Tukufu's Journal
HOWARD HUGHES CRASH, Los Angeles and McMinnville, OR
This was a great story to investigate, and it started by checking out a couple of the world’s largest. One of the first stops was at Powell’s Books in Oregon, which is the largest book store in the world. We went there to do some research on Howard Hughes and his passion for aviation. I was quite amused when one of the guys working there pulled out a book I wrote and asked me to sign it! I left with a shirt and cup to prove that I was actually at Powell's Books. Among academics Powell's is a well known institution.
Next we headed to the Evergreen Aviation Museum in McMinnville, Oregon, home to Howard Hughes' famous Spruce Goose, the largest airplane in the world. Visitors usually don’t get to go inside, and I was pretty thrilled when I was given permission to have a look around for a couple of hours to uncover a critical part of our investigation - our altimeter was exactly the same model and make as one of those in the Spruce Goose.
This wasn’t the only exciting discovery we made – our enquiries uncovered a crash report that hadn’t been seen in decades and a bunch of incredible photos taken just hours after the crash, which we’ve put up on this website.
And apart from a fascinating investigation for our contributor, we managed to make someone else’s day. On that fateful day Hughes crashed into a few houses in Beverly Hills, the left landing gear plunging into one of the roofs. We went to the location to film, and the woman who now lives there had no idea her house had such an incredible history, and even featured in The Aviator.
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Posted on 30 July 2007 By Tukufu Zuberi
This is the first story that I have been involved in that required me to drink early in the morning. A snort is slang for a small glass of whiskey and a Short Snorter was a drinking game popular in the military during Word War II where servicemen signed each other's paper money. In my research for this story I heard several different descriptions of the history of Short Snorting – the only constant was that an essential part of Short Snorting was drinking and bills. The type of bill (dollars, pounds, whatever), or the type of alcohol seems not to have matter much either. It also seemed that being a member of this club carried with it a certain distinction.
I’ve done a lot of research but I still have some burning questions - I wonder if a person engaged in Short Snorting was called a “Short Snorteree”? Were there women in this club? How diverse was the club? I really enjoyed this story, not just because of all the drinking I got to do – an essential part of Short Snorter research – but because I met some very interesting people. Jerry Richards, the forensic scientist worked for the FBI as a photo and document analyst. He’s got a fascinating history and was involved in some of the big legal cases of the past few years including the Vic Morrow crash, analyzing pictures to determine if there was foul play, and the OJ Simpson case.
If you’re keen to see more, the Library of Congress has some fantastic examples of Short Snorters. And we’ve added to this fascinating tradition – the History Detectives team working on this story made our own Short Snorter – all the crew and our interviewees signed it! I wonder if it’s worth anything? Well if not, I will keep my copy for its historical value.
Postscript: After viewing this weeks episode I recall that there were two women signers on Gary Schulze's document. The two women who signed the document were Mattie Pinetti and Arlene Dreznal of the Women's Army Air Corps.More about this story
Posted on 2 July 2007 By Tukufu Zuberi
