Does your aircraft have personality?
“They all do,” insists Danny Groggins, an official with Legend Aircraft Co., as he taxied the Texas company’s latest plane, a Cub Special named “Baloo,” to a display area at Sun ‘n Fun. “We named this one Baloo because it’s blue and because of the cartoon character. Baloo was the bear in ‘Jungle Book’ and he was also in a later cartoon called ‘Tailspins’ where he was a pilot.”
According to Groggins, the practice of naming Legend Cubs began last year when three were flying in loose formation to Sun ‘n Fun.
“When we took off from Sulphur Springs we called them Cub One, Cub Two and Cub Three,” he recalls. “But as we flew on and stopped for refueling we got out of order and it became quite confusing, so we decided to give them names. The first one we named is Tweety — that’s a customer’s airplane.”
The first aircraft to be put on floats was christened Daphne, which is the feminized version of Daffy Duck. Customers were quick to adopt the practice, he notes. “We had a customer who named his airplane Lizzie, there’s one named Sassy and another customer named his airplane Dusty after a cat he had that passed away.”