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End of an era
On Friday December 4th, my brother Kevin will retire from Beechcraft after 45 years of service, having never been laid off. He started October 15th, 1975 - 2 weeks after he turned 18. Believe it or not, there are still people working at Beech that have been there longer than Kevin has – fewer than 10.
He started in the window shop routing out plexiglass windows. He became a jig builder, and helped build the first tools for the all carbon fiber Starship. He even laid up by hand the pre-preg carbon fiber cloth for the 85% scale proof-of-concept which first flew in 1983. In the early 90’s he was promoted to 2nd shift foreman over the jig shop. He did that for 4 years, until he voluntarily went back to working in the jig shop on 1st shift, checking tools for all the carbon fiber fuselages of the Raytheon Premier and the Hawker Horizon.
So, Friday – Kevin rolls his toolbox out the door for the last time. And I applaud him.
He started in the window shop routing out plexiglass windows. He became a jig builder, and helped build the first tools for the all carbon fiber Starship. He even laid up by hand the pre-preg carbon fiber cloth for the 85% scale proof-of-concept which first flew in 1983. In the early 90’s he was promoted to 2nd shift foreman over the jig shop. He did that for 4 years, until he voluntarily went back to working in the jig shop on 1st shift, checking tools for all the carbon fiber fuselages of the Raytheon Premier and the Hawker Horizon.
So, Friday – Kevin rolls his toolbox out the door for the last time. And I applaud him.
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