Aviation

A friend in New York sent me this very interesting article on Bloomberg.com all about the craze for collectiing high-powered binoculars. I must admit its not something I had given a lot of thought to until now! Read more HERE it really is very interesting.

It's impossible not to be surprised by what can turn up at a yard sale, car boot sale or garage sale. Like the story reported in yesterday's Kansas City.com. The story concerns a First officer's hat from a Transcontinental and Western Air flight from San Francisco to Burbank that ran into a severe storm and turned back because of ice. Blown off course, the DC-2 with nine souls aboard smashed into a snowy mountain in Yosemite National Park, just a couple of hundred feet from the crest. Read more HERE

One area of collecting that is gathering momentum is aviation memorabilia; Manion’s International House have an online auction that closes on December 28, 2008 at 8:30 p.m. CST. Previously Manions have tended to concentrate on military collectables but the growing interest in commercial aviation has them branching out. Many of the items offered for sale are from airlines that no longer operate. It’s one of those areas of collecting that can only increase in interest, especially with items dating back to pre-WW2 era when flying-boats took people to Africa, the Far East and across the Atlantic. Air Florida (the Captain's wings in the illustration) went bust in the 1970s.