personal profiles

Here's a chap who has been visiting ModelFlight since its earliest days. We first heard from him on #6 in April 2000 when he told us about his revolutionary 'kinesthetic' training system that does not use the buddy box. Meet CLARENCE C RAGLAND:

Clarence, 53, comes from Lockport, NY, USA and is retired. He is married to Mary and they have a 30-year old son, Christopher.

Clarence flies both fixed wing and helicopters and has been in the hobby some 30 years. His home clubs are Lake Ontario Flyers and Niagara Sunday Fliers.

As well as model flight, Clarence is keen on amateur radio - AB2BP CW only apparently, which will doubtless be meaningful if you know about these things! He is pro-actively promoting R/C aero-modelling by giving flight instruction and free hands-on flying experience for both model airplanes and helicopters.

Flight instruction is something of a passion with Clarence, and he has recently made an innovative move which is helping a local hobby shop owner to positively increase his sales of R/C helicopters and 'planes. Using Clarence's instructor skills, Marc Colucci of Universal Entertainment in Niagara Falls, is offering a unique 'Fly Before You Buy' instructional program that puts his customers in the air with his own shop equipment before they commit themselves. "You will learn to fly," says the promotion, "Whether helicopters or planes, we'll get you flying toward a lifetime of enjoyment". It is clearly a great service to be able to offer and must lead to the introduction of model flying to many more beginners in the hobby.

What it means in practice is that, at no cost to him, Marc sends people to Clarence for the program and they can then also call on Clarence for further on-demand flight instruction. If clients have a problem in paying for further instruction, Clarence is able to refer them to any of several clubs where he knows free instruction is available.

There's been a link to Clarence's website on ModelFlight ever since he first made contact, but if you haven't visited his site but would like to know more about his training system, go to http://www.kites.org/rc_instructors where you can even learn to use his system yourself if you are already an experienced flyer.

By the way, if you're into R/C cars and trucks, you will also enjoy a visit to Marc Colucci's website, as he is an expert in this field. Go to http://www.universalentrnmtrc.com

Join in the fun, send ModelFlight an e-mail and tell us about yourself, your family, hobbies and interests, what you do for a living, how long you've been model-making, what club you belong to, etc. - in fact as much or as little as you see fit. Include a picture of yourself if you can.

Your e-mail address will be shown unless you specifically ask for it not to appear. Picture files ideally need to be in JPG format for best colour reproduction and to minimise time on-line.

If you want to send me pictures by conventional mail, my address is

Reg Heath, 60 South View Gardens, Andover, Hants, SP10 2AQ, UK

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