Folks, These Hanger project updates and your responses to these photos and information has grown so large that the pages are taking forever to download. So - In an attempt to cut the download time required to view the photos and pages I have split them up into separate pages. Beginning with the September 2005 update you can find the reports and photos by clicking on the appropriate link below.
Thanks for your patience and interest in our hanger project.

December 21st, 2005 Update...

Sept 21st, 2005 Update.... Interior walls sheetrocked, electrical in, roof/ceiling trusses installed.

August 29th, 2005. Update... Hanger door is installed and skined.

Photos compliments of Emmette Craver

August 11th, 2005. Update... The hanger door arrives.

A good crew showed up to help inspect and supervise the unloading when our new hanger door arrived. Fortunately for all concerned Spivey's big fork truck was still on site and they managed to get a driver out there to get this thing off the truck. Even though we had what appeared to be an ample amount of warm bodies on hand the prospects of lifting that 1,000 pound door out of the truck by hand was still a little more than anyone really wanted to tackle. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief when the door was finally off the truck and lowered to the ground. Spivey's operator was able to extract the door from the truck and placed it in front of the hanger with the care and ease of handling a baby carriage, great job guys, thanks.
And then of course with another "job well done" chapter members retreated to a good lunch of corn bread and beans. Now all that remains is to get that thing erected and hung so we can close off the hanger.
Things are really taking shape now and it's beginning to look like this chapter is going to have a home soon.

July 31st UPDATE, Progress on the hanger is going along pretty much as planned. Here are some update photos taken by Emmette Craver.

July 30th, 2005

July 28th, 2005

Chapter 59 is very pleased to announce that we have been selected to receive a grant from the prestigious Wolf Aviation Fund.
read more here

Here is a link to the McGregor Lease contract. This is in a ZIP file and the document is in a scanned image file format. This can be opened with any copy of a program typically used to view photos or pictures. Down load the ZIP lease file HERE.

I have also placed a copy of the lease HERE in Adobe Acrobat PDF file format for those who do not have the WinZip archive program or a suitable image viewer.

If you have any questions or comments please post them on the chapter Bulletin Board HERE.

May 2003. The Building Committee has made some substantial progress. Design plans and construction plans have been drawn up and paid for without dipping into the chapter funds or any of the money collected for the project at this point. These plans and construction drawings were paid for by anonymous donations targeted specifically for the purpose. Discussions with the (potential) major contractor and also the McGregor Airport authority and the McGregor city officials have taken place and all indications are that this is still a doable project. The reason the plans were drawn up at this early stage was to aid in the submission of several grant proposals which required a full set of plans. It also appears that the McGregor Airport is about ready to start the expansion of the required taxiway. That gives us 18 months to get our stuff in order or get out.

A lot of time, effort, and attention has been paid to resolving several key issues concerning the scope, cost, size and expense of the project. And several chapter members have voiced some pretty severe objections to the project. Some of those concerns include everything from No Hanger at all, - to - "Why does it have to be so

Here are some links to the currently available Building Committee Minutes of the meetings. These files are in Microsoft Word format which can be accessed by most Windows computers. If you have trouble accessing any of them please let me know what you want and I will do my best to accomodate you.

Building Committee Minutes-01-23-03

Building Committee Minutes-02-06-03

Building Committee Minutes-02-20-03

Building Committee Minutes-03-06-03

Building Committee Minutes-05-01-03

January 2003. Chapter 59 President Emmette Craver made a request for five volenteers to head up a new hanger building committee. These volenteers will have the responsibility to actually get the hanger and Chapter 59 home funded and built.

The EAA Chapter 59 membership voted on Tuesday, June 4th, 2002 to accept the lease contract with the City of McGregor to acquire a parcel of land at the McGregor Airport for the purposes of building a Chapter 59 hanger and activities center. 

Under the terms of the lease contract the name of the new facility will be "EAA Chapter 59 Aviation Training Facility". 
The lease contract must now be presented to the City of McGregor for approval by the City Counsel. 

According to the terms of the lease construction of the facility could begin as early as this fall but will probably take a few more years. The City intends to build an extension to one of the existing taxi ways sometime in 2003. The new EAA Chapter 59 Aviation Training Facility will be built at the end of that new taxi way. According to the lease, we will have an additional 18 months after the completion of the new taxi way to begin construction. 

EAA Chapter 59 has already begun fund raising activities to secure the funding required to complete the project. Under our current 501-C3 tax exempt status donations provided to the Chapter are tax deductible. 

IMPORTANT UPDATE: 

On July 8th, 2002 The City Counsel for the City of McGregor voted to accept and approve the contract for the EAA Chapter 59 Aviation Training Facility. 

A Generous Donation: Long time EAA Chapter 59 member John Foy donated his Stewart S-51 kit project to the chapter. The Stewart kit was sold at auction on Ebay for a total of $31,200.00. The proceeds of this sale will be used exclusively for the Chapter 59 Aviation Training Facility. A gentleman and fellow EAA-er from Bethlehem Connecticut by the name of Tom Whelan purchased the S-51. Tom is the President of EAA Chapter 1097 and is an avid builder of some really beautiful RVs. Our thanks to both John Foy for his generious donation and to Mister Tom Whelan for buying the kit.

Your's truly (Ron McKinley) had the pleasure of delivering the Stewart S-51 to the Whelan Farms airport in Connecticut on October 15th, 2002. You can read more about my trip in my report page. 

November 2002, We are currently in the process of organizing a Hanger Project development and stearing committee. This building committee will consist of at least five chapter members and will have the responsibility of over-seeing the project. Obviously with a project of this magnatude there is no shortage of important issues that need to be addressed. Not the least of which is the cost of building the hanger and facility, but also the long term maintainence and operations costs of the facility once it is completed. 

Here are some drawings and concept renderings created by yours-truely the webmaster. These are simply preliminary concept and an idea of what the facility might look like. Obviously since I am not the architect and I don't have the final say in anything, plus the fact that the concrete has not been poured yet and we still don't have enough money to build anything yet anyway, Nothing is etched in concrete yet. So please don't blow up at these design plans. I could have included a sixth and seventh floor and a drive through for our limo's.
Here are the drawings