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WEDNESDAY Amish Cook Commitment To Community
INSIDE: Hot, chance of PM storms. High 87, low 67. Page 3.
INSIDE: Founding Fathers’ July 4 fare. Page 7.
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M O N DAY, J U N E 2 4 , 2 0 1 3
VOLUME 130, NUMBER 125
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Two killed in Dayton Air Show crash Wing walker Jane Wicker and pilot perish when plane goes down during performance
ISAAC HALE/STAFF PHOTOS
A vintage Stearman aircraft carrying wing walker Jane Wicker and pilot Charlie Schwenker crashes at the Vectren Dayton Air Show, in front of a crowd of spectators. Both Wicker and Schwenker were fatally injured in the crash. Below, Jane Wicker’s plane is shown right before the fatal crash. BY MIKE ULLERY Chief Photographer mullery@dailycall.com VANDALIA – Tragedy struck the Vectren Dayton Air Show on Saturday when a vintage Stearman bi-plane crashed in flames, fatally injuring a wing walker and her pilot. The crash occurred at approximately 12:46 p.m. during a performance by wing walker Jane Wicker of Virginia. As her aircraft came down the show line from left to right, Wicker was dangling beneath the right wing, in a knife-edge with right wing low and the left wing high. The aircraft flew into the ground, just to the right of show center, and burst into flames. Wicker and her pilot,
Charlie Schwenker, also of V i r ginia, died in t h e crash. In an excerpt from an interv i e w yesterday by t h e WICKER Daily Call news partners at WDTN: Wicker said she “knew the sky was hers when she took that first lesson in 1988.” She became a certified pilot in 1989. Wicker’s love of stunt flying began in 1989, when she took a ride on board an aerobatic Flying Circus. She spotted an ad looking
for a wing walker in 1990 , and her next stage of flight was born. Wicker became a wing walker for the Flying Circus and performed with the troupe for 12 years. A mother of two, Wicker took a break for a couple of years, but not for long. She bought her own plane in 2009, and started appearing at air shows. Schwenker was piloting the plane when it crashed. He started flying in 1975 and began flying acrobatics in 1990, according to the Flying Circus. The remainder of Saturday’s air show was canceled. The show resumed as scheduled on Sunday. Tickets for Saturday’s Vectren Dayton Air Show were honored on Sunday. Chairman of the board of trustees for the Vectren
Dayton Air Show, Michael Imhoff, said in a Saturday press conference, “The performers who do perform have a very strong bond and feel a strong need to
go on with the show.” The Ohio Highway Patrol and federal officials are investigating the crash. No cause for the crash is known. Officials
said that it could be months before an official cause is determined. No spectators or air show workers were injured.
How a garden blossoms into a community BY CAROLINE MCCOLLOCH For the Daily Call pdceditorial@civitasmedia.com
PIQUA — Back in the day, most people had vegetable gardens in their back yards, mothers cooked meals from scratch, and all this experience was passed to the next generation. With the advent of two income households, convenience foods, and microwave ovens, the knowledge of growing and preparing food had mostly gone by the wayside. But as people have begun to question what is in our food, and
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how it is made, Piqua has now joined the national trend of rediscovering gardening and cooking. According to summer intern Janel HoweryRanly, City Manager Gary Huff had witnessed successful community gardens when previously working as manager for the city of Fishers, Ind. He was confident that such a project would meet with similar success here. When he approached Doug Harter, street department superintendent, the project “grew wings” At Pitsenbarger Park off McKinley Avenue, what was once a horseshoe pit has been transformed into a charming mosaic of 33 plots varying in size, now bursting with a diverse array of early summer vegetable plants. All the plots were quickly spoken for, and the entire area is enclosed by an attractive privacy fence to protect the gardeners’ labors of love. Parks and recreation department staff had tilled the ground and laid out the design, compost was brought in from the city’s facility on PiquaTroy Road, A.M. Leonard
donated equipment and supplies, and all of this has happened just since May, even though the idea was in the works since February of this year. Piqua resident Serena Martin has been involved in gardening since her teenage years, when the family had a large plot near Laura. She never lost her enthusiasm in spite of many moves over the years before returning to Piqua. At one point, she had lived in a Minnesota city near a bus stop, and planted a cherry tomato plant on a tiny space next to the house. With a heart for learning by experience, she placed a sign nearby to the effect that it was a community tomato plant. “What a hit that was! Mothers with babies and all sorts of people coming to the bus stop enjoyed those little fruits all summer,” she said. Martin’s glowing enthusiasm was not lost on her son Christopher Gleason, who has taken gardening to heart — after planting fruit trees, watermelon, zucchini, and raspberries in their small space at home on Morrow Street, they simply outgrew it
CAROLINE MCCOLLOCH/FOR THE DAILY CALL
Jeanne Hale and Chris Gleason talk shop at the Piqua Community Garden. and were thrilled to learn of the city’s upcoming community garden. “Well, she’s a real salsa hound” Christopher said of his girlfriend Alfie Luther, who also helps in the garden and kitchen. They estimate that last year they canned nearly 100 pints and quarts, of which about a dozen or so remain. Gleason has had a lifelong appreciation for fresh food from the garden. He reads widely and is well informed about the health risks of processed foods.
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Working at Cargill he became intricately familiar with the many ingredients derived from genetically engineered soybeans that end up as the major ingredients in foods designed for convenience and shelf life, but not necessarily health. He dreams of someday earning a living from his own working farm to produce clean nutritious food for his family and the community. “It costs so much just to get started, but I’ve heard chickens and goats aren’t
as expensive as cows,” he said. Gleason advocates organic gardening methods such as diatomaceous earth that physically inhibits insect pests. Interesting biological controls involve such things as spinosad, a fungus absorbed by the plant that kills ants feeding on it, or predator nematodes, microscopic worms that prey on soil larvae and other garden plant nuisance See Garden/Page 2