Keep the Skinny Birds Flying Safely
William-Robert-Skinner-Interstate-Aircraft-Portrait-small-1944-2-3_0001
Fellow Porterfield enthusiasts. This is a portrait picture of William Robert Skinner. One of the Design Engineers at Porterfield Aircraft. He was my father.
He did not particularly like this photo. It was taken on Feb. 3 1944 when he was working for Interstate Aircraft in DeKalb, Ill. He was working on the TDR series of TV Guided Drones for the US Military.
I post this to the Porterfield Club website so that members can see one of the designers responsible in part for the Porterfield Collegiate.
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Comment by Brett Lovett on July 17, 2024 at 9:46am
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Thanks Bill! I was originally thinking that maybe he got started with Interstate here after Porterfield/Columbia closed then transferred to DeKalb. I think one of your other posts I later saw indicated that wasn't the case. I don't think Interstate was doing any classified work at Fairfax, only civilian sales and possibly assembly.
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Comment by Bill Skinner on July 17, 2024 at 9:32am
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Brett. Regarding your question about Interstate and Kansas City, I am not sure about it...
My father worked for a number of companies during the war years. Some of that, including his work for Interstate was on the TDR series of Drones, which was highly classified at the time. That is why he was in DeKalb Illinois. There is a lot more info on the internet now about the TDR-1 and it's development and use.
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Did your father happen to work for Interstate while they were in Kansas City, located at Fairfax Airport? Information about their presence there is scarce, but it appears they were there from February 1942 to sometime between July and December 1942. Plans were apparently to move all aircraft production there from El Segundo employing 400 to 500 people, but it doesn't appear that ever happened. I think it either ended up as just a sales office, or maybe a final assembly or re-assembly plant.
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