The International Cessna^® 170 Association

Saw this obituary in the NY Times yesterday:

William A. Garnett, who elevated the genre of aerial photography to a form of artistic expression with his sweeping pictures of forests, sand dunes, agricultural crops and suburban grids, died at his home in Napa, Calif., on Aug. 26. He was 89.

For more than 50 years and 10,000 hours of flying time, Mr. Garnett piloted his own 1955 Cessna 170B as he photographed out the window, using a variety of camera formats, with both black-and-white and color films. He flew above every state in the country, as well as in other parts of the world.

“The polished aluminum two-seat Cessna was his studio, a private place where the imagination was released from everyday reality,” Weston Naef, curator of photographs at the J. Paul Getty Museum, said in an e-mail message yesterday.

The full story is available at http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/09/obitu ... obituaries

Has anyone ever met this guy?

I never met or even heard of Mr. Garnett; it sounds like he was an interesting guy. Also very impressive that he seems to have used the same airplane for 50 years.

We have a guy here in Tehachapi, George Sandy, who is a professional aerial photographer (owns Aerial Eye, Inc. http://www.aerialeye.com/portfolio.htm) and uses his 1952 170B in some of his work, though he uses the 4-seat model . He uses a Cardinal RG for most of his work for its lack of obstructions to the view. George is very well known in Southern California and is still actively in business in his late 70's. Those of you who attended the 2004 convention here in Tehachapi know what I'm talking about.

Miles