In
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The News:
Local Man Sees Dream Take Flight
ROCKFORD - Dick Myrland can't
recall when or how his fascination with flying began, but he built countless
model airplanes as a child.
When the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor six months after Myrland graduated from
East High School, he decided to enlist in the military in hopes of landing a
plum assignment in the Army Air Corps.
That dream turned into a nightmare when a drunken driver ran down Myrland, who
was walking home from a movie with a friend. A year later, after three surgeries
to repair multiple fractures in both of his legs, military doctors rejected
Myrland for duty in World War II.
"Flying was always a glamorous thing to me ... just something I had this
gut feeling for," said Myrland, now 82. "I always felt kind of cheated
that I didn't get to realize my ambition."
Myrland quenched that unfulfilled desire Tuesday when he took off from Greater
Rockford Airport for a 30-minute tour in a restored Texan AT-6 airplane. He rode
upside down, circled over Wesley Willows retirement complex, where neighbors
waved from the ground, and took the wheel a few times.
"The ride was fantastic. I'm ready to meet my maker now," said a
beaming Myrland after he climbed out of the 1942 aircraft and gave an impromptu
media conference.
United Airlines pilot Rick Siegfried loaned his vintage plane and his cockpit
time at the request of the Never Too Late Foundation, an Indianapolis nonprofit
group that grants wishes to senior citizens, usually those residing in nursing
homes and assisted-living facilities.
Myrland's son, John, who is president of the Indianapolis Chamber of Commerce,
brought his father's dream to the attention of the Never Too Late
organization.
"He's always had a spirit that is very youthful and energetic," said
Cynthia Kinsley, who wasn't surprised when her father called with news of the
flight.
Myrland still drives a car and uses a cell phone -- sometimes simultaneously. He
surfs the Internet on his computer and subscribes to Smithsonian Air & Space
magazine.
"This is right up Dad's alley. I'm sure he's just literally on Cloud
9," said Kinsley, who waited on the tarmac with a small delegation of
family and friends, barely equal in number to the media crews on hand.
Myrland's friend, Leona Carlson, confessed to a minor case of runway jitters as
the silver and red-striped AT-6 touched down.
"I've done a lot of flying, but I never liked it. I'm so relieved,"
said Carlson, a former Rockford Register Star columnist. "He made it back
in one piece."
Myrland said he flew commercially quite a bit as a production executive for
companies that included Wurlitzer, which had its own jet with a pilot who let
him operate the controls.
"I've never landed or taken off," he said, and never found the
disposable income for flying lessons.
Myrland was a teenager the first time he soared into the wild blue yonder. He
and a friend paid $1 to ride in a Piper Cub one Memorial Day.
"The pilot told us: 'I've been asked to go and salute the cemetery. If you
don't mind, I'm going to dive down over them. I'll give a you a little thrill
that I won't charge you for."
It was a flight, like Tuesday's, that he'll never forget.
Contact: mbonne@rrstar.com; 815-987-1389
About Never Too Late
Since its establishment in 2000, Never Too Late Inc. has granted more than 750
wishes to the elderly and others living in nursing homes and long-term-care
facilities, regardless of age.
Examples include a couple who sky-dived to celebrate their 60th wedding
anniversary and two Reba McIntire fans (84 and 71) who met the country singer
backstage after a concert.
The average wish costs $265, according to the nonprofit foundation's
website. Learn more at www.nevertoolate.org
Profile: Dick Myrland
Age: 82
Residence: Rockford
Occupation: Retired vice president, Wurlitzer piano and organ company
Background: Attended Hallstrom Elementary and Lincoln Junior High
schools. Member of first graduating class at Rockford East High School in 1941;
left for a job in Chicago in 1944 and lived there and in Indiana, Mississippi,
New York City and DeKalb before returning to Rockford in 2000.
Family: Daughter, Cynthia Kinsley, a kindergarten teacher at Brookview
Elementary School in Rockford; two sons, John, president of the Indianapolis
Chamber of Commerce, and Robert, a bank executive in Memphis; three
grandchildren and three stepgrandchildren. Wife, the former Jacquelyn Anderson,
died in 2004.