JB, Nancy and Janet Marshall wanted to pay tribute to their friend, Dr. Bill Black, who passed away earlier this year.
The Marshall family established the Dr. Bill Black Aviation Scholarship Fund which will carry Black’s legacy and love for aviation.
Chapter 1494 of the Morristown Experimental Aircraft Association held a luncheon Saturday to honor the first recipient of this scholarship, Neva Bowling.
“With Bell’s love for aviation, all the students he’s flown with and everyone’s encouragement, we just wanted to express our appreciation for being here to support all of our aviation students,” said Nancy Marshall. “It was in our hearts to do something for his memory.”
“He has been here at every possible opportunity,” said Karen Hughes Collins, president of EAA 1494. “His old plane is here at our flight school. He flew Young Eagles, Eagles, he was just a pro. We really miss him.”
Nancy Marshall said Black flew coaches, too.
“Some of them wanted multi-motor working hours and more time for the machines,” Nancy said. “He always wanted to fly somewhere. He didn’t care who or what it was, he just loved flying.”
Through the award and through Black Air’s storytelling and retelling and his love of sharing aviation with others, Pauling and future students will know and appreciate his passion for flying and flight training and his desire to make a positive impact on them. around it.
Current Ray scholars Adam Gillespie, Pauling and Samuel Poste were also honored at the luncheon. Those who obtained their private pilot license in 2020-21 were also welcomed to the luncheon.
Black died on February 22 at Vanderbilt Medical Center in Nashville. Black was an obstetrician-gynecologist at Morristown Hamblin Health Care System, an EOA member, a teacher at Lincoln Memorial University, a reserve police officer, a SWAT paramedic, and he loved working in his garden.
Hughes-Collins’ next project is to create a fund for those working to get their pilot licenses to be able to receive their training without worrying about finances.
“Most of our new pilots are students, they work part-time and don’t have a lot of money,” she said. “They need to keep up with their flights. We would like to see them take someone with them to fly, be it another pilot (or) their neighbor and just share their love of flying.”
Three young men, Ben Green, Nick Campolo and Pauling, were tasked with putting together a program for this.
“We’re looking for them to kind of start that,” said Hughes Collins. “We have a lot of people who, I think, help fund something like that.”
Hughes Collins said the club has been blessed with being able to come together this year after the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.
“It was amazing,” she said. “We were blessed. We had people fund certain scholarships right away. We got three Ray funded radiology scholarships through EAA. We find a local candidate. We got funding for a second Ray scholarship, which is our third. It really helped. .
“We have guys here, so they started getting involved and volunteering,” she said. “That’s what we’d love to see.”
Hughes Collins said the EAA branch has nine scholarship recipients in 2020 and 2021 who received their pilot licenses.
“I’m just amazed at what’s going on,” she said.
Ray scholarships are worth $10,000 per student.
For more information on EAA Chapter 1494, call Hughes-Collins at 865-274-2788.
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