Air Force artists document Reserve fighter group in Alaska...

Well yes, Steven Walker and I had a ball. Neither of us have ever been to Alaska. Our Air Force guide, Major Lisa Reaver was great and showed us all around Elmendorf, AFB and Anchorage. Eventually, Steve and I are gonna post our pics though many of them will be aircraft or airmen working on the base. One evening, after we put in a good days work, Lisa took us to meet some of her friends at a place called Humpy's in downtown Anchorage, where they play this trivia game amongst the restaurant customers. Ten rounds of 8 or more trivia questions between about twenty different teams ( tables ). The game, the food (lots of salmon) the microbreweries and the Air Force camaraderie were all there to make a great "end of the day" party.

The weather wasn't bad for Alaska. It snowed just about every day and it was naturally cold especially on the flight line and tarmac. BRRRRR!

David Bedard, the writer (in the picture is just right of me!) who interviewed us for an article he was writing about our mission, always wanted to be an artist or illustrator, so Steven and I got to answer a lot questions about the biz of commercial art. He was an excellent interviewer and really did his research before interviewing us. It's a shame that he could not expatiate further in the paper on what it is like being an artist, but the story was written to, naturally, highlight their mission. Now, I've kinda called myself out and am really gonna have to give the 477th squadron of the Air Reserve a nice painting.


You can read his article about our mission in the "Last Frontier"at: http://www.jber.army.mil/aw/2010/100416/Story8.htm 

On the last day of our stay, Lisa somehow found out that I still make model aircraft ( we spent some time in the interview talking with David about our influences and naturally I mentioned Jack Leynnwood ) so as a going away present the commander of the squadron presented us with a F-22 Raptor kit to take home. Whoa!