{"id":813,"date":"2006-02-16T23:33:52","date_gmt":"2006-02-17T04:33:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/example.org\/sky_king_a_surp"},"modified":"2006-02-16T23:33:52","modified_gmt":"2006-02-17T04:33:52","slug":"sky_king_a_surp","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/makingripples.com\/?p=813","title":{"rendered":"Sky King – a surprising role model"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Skynpeny\"<\/a>
\nI wrote an earlier post, Meanwhile, back at the ranch<\/a>,  about the Sky King radio show and its secret decoder rings.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

I recently discovered that there is much more to the Sky King saga. Many baby boomers became pilots because of the lasting influence of Sky King and his Cessna named Songbird.<\/p>\n

It probably isn’t so surprising because the flying rancher and his team fought crime in high-tech style. He flew a twin-engine plane and used two-way radio equipment to outwit and overcome the bad guys. He was a western hero of the future in many respects and this captured the imagination of his youthful audience.<\/p>\n

There were four radio Sky Kings including Jack Lester and the announcer was a fellow named Mike Wallace, who went on to become famous in his own right.<\/p>\n

\"Haircut\"<\/a>
\nThe TV version of Sky King starred Kirby Grant as Sky with Gloria Winters as Penny.<\/p>\n

There is a treasure trove of Sky King material on Kent Volgamore’s Kay Vee’s place<\/a> including DVDs and pictures. The pictures shown here are just a preview of those on Kent’s site. <\/p>\n

Be sure and check out the testimonials<\/a> from the men and women who became military, commercial, and private pilots as result of listening to Sky King and Penny on the radio or watching them on TV. <\/p>\n

This poem by Jim Dilly captures the spirit of what Sky King meant to these people.<\/p>\n

\n

SKY KING
by Jim Dilly<\/p>\n

My heroes have always been cowboys and they all carried guns-
and they all rode horses-that is all but one.<\/p>\n

When he went to the rescue he flew a Cessna plane.
His ranch was called the "Flying Crown" and "Sky King" was his name.<\/p>\n

Like all cowboys of his time he always fought for right,
and watching him there on TV lead many of us to flight.<\/p>\n

Every Saturday morning our hero would arrive with a pair of roaring engines
out of the clear blue western skies.
Many lives were touched by this TV man
and many of the pilots today are pilots because of him.<\/p>\n

We need a hero like him more now than we did then,
but unfortunately they quit making heroes like him.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

What a splendid legacy! I am sure there are more examples like this. Can any of you readers recall being inspired to embark on a career because of a radio or TV series?<\/p>\n

Tag: Sky King<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I wrote an earlier post, Meanwhile, back at the ranch,  about the Sky King radio show and its secret decoder rings. I recently discovered that there is much more to the Sky King saga. Many baby boomers became pilots because … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1779],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3R4iK-d7","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/makingripples.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/813"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/makingripples.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/makingripples.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/makingripples.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/makingripples.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=813"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/makingripples.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/813\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/makingripples.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=813"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/makingripples.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=813"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/makingripples.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=813"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}