University Dalv Kansan / Monday, November 20, 1989
9
Lawrence pilot enjoys spontaneity of biplane flight
Love for gadgets brought him his plane and his corporation
By Mark McHugh Kansan staff writer
Gene Burnett files his biplane about 300 feet above ground.
Gene Burnett, Lawrence entrepreneur and longtime benefactor of the University of Kansas, is not ready to park his biplane in its hangar just yet.
Yesterday afternoon, Burnett cranked up the Starduster II biblane for the last time this year. Tightening up his Bell helm around his neck, or his "brain bucket," as he called it, he bounded into the cockpit.
"For an old man, this is getting hard to do." he said
Cruising down the grass runway about 45 mph, Burnett tipped the rudders back and set the plane into the air. The ride was only about eight minutes long, but it provided a unique view of the November-gray fields and contours of the land surrounding Lawrence.
Burnett pivoted a few sharp turns across the fields, zoomed to the lake behind his house and slowed the plane down to about 50 mph before touching down on his 2,150-foot long runway.
He then pulled it to the hangar, where it will be stored for the winter months. He said although it was a windy day and he didn't initially intend to fly, he was glad he took it out anyway.
"That's what's so fun about flying," he said. "It's spontaneous That's what it's all about."
Flying for 50 years
Burnett, 69, started flying in the early 1940s when he joined the War Training Service Corps, a program intended for civilians. It was then that he first learned to fly biplanes. He continued working through World War II to aid the development of radar.
He found that gadgets interested him, so he kept tinkering with instruments and ideas. This eventually led to the birth of Burnett Instrument Co., which he sold in 1970. What started out as a one-man operation in 1948 had become a business corporation by the mid-1960s.
Because he wanted to give something to the medical world, he donated money to the Medical Center in Chicago, which after a long time after him and his wife, Barbara.
Burnett, who is retired, has flown so much that there are only four states in the continental United States he hasn't flown over.
In 1970 he bought plans for the biplane for $50 from a firm in California, and he finished it in seven years. He built an aircraft company and canvas in his basement.
Burnett often flies it over downtown Lawrence, a trip that takes five minutes from his hangar. The trip is usually 25 minutes by car.
does not as closely regulate pilots who fly their experimental planes, he said.
Although the Federal Aviation Administration has tight restrictions oh commercial pilots and planes, it
"You have to distinguish between experimental aircraft and commercial." Burnett said. "The Beechcraft (his other plane) is commercially made and approved by the FAA. They have to be approved and get a certificate to fly. Experimental aircraft, we can do about anything we want. In other words, if she flies, it's your neck.
"The FAA doesn't run the restrictions on you like they used to. But I wouldn't shortcut anything, because you've gotda do it right. Guys who don't pay too much attention to that and are gonna get clobbered."
Barbara Burnett remembers flying with him when technology wasn't as advanced as it is today, at a time when some small planes didn't have
radios.
“Sometimes we’d come in for a landing, and they’d flash a green light if you could land and a red light you couldn’t.” Barbara Burnett said.
Wife stays grounded
Burnett says he will burn his biplane when he can no longer fly
But she doesn't like flying in the biplane.
"Gene is a good pilot; I just don't care for the open cockpit," she said. "I just don't care for the wind blow in my face and that sort of thing."
Although Barbara hasn't taken to flying, her son has. He flew 12 years with her before the normal condition grounded him and is now a construction overseer in Montana.
"I gave him his first flying lesson," Burnett said. "We went to the airport, he learned to fly, he got his first instrument rating and went to Braathen."
Burnett taxied the Stardister into the hangar for the last time this year, but he will take it out again once the weather warms up.
"As long as I can nail it on those short runnels without scaring myself I guess I'll keep doing it," he said.
And when he does quit flying his biplane, he plans to destroy it because he doesn't want to be responsible for someone's death.
"Because of all the litigations
against those who build airplanes, when I no longer fly my airplane, I'm going to take the engine off, along with the propeller and wheels, and sell them." Burnett said.
"And I'll set fire to the rest of the airplane because I don't want to get stuck with a lawsuit," he said. "It sounds dramatic, but it's true."
KU student loan default rate stavs within acceptable limits
By Doug Fishback
By Doug Himbauer Kansan staff writer
Student loan default rates have received nationwide attention in recent years, but University of Kansas students' default rates have been within acceptable limits.
Jerry Rogers, director of financial aid, said that borrowers defaulted on only 2.9 percent of the money issued under the Perkins loan program at KU.
The default rate for the Stafford, or guaranteed student loan, program is about 12
percent of the total money loaned, Rogers said
By federal government standards, a default rate of more than 30 percent is considered high. he said.
About 6,000 students' on the Lawrence campus take out loans each year, Rogers said. The average amount borrowed this year was $3,746. he said.
Bob Thacker, vice president of the Bank of Horton, said he thought that students were becoming more aware of the responsibility that came with taking out a loan.
The Bank of Horton last year loaned about
Carol Wirthman of the First National Bank of Lawrence said that her bank issued about 1,000 student loans each year, for a total of $1.6 million over the years. The loans was 13 percent, which she called low.
$425 million to students across the nation, Thacker said. He said he had been told that his institution was second in the nation in terms of money loaned to students.
Thacker said that the Bank of Horton would not make loans to students of institutions with default rates of 25 percent or higher.
Schools can be penalized if their student default rates climb too high. Wirtchau, said that, under federal law, schools with default rates of 60 percent could be dropped from the GSL program. The federal government
insures repayment of loans made with this program
Student loan default also can result in stiff consequences for the individual borrower. A brochure distributed by the office of student financial aid warms up be-defaults of a poor credit rating, possible court action and the loss of long-term repayment schedules
loan to realize that it was just that — a loan,
not a grant.
According to the brochure in the office of student financial aid, a student borrowing $15,000 under the GSL program will pay an additional finance charge of $3,249 during the maximum five-year repayment period. A student borrowing $10,000 under the Perkins program would pay a finance charge of $2,730 during a 10 year period.
Thacker said that he would advise a student who was thinking about taking out a
Rogers said that many of the student borrowers on the KU financial aid roster would take out a minimum of $10,000 in loans during their years in school.
---