger
in the future."
Fleming said everyone in-
volved in the recycling program
would like to thank the commu-
nity for its continued support ......................................................................................................
She said the NPS appreciates
the volunteers and agencies that
fully alleviate that completely help to haul the recycling trail-
while encouraging even more re-
cycling," she said.
Fleming said the numbers
are slightly skewed because the
program stopped accepting glass
recyclables, so the total weight
has gone down slightly, though
er and Mary Jo Decker and the
Powell Valley Recycling Center
and the Red Apple for making
the program possible.
For questions or if you would
like to volunteer, contact Jenni-
fer Schneider at 307-548-5420.
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