About the Artist

I have loved airplanes for as long as  I can remember.    I remember going on a cub scout field trip to Cannon Air Force Base, New Mexico when I was nine, and was given the opportunity to crawl into the cockpit of a North American F-86 Sabre Jet.  When the pilot put his  helmet on me and closed the canopy,  I was in a special kind of heaven.   Even though I could see people outside,  I enjoyed a special feeling of aloness and quiet that was enhanced by the wonderful exotic cockpit smell of aluminum, electric wiring, paint, oil and probably sweat. 

  The Sabre jet felt like it was alive and seemed aware of my presence.  Sounds weird I know, but it was my first conscious thought of "I love this".    They had to pry me out of that cockpit and as silly as it sounds,  I remember  actually hugging a section of the fuselage  telling the Sabre jet to wait for me,  I'd be back someday.  Hey, I was nine.   I was one lucky kid because I grew up watching USAF F-100's, F-86's and other 1950's jets fly over my little home town of Portales, New Mexico which is nineteen miles from Cannon.  Sonic booms were a common sound, and overall the new jet age was a very exciting time to grow up.    I also loved the magazine ads  that showed colorful,  action  pictures of jet fighters with cars. It's the stuff that dreams are made of.  

 

 

     Being a big comic book guy I believe my appreciation for military flight demonstration teams began with The Black Hawks series of comic books.  The Black Hawks flew the Lockheed  F-90 jets while fighting evil.   The way the a/c were all painted the same, along with the team members all wearing the same suits while kicking bad guys butt's really made a big impression.  When I first saw the Blue Angels flying their F-11 Tigers and later the Thunderbirds in their F-100's  I thought of how much they reminded me of the Black Hawks.  

     Then on occasions like Christmas, we would journey to the small airports at Lubbock or Amarillo, Texas to pick up an uncle or grandmother.  I really looked forward to those trips because I knew I'd get to see big planes close up.   Airports in the 50's were one building and the only thing that separated you from the one airliner that would come in twice a day, was a chain link fence.  Standing at the fence the Braniff DC-6 or TWA Connie would get bigger and bigger as it taxied towards me, and just when I would feel the need to move, it would make a big sweeping turn to the left and cut the engines. 

 

              

 

It was spectacular and I always thought the people getting off the plane looked special because they had just come from the air.   When I was fifteen I took my first flight out of Amarillo on a Braniff Electra and all of a sudden I was one of those lucky people.  The flight to Dallas Love Field (don't you just love that name, Love Field?) was as magical as I always thought flight would be.   To this day I love that time period called the "Golden Years Of Airliners".  Props were everywhere and jets were something new to be excited about.  All the new jet airliners had exciting and dramatic names such as: "Astrojet" 707, Continental's "Proud Bird With The Golden Tail" 707, and Braniff's "Fastback" BAC One Eleven Jet, to name a few.  At airports announcers would announce a flight with like something magical was about to happen.  Airline ad's encouraging you to "Fly Braniff" or "Fly Eestern" evoked a pride in each airline.  During my high school years, in the wee hours you could listen to a special jazz/classical station out of Dallas called "Music Till Dawn" presented by American Airlines.   They had a special, Jackie Gleason style theme music based on the song  "That's All" weaving itself throughout the ad's and the late night announcer with a deep low midnight voice would talk about "American Airlines Astrojets" that would wing you off to exotic places.   Today this time period is my main inspiration for the airline images I create.

 

As a kid growing up in the 1950,s all the military flight movies were very inspirational. The first time I watched  The Bridges Of Toko-Ri   and The Men Of The Fighting Lady  I became convinced that the life of a Navy pilot was for me.   It was a tough choice when other great USAF movies  like The Mc Connell Story ,  The Hunters , Strategic Air Command  and a host of others also pulled me in their direction.

 

                                          

Television also played  a huge role,  and when I watched the weekly 1960's show "The Blue Angels", I decided being just a Navy pilot wouldn’t be enough, I had to be a Blue Angel.   The first time I saw the Blue Angels flying in their supersonic Grumman Tigers, and the Thunderbirds flying their supersonic F-100's, I was spellbound.   They were so beautiful, graceful, and loud.  To this day I love loud fighters and the smell of jet fuel.  I always wanted a men's cologne called "Eau De JP Four" to spray around my model room.  I'm kidding, well maybe.    So here I was all inspired as a result of all this aviation stimulation and I expressed my passion the only way I knew,  which was to build plastic model airplanes.   I loved all the old Aurora and Revell kits and had them hanging all over my room. Building plastic model airplanes was very important to me then, and remains one of my greatest passions.   Little did I know where it would take me in the future.  I'd go to bed at night dreaming of performing flawless slow rolls in front of thousands of admiring fans (mostly women) secure in the knowledge that the Blue Angels were patiently waiting for me to grow up.                                                                          

 

 

  

Towards the end of college I applied and was accepted to the Navy’s Aviation Officers Candidate program. I remember during my senior year I was introduced to the cockpit of an F-8 Crusader by a fellow Portales boy, CDR Jack Woodul, USNR(Ret) who was flying F-8's as a reserve pilot out of NAS Dallas when not flying regularly for Delta.  Jack (also famous for Tailhook Magazines continuing adventures of Youthly Puresome)  flew A-4 Skyhawk's with VA-86 over Vietnam,  and he was my mentor for Naval Aviation.  I in my junior year in college I applied and was accepted to the Navy's Aviation Officer Candidate program.  Getting the news I was accepted was  one of the high points in my life up to that time.   In my senior year  the Navy flew me to NAS Dallas to swear me in and before my first orientation flight,  Jack took me out to the flight line and let me climb up into the cockpits of an F-8 Crusader and A-4 Skyhawk.    I remember sitting in the cockpit of the F-8 and a memory of nine year old me in my Sabre jet waiting for me back at Cannon  told me I was in the right place.   Later that day I was sitting in the back of a beautiful blue and gold T-34B with "Fly Navy" on the side getting ready for my first flight in a Navy aircraft.  I forget the pilots name but he was very cool and explained everything he was doing and made me feel a part of it all.   We taxied out to the run up area and there were F-8 Crusaders stacked around us doing their own engine runs ups.   The noise of the jet engines from those massive birds was awesome and while enjoying the smell of the JP-4 one of the F-8 pilots looked over at me and gave me a thumbs up.  I thought I'd died and gone to heaven.  

     In the middle of Aviation Officer Candidate training at NAS Pensacola, "The Cradle Of Naval Aviation" I was shipped out to NAS Saufley Field for Primary flight training and  was introduced again to the Beechcraft T-34B Mentor.   Within VT-1, Flight 12  I took to flying like I always new I would and received high flight grades from my instructors.   I loved spin training most of all.  My solo day was a magic day I'll never forget as it's the first time I would realize I was totally responsible for what happens,  and the only person that can save me,  was me.  It was a free, sobering flight and a "well done" by the check instructor when I picked him up meant the world to me.

      The first time I took off on my post-solo flight I found myself flying out towards one of the many training areas that surround Pensacola.   After reaching level cruise I relaxed a little (not having an instructor in the back yelling at you was a luxury) and watched another T-34 down and to my right flying in the same direction and it hit me. “Damn, I’m really doing it”.  Later when I taxied in with the canopy back I felt like hot stuff until I shut down.   As I yelled out to the crew chief “gas, mags and battery off” I proceeded to knock my helmet off the side rail of the cockpit,  wherein it bounced off the wing and onto the tarmac.   The plane captain just looked at me and shook his head.   It was humbling

  Shortly after that another special moment in training came.  Nearing the end of that phase of training my instructor and I were getting ready to depart on my fourteenth flight,  a post solo flight (precision landings and aerobatic high work).    We were just about to taxi onto the active runway when we heard the tower advise “ Souix Falls 349 hold short of the runway” My instructor signaled he had the aircraft and told me to look to my left as he didn’t want me to miss what I was about to witness. 

 Towards the end of the runway I saw a tremendous cloud of dust boil up into the air as four Blue Angels in the diamond formation roared towards us in their big blue and gold F-4J Phantoms. They were leaving that morning after performing at an air show at Saufley the day before.  As they reached the mid-point of the runway they all four rotated right in front of us and I swore I could have reached out and touched Blue Angel #4 who was just to the right of Blue Angel #3 preparing to slide over into the slot position right after lifting off. It was one of the most breathtaking sights I’ve ever seen, and as they climbed away in formation my little “teener weener” swayed and bounced from the turbulence.  We were both quiet for a few moments when my instructor said “kind of gets to you don’t it.”

 

         

(T-34 artwork by Aviation Artist Michael Bacon)            (F-4J picture by Blue Angel Richard Keane)                                                                                                      

     As life will sometime happen, it turns out that even though I had good flight grades, my lack of math abilities really hurt me in ground school, and somewhere in there the Navy decided that Dave was not going to be a pilot.  I'd signed up for a six year tour, which would have most likely found me in Vietnam and all of a sudden it was over.    That was rough, but to this day I am proud of going after my dream and grateful for getting  to experience a small piece of the naval air dream.  It was a defining moment and one of the greatest peaks in my life.  It also left me with a deep and profound respect for all the men and women of the military who saddle up daily to do a tough job.

 

Being a pivotal  point I decided to embark on a career in law enforcement as a police officer, which I did for 40 wonderful, exciting and action packed years.   I enjoyed the semi-military feel of the job, and having another way to serve my country and my fellow man.  Now that I'm retired I can devote all my  time to my real passion.  Over the years  my great passion for aviation has always been alive and I found a way to express that passion by combining three artistic mediums to create aviation magic.  My style of aviation art allows me freedom to create anything I can imagine.  By building and photographing models , sky/cloudscapes and bringing them all together in a digital format, I create  artist representations which allows me freedom to honor all moments in the  history of flight and even some hypothetical moments. 

     Last year I had the opportunity to sit in the cockpit of an F-86 Sabre jet at an airfield in Miami, Fl.   The first thing I noticed is that it is smaller than I remember from my cub scout days.  No kidding.  This time when the canopy was closing I had to duck my head.   Then all of a sudden a distant memory came to me.  A memory of my nine year old self sitting in my F-86.  Suddenly I was a kid again and and the same feelings came rushing back.   I couldn't know if this was the same F-86 but it "felt" like the same one.  I realized it was a long road from Cannon AFB to now.  Once again I was with my old friend who was saying "welcome back".    I told it all that had happened to me since that early age.  It told me some stories too.

 

 

Thank you for taking the time to read about some of my life.  Aviation has been my driving passion all these years, and I am grateful to be inspired to create beautiful images of aircraft in flight.  My hope is  that you enjoy the images in my Works gallery, as much as I enjoyed creating them.  "AND NOW LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, LOW AND FROM YOUR RIGHT WITH SMOKE ON, TRAVELING AT 600 MILES PER HOUR, YOUR UNITED STATES...................................".