By Matt Ruder, EAA 565390
On July 15, 2023, a very special thing happened due to the most gracious group of pilots.
Backstory: Gene “Stick” Ruder, EAA 75002 and Vintage 35, was a pilot by every definition. Born in 1929, he was in love with flight at an early age. He became a fighter pilot with the Air Force and flew combat missions in Korea. After active duty with the Air Force, he continued to fly fighters for the Air National Guard for a total of 23 years of military service. He also flew for United Airlines for 34 years, retiring on the DC-10 in 1989. In 1968, he bought a farm in northern Illinois and created a grass runway. An airport was born… 59IL on the charts. On “The Farm” he had a Cub, Navion, Cessna 150/150, and others while renting hangar space to many aircraft owners throughout the decades. He received the Wright Brothers Master Pilot Award. He even turned down the space program because he didn’t want to be “bounced around.” Sadly, a classmate of his, Gus Grissom, perished in the space program. Indeed, Stick was a pilot. Stick was my dad.
Stick suffered a stroke in April 2022. Although he was still current to fly at age 92, he was now wheelchair-bound with limited speech. He had care throughout the day from AWESOME nurses. After about a year in that state, he said that he wanted to go for “One last ride…” When I heard that, well, I was going to move Heaven and Earth to make it happen.
I reached out on a couple of social media pages associated with the Navion. The Navion was his favorite personal airplane. Of course, the Navion has a sliding canopy and low wing so getting him in it with his limited mobility made it a great choice. Fate then happened. A hero named Greg Young responded to my request to give an old “Navioneer” a ride. It just so happened that Greg’s group of Navion owner/pilots were having a formation flying clinic three miles away from The Farm at DeKalb Airport (DKB). They all agreed to make this happen.
We weren’t certain about when the Navions would arrive at The Farm, but we took Stick outside while we waited. Because Oshkosh was about to happen and several groups staged out of DKB for it and other events, we were treated to a lot of flying activity over The Farm including a B-29, B-24, and some L-19s and such. Then, things started to happen.
A flight of three Navions, one with smoke, approached from the north for a flyover. Then they came from the east as they peeled off in perfect timing to set up for landing on 27 at The Farm. They all taxied up and I parked them, trying my best to remember the proper hand signals. All pilots got out and visited with Dad and the roughly dozen family and friends there. We never told Stick that the purpose of this impromptu fly-in was to give him one last ride. My brother, Dave, asked him if he wanted to go up and he said yes. Perhaps of note, one of the pilots was a doctor, two of Dad’s nurses were there, and we had several able-bodied men to get him from the wheelchair into the cockpit, so we weren’t worried about his frail state. Of the pick of Navions, Dad chose the one with air conditioning of course.
So, with many hands, Dad was in the cockpit again, for one last ride. I sat in the back seat, Dad in the front right, with Greg as PIC. We taxied out on the grass strip that Dad flew me home from the hospital at a few days old after being born, in a Navion. He gave me my first ride, and Greg and I were giving him his last. It was a beautiful VFR day. Greg went through the checklists and rolled down the runway. Dad was airborne again.
I thought we shouldn’t be up very long due to Dad’s frail condition. I was surprised and very happy to hear that another Navion was waiting to join up on the wing. Kevin Domingue joined us in formation, and we enjoyed the countryside as a two-ship of Navions with Greg as flight lead. As we finished the flight, Greg came in low over 27 and did a gentle pull-up to settle in for a perfect landing, just as gently for Dad at 94 as Dad did for me as a newborn. It was the most special day indeed.
Post flight, we got Dad out of the cockpit and in for some rest. He wasn’t very talkative that day, but in the following days the proof of how special this day was shined through. He was asked by one how his flight the other day was. His response, “The best flight of my life.” Another asked the same. His response, “I didn’t like it.” She asked, “Why not?” His response, “Because his [Navion] was nicer than mine.” He still had his wit.
Dad died three months later on October 29, 2023.
If it weren’t for many special people, he wouldn’t have gotten his last ride. Many thanks to pilots Greg Young, Russell Herrington, Tom Burlace, Bill Klungle, and Kevin Domingue. Nurses Kirsten Knight and Jill Atkins were there to help, as well as family friend Jamie Willrett to get Dad in the cockpit. I offered the pilots fuel, money, donuts… anything they wanted. The only thing they requested was for us to have some water to drink.
It was the most special of days….