Maricopa County AZ Archives Obituaries.....Chapin, Wallace September 5, 2005
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Kim Ross slimkim@gci.net September 5, 2011, 11:33 pm

adn.com 10/14/2005
Wallace Chapin, 84

Former Alaska resident Wallace Hadley Chapin, 84, died Sept. 5, 2005, in
Scottsdale, Ariz.

A family gathering was Sept. 8 at the family home.

Mr. Chapin was born March 20, 1921, in San Francisco but moved to San Jose,
Calif., at an early age. He attended San Jose High School. While a teenager, he
developed an interest in flying, which was to be a driving passion for the rest
of his life.

Along with a lifelong friend, Glenn Kelly, he purchased a glider in the
mid-1930s, hitched the glider to his dad's car and went aloft in an area that is
now Foster City, Calif. He continued this interest in aviation at San Jose State
University and was a member of the flying club there. While at the university,
he joined the Navy Reserve and was active until the outbreak of World War II.

Because he had prior flying experience, he served as a flying instructor during
the war. This included providing night evasive tactics training to fighter
pilots in a U.S. Marine Corps squadron commanded by Maj. Pappy Boyington in the
Solomon Islands in 1943.

At the end of the war, he continued flying for a number of commercial airlines,
including Transocean Airlines and then for Japan Airlines, from which he retired.

Mr. Chapin settled in Anchorage in the early '70s. Here he worked on and
completed his lifelong dream of building an aerobatic biplane. Originally
designed by a U.S. Navy aeronautical engineer for world-class aerobatic
competition in 1960, and designated as a PJ-260 Senior Aero Sport, Mr. Chapin's
highly modified 290 HP biplane took 27 years of meticulous construction to
complete. It will continue to be flown by his children and grandchildren. For
his work on the biplane, he was given an outstanding workmanship award in
Oshkosh, Wis., in 2000.

He is survived by his wife of 38 years, Chiseko; and his children, Beth
Mechfessel, Randy Chapin, Claudia Vongrey, Paul Chapin, Judith Sorenson, Robin
Kucera, Chimmi Chapin, and Sandy Kukla; 15 grandchildren and 17
great-grandchildren.

Read more: http://www.adn.com/2005/10/14/42951/obituaries.html#ixzz1X7lXZGbA


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