By Larry Rogien
All of us have crossed paths with people who influenced us. Over the years at Oshkosh, I have had opportunities to meet and converse with people like Bob Hoover, Chuck Yeager, Dick and Burt Rutan, Jeana Yeager, Paul and Tom Poberezny, and Dick Matt, to name a few.
Some of those influences are lesser-known but have a higher level of influence to me. Brian and Sally Ryan are two. Years spent camping next to them in Oaken Alley — the strip of oak trees on the field west of runway 36, between Vintage and the Fun Fly Zone — exposed some of their talents and wisdom.
Sally was a writer and had published articles on camping with their Navion. Brian was quite nonchalant about his vocation — when asked what he did, he glibly replied that he was a rocket scientist. He worked for Honeywell designing the guidance systems for the Patriot missiles.
They camped next to another Navion pilot and his wife — Bob and Eunie Rogien. Bob and Eunie ran a construction company and built churches and Christian schools, among a range of other edifices. Bob also gave presentations at Oshkosh on Navion maintenance. Spending a week at Oshkosh listening to and engaging in conversations with these four left a lasting impression on me.
The influences remain, but the influencers have passed on. Brian passed away in an airplane crash in Europe during a work assignment. Bob died in the crash of his twin Navion. Sally had a rock engraved in memorial of Bob. The engraving was simply “In memory of our friend Bob Rogien.”
That rock was planted in Oaken Alley circa 1992, where it remained until AirVenture 2023. By then, Sally had passed on and the memory of the Navion campers had dimmed. The children of Bob and Eunie thought it would be appropriate that the rock should be transplanted to Eunie’s home, since she was the last survivor of the group.
While digging up the rock, two Oaken Alley campers came by rather annoyed that the rock was being moved. The campers had relied on the rock as a landmark to lead them back to their tent in Oaken Alley. But they agreed that the rock’s rightful place was back with Bob’s widow, and that is where the rock is today.
But that shows the influence of these two couples continued long after three of the four had gone West. Bob’s widow, Eunie, enjoys the rock 30-plus years after the premature separation from her spouse.
We never know how far our influence will go. We are surrounded by people that influence us and are acting as influences ourselves (think Young Eagles and KidVenture). Allow yourself to become aware of your and others’ influences so that you can appreciate and enjoy the various influences all around us during the week of AirVenture.