Smith Flying Service

Part 2

Smith engaged experienced pilots to operate the Lake plane.  Joseph Baratta, Mountaintop, had his first plane ride at Smith’s Service in Forty Fort in 1939.  Baratta became an airplane mechanic in the Harrisburg area and first flew solo in 1943.  He later served in the Korean War as a plane mechanic.  In the 1950’s Baratta flew Smith’s Lake plane on weekends – recalling a ride cost $6.00.  The plane was flown to a dock on the Susquehanna River where Smith had fuel tanks to refuel the plane when needed.  Tours began at 10 or 11 A.M. and when very busy, Baratta was handed a sandwich or a hot dog for lunch.  He did not leave the plane until dark.  Power boats would try to race along the plane at take-off but the plane quickly gained speed to out-distance any speedboat.  Sometimes swimmers took hold of braces under the plane but the swimmers always fell off during take-off.  Russ Smith flew State Senator Andrew Sordoni’s private plane and Baratta flew for Andrew Sordoni, Jr.  He still pilots planes.

Bob Heim, Wilkes-Barre, began flying in the Williamsport area at age 18.  He served as an airplane mechanic in the US Air Force in Colorado with the earliest of the Air Force Academy students.  He relocated to the Wyoming Valley to obtain his commercial pilot’s license under the GI Bill with Smith’s Flying School.  While Smith sold Cessna airplanes he used a Piper Club (J-3) 65 HP plane initially at the Lake but later a Piper PA-11 90 HP plane.

Heim worked two seasons at the Lake in the late 1950’s.  He remembered it as a 20 minute ride – with room for only one adult passenger but sometimes two smaller adults could squeeze in the back of the plane.  Sometimes area pilots who worked to qualify for “seaplane rating” would lease the Smith plane for the needed experience to obtain this special license.  One time when Heim was in training with Smith in a seaplane Smith directed Heim in a simulated emergency and Heim landed in Huntsville Dam, the nearest body of water.  While landing the pilot could easily gauge the position and direction of sailboats, but motor boats with skiers could easily cut in front of the plane’s landing path.  A couple of times, with the plane fitted with skies for possible winter landings, Heim would fly to the Lake – and once dropped a passenger on the winter ice at a dock.

Both Baratta and Heim remember Smith hosting an annual summer party at the Lake hanger for the Quiet Birdmen, an association of flying enthusiasts.  A winter party was always hosted by Andy Perugino, the West Side restaurant owner and flyer.

The Smith air service never had a serious accident at the Lake.  Once, in mid-June 1948 a student pilot landed at the Lake near Sandy Beach when a float-pontoon separated from the craft.  A group of motor boat operators were able to tow the plane to the beach.  Other seaplane accidents in the Valley were unlucky.  The first seaplane to visit the Valley landed in the Susquehanna River in Wilkes-Barre in August 1920.  A couple of days later it crashed in Nesbitt Park, by the North Street Bridge, killing the pilot and a passenger.  In June 1956 a rented non-amphibious plane crashed into Lake Silkworth, killing the pilot and seriously injuring a young woman passenger.  A year to the day later, in June 1957, Stanley Urbanski, who had a seaplane based at the Lake, developed engine trouble and he tried to glide to a landing at Huntsville Dam.  The plane crashed into the Huntsville lake and sank.  Urbanski, then age 44, was able to swim to safety despite arm and leg injuries.  The plane was later recovered.

In 1950 Smith sold a portion of his lake frontage to the Harvey’s Lake Boat Club (now the Yacht Club).  In 1962 he sold the balance of his frontage and the hanger to the Club which remodeled the hanger front in later years – but it is still the base for the Club.  In 1969 Smith retired - three years before the Agnes Flood poured over the Forty Fort airport.

K. Russell Smith passed away on September 24, 1989. His spouse, the former Eleanor Magee, whom he married in March 1941, had passed away in 1962. They were survived by a daughter, Pamela Smith Walsh, O'Fallon, MO, who contributed to this article.

Thanks! to Dale Campbell for permission to use his video to open this article.

 

Revised with Video March 2020