?»?Allan Walter Marquardt?€™s fascination with aviation began as a child watching P-38s fly over the Lockheed plant in Burbank, California, where his father, Walter, a former fire fighter and purple heart WWI veteran, was a guard. His mother Emily?€™s fine hair was used in the making of cross-hairs for the Norton bomb sight during WWII. As quartermaster of the USS Princeton during the Korean War, Al was engaged in carrier flight operations involving F4U Corsairs, AD-6 Skyraiders, and F9F Panther jets.

During the ?€?70s Al and his son made countless visits to Van Nuys airport searching out-of-the-way hangars for warbird restoration projects. They built plastic airplane models together, from which Al eventually graduated to radio controlled gliders. They once welcomed into their home Lyle Shelton, owner and pilot of the famed F8F air racer Rare Bear, who presented them with an autographed photograph of plane and pilot.

Late in his career as a corporate executive Al flew frequently on corporate Learjet and was delighted to be treated to aerobatic maneuvers on occasion. He flew and landed a sail plane in the mid-?€?80s and toured the Paul E. Garber Preservation, Restoration, and Storage Facility of the National Air and Space Museum in the late ?€?90s.

Through decades of shared experiences, attending air shows and the Reno Air Races, subscribing to Air & Space Magazine and discussing its articles, Al has instilled in his son an enduring enthusiasm for aviation, for which he will always be gratefully remembered.