Texas Ballooning History

Bill Murtorff told me that Marie Ella Davis and some friends formed a group and bought a Semco balloon in the mid ‘60s in Houston. It mostly did tethers. Every landing was an adventure. Forrest Patton bought a Piccard balloon in the late ‘60s. He flew it for a couple of years and then sold it to a guy in Kansas who printed Forrest’s logbook. Murtorff read it and said it was filled with humorous adventures. Also there was a Raven balloon in Dallas named the “Star of Texas” maybe owned by Robert Mayo. Karl Stefan also flew the balloon at several events.

In Austin, Derek Howard and Randy Rogers bought a Raven balloon in 1970. Derek taught Bill Murtorff in 1971.

Murtorf said the balloon prices back then were: Raven $5000, Piccard $4000 and Semco $3000. He bought the Piccard. In the spring of 1972 he was one of 13 pilots to fly in the first Albuquerque balloon event. Bill’s first student was Tom Gabel.

Lloyd

 

Derek Howard and Randy Rogers

After finishing college at the University of Texas, Derek Howard and his friend Randy Rogers wanted a hot air balloon. However in 1970 there were no balloons to be found in Texas. Derek and Randy were not even sure what a balloon looked like. They spent a week making phone calls all over the country trying to find one; they even called Goodyear about helium bags and gondolas. Finally someone referred them to Raven Industries, a small company in South Dakota that made hot air balloons.

They started raising money immediately and with $6000 bought a Raven S-50A with all the equipment, including a trailer. Matt Wiederkehr of St. Paul, Minnesota was referred to them for training. Only one of them could afford to take the lessons. The winner of a coin flip would take lessons and then train the other. Back then only eight hours were required to get a commercial license and become an instructor. Randy won the coin flip. They just wanted to fulfill the minimum requirements so they could train on their own. F.A.A. Flight Examiners were eager to give them their check ride so they too could fly in a balloon. Like most balloon pilots in those days, Derek had to give the F.A.A. Examiner a five minute lesson on lighter-than-air craft before being given a check ride. Derek said he began instructing others the same day he received his license. He was learning by “seat of the pants” flying as he was teaching others.

His partnership with Randy Rogers ended when Randy left for medical school. Derek said it was exciting to have the only balloon around. The only other balloon in Texas was in Dallas. Derek started Southwestern Balloon School. The famed cartoonist Gilbert Shelton even designed his first advertising. He trained about thirty students from as far away as California and Iowa. Not all of them bought balloons, but soon there were four balloons in Texas. Some of Derek’s students were Bill Murtorff, Portis Wooley, Ray Galleger and Jack Jewett.

His favorite student was Murtorff. Bill was so enthusiastic about ballooning that Derek knew he would be around a long time. At that time Murtorff ran a surfboard shop in Corpus Christi until Hurricane Carla wiped him out (Bill had long white hair and a beard back then too). He would drive from Corpus to Austin for lessons. After all, Derek was the only pilot around who could train him. Murtorff might arrive at Derek’s door at 5:00 in the morning and drive right back if the weather was bad. He had about ten dry runs but never complained. Murtorff probably got half of his hours tethered in parking lots while Derek was also making money from a car dealer or shopping center. Murtorff wanted to get his license any way he could and Derek wanted to make as much money as he could. Derek put on the first hot air balloon race in Texas. In 1972 he invited ten balloons to a race at Bird’s Nest Airport in Manor, Texas. Also that year he made a short movie called Ballooning Over LBJ Country in which he flew over all the Highland Lakes. Derek Howard retired from ballooning in 1980 and is now an attorney in Austin.

Watch one of their home-made movies. Aluminum gondola, flap inflation and a parachutist. 

 

 


My First Flight, by Bill Murtorff

The date was April 23, 1971. It was early in the afternoon and a group of us were sitting in Olmos Park in San Antonio with a large piece of red and yellow fabric spread out on the ground. This was a Raven AX-6 envelope. We weren’t just sitting in the park waiting for the wind to drop.  We had needle and thread. Derek Howard, my instructor, and his girlfriend Alicia were sewing up the holes and I was in charge of finding them. After reading about hot air balloons in a Sunday supplement of the newspaper, it had taken me 6 mos. just to track down one of the two balloons in Texas at that time. After finding Derek, I had been trying to get into a balloon with him for a flight since November. Maybe you can remember seeing the balloon being shown inflating during the 1970 Texas-Arkansas football game. In Michigan Bruce Comstock had a similar patterned balloon and his wife Tucker went out to see if their’s had been stolen from their garage when they saw Derek’s on TV.  By now, I had a Piccard balloon on order and it was to be ready in late May. If today was to be my first flight, I sure hoped I could handle the trip. I’d hate to lose the $4,000 I’d already paid for the balloon if fear got the best of me.

I had made the trip from my home in Corpus Christi to meet with Derek, a UT student in Austin, at least a dozen times. Sometimes I stayed for days waiting for the rain to stop, the wind to drop or the fog to lift. Sometimes I just turned around and returned home. It was a 200 mile trip and today I have no sympathy when people tell me about the long drive across Houston. 

Back to the park. We had attached a banner for a local hard rock FM radio station. Derek had a contract and did a lot of promotions for them. It soon became the most popular radio station in San Antonio. Well, the time had finally come to grab the bull by the horns. The surface winds had died and the upper winds were out of the north. The inflation went smoothly. I climbed aboard and we were off. I was so awe-struck, I forgot to be scared. We passed by the Hemisphere Tower at about 1,000 ft. and waved at the people eating dinner. We climbed to 2,000 ft. and I don’t remember much except that we flew over Stinson airport on the south side of the city. The countryside in that area is rolling hills and mesquite. Derek came down to land in the Pleasanton area. We had gone over 20 miles in just over an hour. Derek deployed the large rope called a drag line to slow our speed and descent. Next he dropped a nylon line about 100 ft. long with a boat anchor attached. This was to snag a fence or something and stop the drag. Sounded good to me. It all worked and we slammed down to a stop. The crew found us and we packed up and went back to San Antonio. I’m really not sure how I felt about that flight. I do know that my next flight was on a tether and the next one was a contour flight with Don Piccard in Cal. It lasted 7 minutes. I returned to Texas and taught Derek how to really fly.

 

The First Texas Hot-Air Balloon Race

Bird’s Nest Airport, Manor, Texas

October 7 & 8, 1972

 

Pilots

Derek Howard
Matt Widerkher
Bill Murtorff
Karl Stefan
Sid Cutter
Tom Gabel
David Evans
Ray Gallahger
Greg Wilson

                                          

                                                                                                      Poster courtesy of the David Smuck Collection

 

 

Past Ballooning Events in Central Texas

 

Balloon Clubs

The first balloon club in Central Texas was in the 1970’s and named the Armadillo Aeronaut’s Ballooning and Breakfast Society.

It disbanded and a few years later some of that group with others formed The Central Texas Ballooning Association in 1984. It is still active today.

The original balloon club in Texas may have been the Houston Balloon Pilots Association.