"Last Mohican"

(Home base: xy (????), . Chief pilot: Sir Fokke )

Story of "The Last Mohican" THC-024

By: Anthony Fokker the Third

When I was born as a grandson of Anthony Fokker, the founder of the famous Dutch aircraft builder, it was obvious that I was to be involved in flying later. With a grandfather like him, and a father that was part of the Board of Directors at Fokker, I couldn't have done otherwise! I've never met my grandfather, as he passed away in 1939, before I was born. But he did make a deep impression on my father, so I've heard plenty of stories. Grandfather also kept a nice archive, both in paper and in all sorts of other stuff (in his attic, located at the factory, he even had a full cockpit of a Dr.1, the triplane flown by the Red Baron, and one of his first plane, the "Spider"!) As a kid I loved to play there, and my father pushed me to.

When I was 21, I was taken on a trip by my father (as a birthday present) in an airline cockpit. No Fokker alas, as none was available, but an Airbus A-300, here you can see me sitting on the First Officer's seat:

Of course, I wasn't allowed to actually fly it in that seat, but I sure as hell would have loved to! But the present was even better than that flight: I was given the money and opportunity to get my flying papers, yippee!

I made lots of hours studying books, flying simulators, and also several smaller aircraft, like the wellknown Cessna 172, the Piper and a King-Air B200.

I was given a position in the Board of Directors at Fokker at the age of 25, but it was a meaningless position. They just wanted a Fokker family member on board, but they didn't trust me taking decisions. O well.

Alas, a few years ago, Fokker went bankrupt. I won't go over the details here, they are both well known and too painful for me. The complete fleet at Fokker was to be sold to the highest bidder. I just couldn't let all those wonderful machines be gone from here, and I had set my goal on acquiring at least one Fokker plane. But of course I didn't have the money to buy one.

Then a miracle happened: the firm's lawyer found out, that my grandfather had written in his will, that the last Fokker family member alive if and when the company would cease to exist, were to inherit one plane of each model in production at that time. At the time of the bankrupcy, all aircraft that was in production was already sold. The only option was the Fokker F27, the "welkome sign" of the factory on Schiphol-East. So now, thanks to my grandfather's foreseeing, I am the proud owner of a Fokker F27! As this was the last Fokker to be flown by a member of the Fokker family, I named her "The Last Mohican". You will understand, that this plane means something special to me.

As I had also just heard that I would become an active member of dESPair, I took the liberty of painting the ESP logo on the plane, and on her hangar in Soesterberg. The Last Mohican now has her home there, as that is closer to my house. Yes, I got permission from the army to do so (it's a military airport). Here she is, together with her proud owner!

I hope you will understand, that I cannot offer this plane yet to dESPair members. First of all, it needs some more repainting, and although I may know what it takes (and costs) to fly her, I've not yet written it all down. But you can expect to find her in the dESPair fleet one of these days! In fact, I did take her on a dESPair-maiden flight from Helgoland to ESP Island:

Anthony Fokker 3rd Captain Raven