Category: Features

Art in Motion

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The craft of making fast bikes look even faster

Story by Mike Bolton
Photos by Jerry Martin
Rider photos submitted

The rider on the sleek, screaming motorcycle shifted left on the seat and his left knee dragged the asphalt as the brightly colored rocket hugged the turn at a speed that seemingly defied physics. The rider was not alone in his insanity. He was surrounded by other riders and their cycles in a perfectly choreographed high-speed routine that made Dancing with the Stars look like some vacation Bible school production.

Despite the incredible skill level, this motorcycle race broadcast by the SPEED Channel from another state means little to most NASCAR-addicted Southern channel surfers. Scoffing that motorcycle racing isn’t real racing, they steer the channels with the remote to the safer and less insane confines of Pawn Stars or Storage Wars.

Scott Moore isn’t the typical Southern channel surfer. He watches the race with intense interest. While the motorcycle being shown on television can’t claim its soul was born in the unassuming beige workshop just outside Moore’s back door in Washington Valley, he knows its identity is fully rooted there.

To say Moore has found an unlikely niche in a world foreign to most Alabamians is a gross understatement. The quiet 1984 Springville High graduate is not a mechanic that can make a motorcycle engine perform at magical levels. He’s an artist who can make a motorcycle a one-of-a-kind rolling billboard that is easily identifiable at 160 mph.

Erase the thought of the Teutels painting motorcycle frames on American Chopper. Motorcycle racers from across the big pond and across the U.S. ship their fairings — those fiberglass and carbon-fiber additions that make racing motorcycles aerodynamic — to the small shop in Springville for Moore to work his magic on. His business is called Fast-Finish.

How does an artist that isn’t that well-known in St. Clair County become so well known across the United States and the world?

“In 1992, I painted a few street bikes and amateur racers for some friends in Birmingham,” Moore said from his shop in Washington Valley, a shop that doesn’t even have a sign touting what goes on inside. “My friends took those bikes to some national events and other people saw them and asked where they had their paint-work done.

“I started getting painting requests and it just grew. I never really set out for it to turn out like this. Now I have stuff all over the world. It got there for awhile you could pick up just about any motorcycle magazine and see a motorcycle that I had done.”

By providing the identity for the motorcycles for World Superbike champion Neil Hodgson, former Moto GP champion Kevin Schwantz and former AMA Superbike champion Ben Spies, Moore was able to display his artwork across the U.S. and world. It has resulted in word-of-mouth advertising that has branched off in many different directions.

UPS delivery drivers have the route to Moore’s rural Washington Valley shop memorized as they provide frequent deliveries of motorcycle fairings to get Moore’s touch. One day he may receive fairings from a national racing team, the next day from Grammy Winner Trevor Sadler. A delivery may be from a vintage motorcycle enthusiast one day, a delivery from China from an admirer of Moore’s work the following day.

One of Moore’s biggest customers at the moment is the National Guard racing team belonging to Michael Jordan Motorsports. The former NBA great has owned an entire team of racing motorcycles for several years.

“My dad called me one day and said some guy named Michael Jordan had sent me a package by UPS and he wanted to know if I wanted him to just leave it on the driveway,” Moore said with a laugh. “I told him that he’d better put that one up in a safe place.”

The paint schemes for some motorcycles come from Moore’s head but bigger race teams provide direction.

“The bigger teams use a graphics art department that will send me detailed artwork of exactly how they want it to look,” he explained. “It will include every decal with instructions of where they go.

“Others will send me a sketch of what they want and others will just tell me to make it look good.”

The interest in vintage motorcycle racing has increased dramatically in the South with the opening of Barber’s Motorsports Park and the Barber’s Vintage Motorsports Museum in Leeds.

It has opened up a niche within a niche for the humble Moore. He has done the artwork for several motorcycles in the Barber’s museum as well as some $500,000 vintage motorcycles for individuals. His work has won best in show at the prestigious Amelia Island Vintage Motorcycle show in Florida and the vintage motorcycle show in Pebble Beach.

Vintage racing motorcycles now make up a good portion of his work.

Moore says his evolution into this type of work has been pretty amazing considering it was never in his dreams after graduating from high school.

“I worked in Birmingham for a land surveying crew and somebody wanted me to paint a truck for them and I just needed a place to do it,” he said. “My dad drove a truck and he paid me to wash the truck for him.

“I painted this truck and it turned out OK, and I started painting other trucks and cars. I figured out that the pay for painting them was a whole lot better than the pay for washing them.”

To see more of Moore’s work visit
www.fastfinishpainting.com

LEARJET 464 Juliet

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A mission of hope, a story of perseverance

Editor’s note: Excerpts from Wood’s book are italicized.

Story by Samantha Corona
Photos by Jerry Martin

In 1981, Bobby Wood sat down with a pen and paper, and began to write.

His story would have all the exciting elements – foreign countries, constant travels, a clash of cultures, gangs of criminals, and a few good guys who chose morals over money. It would highlight corrupt governments, an illegal industry on two continents, and one man’s quest to bring a valuable piece of American property — and history — home.

Most importantly, Wood’s story would be real. No fictional characters and no exaggerations, it would be his own true-life experiences – him and 464 Juliet.

“I wrote it all down by hand. I sat down and started writing, and I filled up notebook after notebook,” Wood said. “I wanted to include everything, every detail.”

Now, more than 30 years later, that original story Wood scribbled down has become a memoir, a nonfiction novel finally ready to be shared with the rest of the world – Learjet 464 Juliet.

“I’ve had this story for years and wanted to share it, but because of certain people and certain events, I wasn’t able to,” Wood said. “Now that some people have passed on, I’m able to publish it.”

Owner of Wood Performance in Pell City, Wood grew up in Birmingham, detouring to Florida before now calling Cropwell, Ala., home.

He began his love for engines early. His father owned and operated Wood Chevrolet in Birmingham, and it wasn’t long before the car fever caught on. Wood became involved in professional drag racing and was named the NHRA National record holder twice. He later traveled the nation in the Coca-Cola racing circuit.

Wood’s business today is leading innovation and design of carburetors and cam shafts for Harley Davidson motorcycles.

“I’ve always loved working with my hands. I like putting things together to see how they work,” he said.

In 1972, Wood moved to Opa-Locka, Florida, just outside Miami, with his wife, Terry, and their children. He started Wood Engineering, which built and designed products for the aircraft industry, and in 1978, under the title of Air Unlimited, Wood also opened a Cessna aircraft dealership, flight-training school and FAA repair station.

That’s where the story begins, and a Learjet by the name of 464 Juliet enters Wood’s life.

In January 1980, Raul Soto, Colombian by birth and Wood’s “right-hand man” at Air Unlimited, arranged for Wood to meet with a lawyer in Colombia who was interested in striking up an oil deal and in need of private investors. It was a proposition Wood decided to explore.

As the deal unfolded, Wood was introduced to another Colombian lawyer who brought his attention to the opportunity of restoring and returning confiscated airplanes.

The “business” of Colombia at that time – drug imports and exports – made available several abandoned and hijacked aircraft throughout the country. Some were left to waste away, some stripped for any value they could provide to the starving, money-hungry population, and some were considered property of the Colombian government and military.

An aviator at heart, Wood’s interest was piqued at the possibility of repairing and restoring these planes, both for the financial possibilities and the fun.

While out exploring the area and surveying a number of planes, native Soto remembered a U.S. plane that had been grounded just a few years earlier in 1977.

According to Wood and several news stories, the Learjet N464J was on a rescue mission to bring an American who had been badly injured in a plane crash back to the states to receive care in Texas. The victim was severely burned and required treatment that Colombian hospitals couldn’t provide.

“464 Juliet, a Jet Ambulance on a medical mission of mercy, had been sent to retrieve an American named Bruce Douglas Allen, who had been horribly injured in a plane crash. As Allen lay dying with third-degree burns over 80 percent of his body, Colombian officials and agencies, with the possible blessings of their United States counterparts, detained 464 Juliet on trumped-up charges of violation of airspace, and then, days later, neatly confiscated her by planting only fifty grams of cocaine onboard to ensure she would never leave Colombia. Neither would Allen, who was left to die unattended, a few days after 464 Juliet was confiscated.”

Six Americans – two pilots, two paramedics and two passengers – were jailed for their involvement with the rescue mission, but the circumstances, and their eventual release, left a number of unanswered questions.

As Wood made his way to the Simon Bolivar airport, where Juliet was detained, he saw the tail with her name, and it was love at first sight.

“Learjets are something special. I’ve always loved them, and I was excited about the chance to get her up and running again,” he said.

That opportunity wouldn’t be as easy as Wood had imagined.

As the story will tell readers, over several weeks and months, every roadblock imaginable lined the path – self-serving locals, legal red tape, drug lords and corrupt government officials would all have a say in Wood’s new quest to uncover the true story of that mercy mission and free Juliet.

“At that point I made a decision: If I didn’t get 464 Juliet out, no one else would either. I could have been wrong, but I didn’t believe so. I would turn their game back on them and muddy up the waters so much as to actual ownership that it would take years to clear – by that time the jet would be worthless.”

Today, Terry said she still remembers vividly how she felt every time her husband would head back to the Miami airport, bound for Colombia and whatever obstacles awaited him.

“I was terrified,” she said. “I knew he had to do this because he wanted it so badly, but I hated it every time he left.”

A man of deep faith, Wood said there was scarcely ever a moment when he didn’t feel completely fortunate to make it through alive. Without a doubt, he says the adventure would not have been possible without the grace of God.

“I have always been a devout believer in God, and I prayed to him for strength. I had been so busy, I had almost forgotten that He was there, but as I prayed, rattling over that road to Cienaga (city along the northern coast of Colombia), I truly felt His presence and was comforted.”

Thirty years later, Wood says he still feels blessed to have witnessed everything he did, and to have made it home to Terry and his children. As for the fate of 464 Juliet, he said, that is something readers will have to discover for themselves.

Flying High

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St. Clair residents revel in the thrill of hang gliding

Story by Loyd McIntosh
Photos by Jerry Martin

Since the time the first human being turned his eyes upward and saw a strange-featured creature flapping its wings in the air, mankind has dreamed of flying. For thousands upon thousands of years, fulfillment of that dream remained elusive, even as Homo sapiens conquered practically everything else. But a millennia of frustration, experimentation and spectacular failure was erased when a couple of bicycle builders from North Carolina named Orville and Wilbur became the first humans to achieve flight a little more than 109 years ago.

Since then, flying has become, for the most part, ho-hum. Routine. Another day at the office for millions of people traveling from meeting to meeting, airport to airport every single day; security checks in shoeless feet with unfamiliar hands getting a little too familiar.

If this experience makes you want to jump off the nearest cliff, rest assured, you’re not alone. But, before you leap, be sure to strap a giant kite to your back and get ready to really experience the miracle of flight. Some people might consider this method of flight, known as hang gliding, to be a little dangerous and a whole lot of crazy, but to a handful of St. Clair County residents, hang gliding is one heck of a thrill.

“It’s awesome,” said Bill Turner, a Springville resident and a dentist in Center Point. Turner at first glance may appear rather conservative and measured for the risky sport of hang gliding. But this self-described extreme sports enthusiast was introduced to hang gliding back in 1999 and almost 13 years later, hasn’t yet become bored with the feeling and excitement he gets from flying.

“My best description is if you can remember the dreams you had when you were a young child where you were just flying. You know, arms out flying around over things,” he said. “If you take that and put a small fan in front of your face to blow air on you, that’s what it’s like.”

Turner is part of a group of local gliders who are members of the Alabama Hang Gliding Association, a group started by another St. Clair County resident and avid glider, Phillip Dabney, back in 1980. The group has seen some ups and downs among its membership ranks over the years, but throughout the winter and spring, dozens of hang gliders from around the state make their way to launch sites dotting ridges and cliffs along Chandler Mountain.

Peaking at an elevation of 1,529 feet and overlooking Springville on one side and Oneonta in Blount County on the other, the mountain is a popular spot for hang gliders hungry for a place close to home to pursue their passion, even if it means having to pack up their gear with little advanced planning. “I started my own landscaping company in order to have more flexible hours and to be able to go hang gliding at a moment’s notice,” said Dabney, who lives close to his favorite launch point on Chandler Mountain near Springville. He and Turner say the challenge is the unpredictable nature of the weather patterns on the mountain.

“Everything is sort of determined by the wind and the weather,” Turner explained. “That ridge happens to face southeast, which means in the winter time, when we have those unseasonably warm days — 65 degrees, when normally it’s been 40 all week long — you get the wind blowing out of the southeast that takes that Florida air and warms the area around here and makes it delightful for us to fly.

“You want the wind to blow into the ridge and be deflected upward so when you launch, you’ll get up in that airlift that’s running along the ridge and then from that you can run into thermals and get up much higher,” he added.

Turner caught the hang gliding bug a dozen years ago after agreeing to accompany his brother, Jim, to Lookout Mountain near Chattanooga, home of some spectacular flying and where one of the nation’s best hang gliding schools happens to be located. Turner said his brother asked him to come along and take some photos during a tandem flight with an instructor. Initially believing his brother had gone a little loco in the dome, Turner agreed to go and brought his youngest son, Grant, along. Before he knew it, his son was wanting to fly. Turner suddenly realized he had a decision to make.

“So, we get up there and I sign him up and I’m thinking, ‘I’m going to have to come back here next Saturday and fly if the world finds out that my youngest son and my brother flew and I didn’t,” Turner recalled. “So, I plopped down another $125 and signed up for it.”

Before Turner could fly that morning, a warm weather storm came through, and his turn was postponed until the afternoon. By then, the choppy winds from the early morning were long gone. The conditions couldn’t have been more perfect. “My first flight was in air that had been calmed by the rain and was perfectly smooth, and I mean it just hooked me right in. It was so smooth, so nice and so much fun,” he said. That was in October 1999. “I’ve loved it ever since.”

Before long, Turner graduated from tandem flights to solo hang gliding and is now a tandem instructor himself. He said the thrill he received from hang gliding was so intense that it may have affected his judgment once in a while as a new pilot. However, even the most experienced pilots can have a close call or two — jumping off a cliff always comes with a certain amount of risk. Turner said he’s learned to dial back the adrenaline-junkie side of his personality over time.

“I probably let my love for it interfere with my common sense,” he said with a laugh. “I think I’m a little wiser now than I was then, but it gets in your system, and you love it so much that you just have to go every weekend.

“I’ve had a few close calls, more than I’d like to admit. Every pilot that has flown has had some close calls,” he noted. “There is a saying in aviation, ‘There are old pilots, there are bold pilots, but there are no old, bold pilots.’”

St. Clair County really is a sportsman’s paradise with plenty of lakes and acres upon acres of undisturbed land to take in and experience nature. But, Turner said, there is simply nothing like experiencing the surrounding area from the air silently and without so much as a windshield between the pilot and the world.

“We have lots of interaction with birds of prey up there. Not necessarily intentionally,” he said. “One of the things we look for when we try to find rising air is a bird, usually it’s a turkey vulture, but sometimes there are eagles or falcons, all sorts of birds like that, that will be circling, and we head into that air and try to get with them.

“Many times I have launched from Springville, and I have been on the wingtip of an eagle, and we’re circling each other. It is absolutely amazing. Sometimes we come up on birds that will be doing the ridge lift and really you’re just a few feet from them. Literally, I’ve been within 3 feet of a big bird, wings all the way out, and I could have reached out and touched it if I had wanted to,” Turner said. “The beauty up in the sky, particularly if you’re flying late at night and the sun is setting, is just amazing. And when the air smooths out, there are times when you can really fly with just two fingers on that control bar. It really is wonderful.”

For Dabney, who has been flying for almost 35 years, one of his favorite memories involved experiencing a certain weather phenomenon most people only hear about from meteorologists.

“I was flying with a friend over Blount Mountain. We were about 2,000 feet over the top of the mountain and flew out over the Big Oak Girls Ranch, and it started snowing. As we got lower, it turned to sleet then light rain,” Dabney said. “By the time we landed in the Washington Valley it was sunny, and none of the precipitation had made it to the ground. It had all evaporated in a drier layer of air near the ground. This phenomenon is called ‘virga.’ You may have heard (TV meteorologist) James Spann mention it.”

Regardless of the reasons for flying, which mountain you launch from, or whether it’s a tandem flight or solo, Turner said the idea of flying thousands of feet above the earth with only a helmet for protection is a buzz that never gets old. “There’s something incredibly exciting about having that big kite on your back, rolling down a hill, and realizing that you’re the only one controlling that thing.

“It’s so simple. It’s just pure flight.”

Features

Custom Candy

Independent business bringing its sweet operation to Moody

By Amanda Pritchard
Photos by Jerry Martin

Creating a candy wonderland for children of all ages, store owner and creator Hanson Watkins opened Indie Candy in Crestline Village with that goal in mind. The business has thrived, and now she is expanding production in Moody.

In looking for the perfect place to expand her business, Watkins searched within an hour radius all around Birmingham, but ultimately knew she wanted to settle in Moody. “My father has done business in Moody for 30 years. It has a great reputation.”

This natural gourmet sweets shop specializes in allergen-free candies. Still keeping its storefront in Crestline Village at 73 Church St., Watkins will over time be building her workforce from seven employees to approximately 25 once the expansion is complete.

Featuring treats that Watkins calls “super duper handmade,” Indie Candy provides sweets that are free from the big eight allergens — wheat, soy, peanuts, eggs, tree nuts, dairy, fish and shellfish. “If it’s on the market and fits in our all-natural, allergen-free category, then we have it,” Watkins said.

Producing hard candy, chocolate and gummies, Watkins says, “Indie Candy focuses heavily on quality ingredients, keeping things fresh and shipping immediately.” Citing its best-seller as flavored gummies, Indie Candy packages its edibles in festive seasonal wrappings. “Everyone’s gone crazy for our pumpkin pie brittle. We’ll have it packaged in our gift tins for Christmas.”

Making it a mission to bring new experiences to candy lovers, young and old, Indie Candy Public Relations Director Beth Norris said, “Watching kids come in and eat their first piece of chocolate is out of control. Women come in all the time who haven’t been able to have candy and ask which section can they have. When we say all of it, they get so excited.”

Celebrating brisk Halloween sales, the staff at Indie Candy shipped more than 8,000 individual pieces of candy.

Indie Candy does not just make candy for others. They treat themselves, too. Watkins and her family have had trouble finding the right edibles without allergens and food dyes, so she looked to herself to provide the goodies. Mango and cherry gummies are her personal favorites, while Norris says she prefers the truffle apple.

Offering alternatives to allergens, Indie Candy can be purchased at its Crestline location or through its website at www.indiecandy.com. New customers can also “like” Indie Candy’s Facebook page to find out what’s cooking in the kitchen.

Indie Candy’s move to Moody with its production facilities will be completed soon. The new location is at Moody Acres where Minnie’s Bakery once occupied space.

Looking forward to expanding her business, Watkins said, “This is such a big deal for families who haven’t been able to have candy before. We can’t help but feel like what we do matters.”

Flying High Over St. Clair

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By Elaine Hobson Miller
Photos by Jerry Martin

The tall, chubby guy in overalls and white tee-shirt runs up to the airshow emcee and in a drawl as Southern as coon dogs and camouflage starts babbling about redeeming a flight instruction coupon. Trying to get rid of the man, who claims he’s Clem Cleaver from Alabama, the emcee motions him toward a little yellow airplane. He tells the man standing beside it to give the guy a demo. But when Clem climbs aboard, he “accidentally” takes off on a wibbly-wobbly solo flight that culminates with his landing atop a pickup truck that’s doing 55 miles per hour down the runway.

It takes skill to do that. Not just the skill of landing on a moving target, but the skill of making it appear that you don’t know what you’re doing. Make no mistake about it, Greg Koontz knows what he’s doing. An aerobatics pilot, Master Flight Instructor, aerobatic pilot evaluator and the 2011 recipient of the FAA’s Flight Instructor of the Year for the Southern Region, this St. Clair County resident got his student pilot’s certificate three days before getting his driver’s license. He’s been flying high ever since.

“I learned to fly in 1969, and soloed before I got my driver’s license,” says Koontz. “At 17, I got my pilot’s license. My first plane was a 1946 Piper Cub that I rebuilt in my mom’s basement.”

The Clem Cleaver role is part of a comedy routine Greg and his Alabama Boys perform at air shows throughout the country. He developed this act in 2005, but he has been performing aerobatic maneuvers since he was a teenager. His father was a corporate pilot and took 7-year-old Koontz to an air show. At the end of the show, he announced, “I want to be an air show pilot.”

At 18, Koontz went to work for Moser’s Aero Sport Inc., in St. Augustine, Fla. His main job was flight instructor, but at 19, he began performing in Colonel Moser’s Flying Circus, flying air shows all over the Southeast and parts of the Caribbean. That’s where he learned the truck-top landing. “Jim & Ernie Moser were inducted into the Air Show Hall of Fame in Las Vegas in November (2011) by the International Council of Air Shows (ICAS),” he says. “It makes me proud that I was part of that operation.”

He spent 10 years running flight schools and charter businesses before taking a job as corporate pilot for McGriff, Seibels & Williams, Birmingham insurance agents. He held that position for 20 years, doing air shows on the side.

In 1995, he started coming to St. Clair County to do aerobatic maneuvers at a model airplane show the late Bud Caddell held every year on Slasham Road. When Caddell’s son stopped holding the shows about two years ago, Koontz held an open-house for some of his flying buddies. Strangers got wind of the event, mistook it for an air show and started showing up.

“I fed barbecue to 400 people this year,” Koontz says of his October lawn party. “With so many strangers and the cost of feeding folks, I may have to start charging and actually calling it an air show.”

The festivities take place on Koontz’s little piece of heaven on Slasham Road. When he and his wife, Cora, started coming out for the Caddell shows, they thought it was a beautiful area. In 1999, Bob Dugger sold them a corner of some land he had just purchased, along with rights to Dugger’s private grass runway. They built the hangar in 2002, and in 2004, after the last of their two children headed off to college, they built their house. They opened Sky Country Bed & Breakfast in 2005, using two spare bedrooms for their fly-in guests.

“I have the only aerobatic school with a B&B on a private grass air strip that I know about,” Koontz says. He teaches several types of aerobatic courses, specializing in beginners, and stays booked six to eight weeks in advance. “People who buy an aerobatic plane and want to expand their capabilities will take my complete course, but lots of people take aerobatics just to improve or enhance their flying abilities,” he says.

About 80 pilots a year train under Koontz at his headquarters. Hearing about him from air shows and the Internet, they come from all over the U.S. and around the world, including Spain, Portugal, Germany, South Africa, Argentina and the Philippines. The courses run from two to five days, with most pilots from outside the U.S. staying for five.

“The fun of doing this business is sitting around the dinner table talking with folks,” he says. He not only trains pilots, but does his own basic maintenance (he’s a licensed aircraft mechanic), all the cooking and grocery shopping, too. “My wife doesn’t cook,” he explains, not appearing the least bit bothered by this. After all, she works a full-time job in Birmingham. They were married in 1975, after he taught her to fly in 1974.

Koontz holds aerobatics clinics worldwide, in places like South Africa, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Canada and all over the U.S., including Alaska and Hawaii. He did an air show a few years ago in the United Arab Emirates, and he’s helping establish Portugal’s first aerobatics school.

He’s also an aerobatics competency evaluator. Aerobatic pilots start performing at 800 feet above ground, and must be evaluated every time they want to certify to fly at a lower altitude. In addition, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) requires aerobatic pilots to be re-evaluated annually and gave that task to ICAS. Koontz is chairman of the national committee that does this, the ACE (aerobatic competency evaluators) committee, managing a nationwide group of evaluators from every state.

Three airplanes dock in his hangar today, including a red Super Decathlon built by American Champion Aircraft of Wisconsin and emblazoned with the names of 14 sponsors. He also has a 1941 Piper Cub and a 1939 clipped-wing Cub. He uses all of those planes when he trains pilots and sometimes uses the pilots’ own aircraft. He recently purchased a Cessna 182 that he calls his traveling plane. It has four seats — room for Greg, Cora and two guests. “I always promised we’d get a traveling plane, one to take trips in, rather than to do tricks in,” he says.

The difference between a “traveling plane” and an aerobatic plane is more than just its seating capacity, however. An aerobatic plane is aerodynamically designed to do maneuvers and structurally designed to handle the G-forces they encounter.

Koontz performs in 20 air shows a year, flying to them in his Super Decathlon with one of the Alabama Boys. The remainder of the troupe, which includes son, James, Steven Smith, Fred Masterson, Tommy Foster and Bob Dugger, travels in the pickup that Koontz lands on during their routine. Not all of the Boys go to every show. The truck pulls a trailer carrying another yellow Piper Cub, its wings separated from the body and stowed on the inside walls of the trailer, like a dismembered butterfly. Koontz uses it for his comedy act, but flies the Super Decathlon for his aerobatics.

“Aerobatics is a very old, traditional act that has been around for many, many years,” he says. “I traced it back to the 1930s to a man named Mike Murphy. All aerobatics today are pretty much the same as Murphy invented, but with individual twists.”

Fellow aerobatics performer Patty Flagstaff of St. Augustine, Fla., herself a six-time member of the U.S. Aerobatic Team and the first woman to win the title of U.S. National Aerobatics Champion, has known Koontz for 15 to 20 years. She has nothing but praise for his talents.

“He’s a real pro, and I’ve never met anybody who doesn’t think highly of him,” she says. “He’s very well liked and he’s a really, really entertaining showman. I don’t do a lot of training because I don’t have a training plane, and I’m very careful who I send people to for instruction. But I’ve sent a lot of people to Greg, including a relative and one of my best friends.”

Like Patty, Koontz flies for the adventure, the freedom and the challenge. “Obviously, it’s a big thrill, being way off the ground like that, but it’s also the accomplishment that I enjoy,” he says. “It takes years and years to get better at it, and there’s always a new challenge.”

The entertainment component fascinates him, too. It’s a niche in aviation only a few people fill. “I like entertaining people. It’s very gratifying to me to land and have hundreds of people wanting my autograph. It’s fun to have that attention because I did a good job of entertaining.”

Aerobatics is a dangerous sport, he’ll admit that. He has lost five friends from air show crashes this year.

“That’s the secret in this business,” he says, “Don’t hit the ground.”

Features

Paradise Found: Sweet Apple Farm

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Story by Carol Pappas
Photos by Jerry Martin

Her inspiration came from the rolling pastures, an 1840s log cabin and a nondescript barn she turned into a crystal chandelier showplace.

It was paradise found the moment she saw it, but the “vision” took nearly a year to evolve. And now, on the outskirts of Pell City lies a majestic estate known as Sweet Apple Farm — a picturesque event venue “Miss Tina” wants to share with all who dream of celebrating a special day in a dream-come-true place.

The sprawling 80-acre estate didn’t always look as it does today. “A labor of love” over 12 months transformed it into a perfect place for weddings and other special events and parties.

The empty shell of an 1841 log cabin is fully restored and decorated with period antiques to be used as a honeymoon suite. The former owners, Bill and Barbara Alvis, bought it and had it moved to the property. But it remained a shell until Miss Tina, who got her abbreviated name from Alabamians who couldn’t pronounce the longer, Italian version, began her work there. “Now it is a real home for somebody. I tried to keep the integrity as much as I could but with modern conveniences.”

Just across the way is a garage turned into a guest cottage with courtyard and patio and all the amenities for a comfortable and memorable stay.

A nearby potting shed is now a dressing room and bathroom.

A gently rolling pasture of lush green features a simple, white archway to frame a wedding ceremony. Or move the nuptials inside to a small barn turned chapel.

A white picket fence fronts the property for three quarters of a mile, and two ponds are home to catfish, bream “and very large turtles,” she said.

But the focal point that draws like no other is the crystal chandelier barn with hardwood floors that evokes a magical feel as soon as she flips on the light switch. The kinship she feels with this part of the property is evident when she refers to it as a person rather than a structure.

“When I found her, I didn’t know what to do with her. I’ll know when I get there,” she said she would tell herself.

Her contracting crew, led by Pell City’s Randall Weaver, gutted and restored the home she lives in first. “But I was drawn to the barn over and over again.” Every day when the crew left, she would sit on a trash can and think and pray about what to do — “How can it best serve other people and make their dreams come true?”

Then she envisioned it — the whole place bathed in lights from dangling crystal chandeliers, reflecting in the rich and rustic texture of hardwood floors. “Then I knew the road I was on.”

It was then that she started her due diligence, she said, researching to see if it could become a viable business. Much to her own surprise, she found there was nothing like it in the area. “I followed my intuition, and it has been an honor and privilege to create this.”

The barn can play host to 150 people for a seated dinner or 200 for a buffet. A commercial prep kitchen services the barn, which boasts mammoth windows and glass doors all around to let the outside in — bringing the rolling hills into a perfectly framed view. From the ceiling beams hang rows and rows of imported chandeliers put together by hand by her electricians.

It is hard to imagine that it once served as a home to pigs and horses containing nothing more than stalls and a dirt floor. Today, it is has the feel of an elegant ballroom nestled cozily in the countryside.

When she moved to the region from Miami, “I thought I was retiring.” But the land and all that came with it beckoned her to see it as a “gift” to be shared others.

With a background in construction developments along with a radio talk show career, stints in newspaper writing and photography as well as wedding photography, Miss Tina is quite a story all on her own. Her distinctive voice set her on a path to radio when she was discovered by Roy Leonard and Paul Harvey, she said. “I did voiceovers for them.”

That led her to a talk show from a “feminine view” and various other careers and challenges over the years in Chicago and Miami.

She was never content to do just one thing, and her versatility shows in virtually every square inch of Sweet Apple Farm.

“It took Randall a month to quit rolling his eyes,” she said of her contractor’s reaction to the plans she had for the property. Custom benches are found all over the land. Solar lights at night shine “like diamonds,” she said. And an 1800 bell stands sentry over the chapel and her home.

A fire pit, a deer sanctuary, a screened pavilion, a walkway uncommonly made of manhole covers and stone and a “serenity pond” are but a few of the unusual touches she has given the place to make it a destination point like no other.

“I love helping people. That’s my bottom line. This has been the grandest challenge I have ever awarded myself, and I am humbly pleased to have met it. I created a very beautiful place to help make people’s dreams come true.”

Just like hers.

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