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Falling in Love with a Cassutt, Part II
By Steve Weaver
Steve Weaver in the early ’70s with his Cassutt. (Photo provided by Steve Weaver)To anyone who has been stranded, immobile and silent on the side of a busy interstate, the whoosh of passing cars and the blasts of air from speeding tractor trailers rocking your vehicle is familiar. You sit in your crippled automobile on the verge and you change not a whit the traffic that ignores you and continues on its way. I can tell you though, when the stalled vehicle is an airplane, things change completely. Apparently, jaded though the public is, the sight of an airplane beside a busy road is enough to stop traffic. Within minutes multiple cars and trucks had stopped and I had dispatched one volunteer to phone the airport and tell my friend Jake to come to my aid.
In twenty minutes or so Jake arrived, a wide smile plastered on his face. Thankfully, with the cell phone still an invention of the far future, the police had not also appeared, and we began to noodle the problem of getting the airplane back into the air.
Falling in love with a Cassutt
Steve Weaver in the early 70s with his speedy Cassutt. (Courtesy of Steve Weaver)By Steve Weaver
In the summer of 1974 I was operating a Flying Service in the northern part of West Virginia. My days were full to overflowing as I jumped between management duties and flying, managing the bustling FBO when I could and flying when I was needed to fill-in for the other pilots.
The charter business was booming at that time and many of my days (and nights) were spent flying businessmen and freight all over the Eastern part of the US in the Navajo, the Seneca and the Aztecs that we operated for hire. During one such trip to a small airport in the Eastern section of Pennsylvania, an ad on the office bulletin board caught my eye.
“For Sale, 1937 J-2 Cub”, the sign said. I owned a 1939 J-3 at the time, but I’d always been curious about the earlier Cubs that used the 40 horse power Continental engines. I inquired about it from the lady running the little airport, and she stated that it had been her deceased husband’s airplane and she wanted to sell it to make room in the hangar.