The Tampa Times from Tampa, Florida • 43

Section THE TAMPA TIMES Thursday September 18, 1975 I By ROBERT DODGE Times Staff Writer would not run out and delay work on the west runway. Also, a lighter pavement will be placed at each end of the west runway to protect it from the blast of the big jets, Mast said. "At the end of the full strength pavement, there will be a lighter pavement called tt blast pad to prevent erosion from the jet blast," he said. Officials at the airport said they anticipate a slight slowdown in the rate of landings and takeoffs because all the planes are being funneled onto one landing strip. However, they said no safety problems were expected.

"We don't anticipate any safety problems," Seale said. "We will have more Currently, planes cannot land at the airport when the cloud ceiling is lower than 200 feet, Seale said. Once the new lights and instruments are installed, planes will be able to use the west runway when the cloud ceiling is as low as 100 feet. Workers at the airport began constructing a taxiway there in June which connects the northern end of the east runway with the terminal building. Mast said the taxiway was needed so planes get off the east runway before taxiing to the airside buildings.

Mast said the taxiway will allow the east runway to handle the increased traffic load that will be placed on it when the wesj runway is closed. Mast said the runway project is progressing on time and that the contractor, Cone Brothers Construction has been stockpiling materials so it 'HLv II fjTampa 0 Airport fjHt-V LJfl date the new widebodied jet liners now using the airport. The old runway, built around 1960, is showing signs of deterioration from the heavier planes. The airport is spending $4.5 million on the project raised from a bond issue. In addition to rebuilding the runway, new lights are being installed along with a taxiway on the east runway.

Mast said high intensity lights were being placed on the side of the west runway. Also, a centerline lighting system and lights showing pilots where to touchdown at night are being installed in the runway surface. The new lights along with $300,000 of radio direction equipment being installed by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) will upgrade the west runway so planes can land safely in low visibility weather, according to J.D. Seale of the FAA. congestion because we have less concrete.

We anticipate this. This is our business." Seale said some flights might have to wait on the ground, while others land but he did not foresee any major tieups. "When both runways are used, one is for takeoffs and the other one for landings," Mast said. "By restricting it, traffic will be slowed down as if one plane were landing." Mast said residents in the Interbay area should not be surprised by the low flying jets as they have been forewarned through television and newspaper He said, in addition, the authority was running several newspaper advertisements warning residents of the noise. The west runway at Tampa International Airport will be closed Monday for six months for repairs and aic traffic will be routed over a residential neighborhood, airport officials said yesterday.

Air traffic will use the east runway taking planes over the residential Inter-bay area to the south of the airport. Normally, air traffic either landing from the south or taking off in that direction uses the wst runway, which takes the jets overTampaBay. "When we have both runways in operation the planes don't go over that area," airport manager Stewart Mast said. The 150-foot-wide strip is being rebuilt, Mast said, to accommo- 7 a officials ouni fail disclose income her seat on the board before deciding whether to file. Mrs.

White, a clerk in the city parks department, said she didn't know about the requirement. "There has never been any mention of it to me. I'm not going to tell you whose responsibility it is, but if I'm supposed to file I will," she said. Martinez, a florist, also said he didn't know board members had to file, but said he would do so. Carter could not be reached for comment.

McKay said board member Leonard Gilbert acted as the board's counsel in legal matters, but Gilbert could not be reached for comment. Officials who don't file can be fined up to $5,000 and removed from office. The state ethics commission decides what action, if any, to take against such officials. The law requires public officials to report income sources exceeding 10 per cent of total income, 10 per cent or more ownership of businesses and assets greater than 15 per cent of the official's net worth. McKay said, "Sometimes I think city, county and state government and the newspapers don't realize that volunteers can't do all these things unless it's explained to them." Rey, owner of a Tampa dance studio, said he didn't file "because I forgot." "I've been so darned busy," he said, but added that he would file.

Copeland, who is the son of Tampa City Council chairman Lloyd Copeland, said, "I didn't know I had to" but that he would file. "I realize it was my responsibility," said Copeland, a Chamberlain High School music teacher. "Somebody said something about it at a meeting one time, but it was never talked about further." Dixon acknowledged being given the form but also forgot about it. "I've thought about it a couple of times since but I just forgot," he said, adding that he would file. An architect, Dixon said the only thing he would have to report in the form was his architect's salary and his wife's "little trust." "I don't have anything to hide except that I'm as poor as I am," he said.

Ms. Echelman, a self-employed silversmith, said, "I filled it out but it was so complicated and I didn't know all the answers to it." She said arts council staffers handed the forms out but "we didn't see it as urgent." Ms. Echelman said she would probably wait to see if she was reappointed to By JIM SEALE Times Staff Writer Seven of the 14 members of the Tam-pa-Hillsborough County Arts Council have not filed financial disclosure forms as required by law, records show. Deadline for filing was July 15, and city attorney Henry Williams said the arts council was covered under the 1974 financial disclosure law. Six of those who haven't filed sard-they either forgot to file or didn't know they were supposed to, even though arts council officials said copies of the form were either mailed or handed out to board members at a meeting.

Those who haven't filed are Frank Rey, arts council secretary-treasurer; Calvin W. Carter; James C. Copeland; Joseph Dixon III; Anne Echelman; Andrew J. Martinez; Mrs. Alice White.

Irene Hadley, arts council community relations director, said the forms were given to the members at a council board meeting this summer. Williams' office sent the forms, she said. Arts council chairman Herbert McKay, who filed the form April 10, said the matter of the requirement had been discussed at a board meeting "several months ago" and that forms were either mailed to members or given out at a meeting. Colorful biplane buzzes Tampa in 1950 Mrs. Betty Skelton Frankman and her "Little plane to the City of Tampa as a gift, in appreciation Stinker Too," shown here in a 1950 photograph of the support Tampans gave her and the plane flying above Tampa, may be in the skies again.

several years ago. Mrs. Frankman wants to donate the aerobatic bi- Famous litfle biplane may be returning here Beach Park boat moving to drydock By DALE WILSON Times Staff Writer By JIM SEALE Times Staff Writer v- if 1 Ni i. i 1 1 straight, in 1948, 1949, and 1950. She set the record for altitude at Tampa's old MacDill Field in May 1951, when she climbed to 29,760 feet in a Piper Cub.

She narrowly escaped death over Tampa once when the finely tuned Rolls-Royce engine in her P-51 Mustang fighter plane blew to pieces after she unofficially broke the 418-mile-an hour barrier. "I would have set the record that day, but the rules said that you had to land at the same place that you took off; and that the plane couldn't climb above 1,000 feet," she said yesterday. "When the engine blew, I pulled up to bail out, and climbed above 1,000 feet. That nullified the record," she recounted. She "dead-sticked" the plane landed without power at nearby MacDill Field.

"When something like that happens, you don't have time to do anything else," Mrs. Frankman said. For a publicity stunt, she pulled the cork out of a huge whiskey bottle that was mounted on top of a building in downtown Tampa. "They fixed up a helicopter so I could get out on one of its tires. We had a hook attached to the bottom of the 'copter, and I grabbed the cork.

It was fun," she said. Her "Little Stinker Too" was the first of hundreds built by Curtis Pitts in Gainesville in 1946. She sold the biplane in the 1950s, bought it again in 1967, and completely rebuilt it at a cost of $40,000. The airplane is now kept at Gilbert Field in Winter Haven. If city and airport officials accept the donation, Mrs.

Frankman hopes to present it to Tampa on Thanksgiving Day. She said she was unsure if she would personally fly the "Little Stinker Too" to Tampa. Ironically, after so many brushes with death in an airplane, she has been in and out of hospitals last year with a hurt back. hurt it lifting a box. Now isn't that dumb?" she said with a laugh.

Although Mrs. Frankman was born in Pensacola, she flew her first solo flight from the Peter O. Knight Airport. She was reservations agent for Eastern Airlines at both Peter U. Knight and Drew Fields (now Tampa International), and made her first flight to break the air speed record in a P-51 racing plane at Drew Field.

After more than 20 years' absence from the skies over Tampa, the world-famous "Little Stinker Too" a 564-pound, Pitts Specia aerobatic two-winged airplane may be returning home. Greater Tampa Chamber of Commerce officials will decide today whether to pass a recommendation on to the Hillsborough County Aviation Authority to accept a donation of the biplane for display at Tampa International Airport. The little red-and-white airplane has had as colorful a career as her first and present owner, Mrs. Betty Skelton Frankman of Winter Haven. Mrs.

Frankman, a former Tampa aviatrix who first soloed in an airplane in 1925 when she was 12 years old, and who once said she was playing with model airplanes when other girls were playing with dolls, wants to give "Little Stinker Too" to the City of Tampa as a Already several museums across the nation, including the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C., and the Experimental Aircraft Museum in Hales Corner, are vying for the airplane, but Mrs. Frankman told The Times yesterday she wanted to give it to Tampa. "I would prefer that the airplane return home to Tampa, and to all of her many friends there who helped her get started on her successful career," she said in a letter to local officials. If city and airport officials accept the donation, Mrs. Frankman would like to see the Pitts Special classic displayed in the terminal building at the airport, possibly near the airport's shuttle cars.

Both the airplane and the woman are no strangers to Tampa skies. In 1948 she was known as the world's No. 1 girl stunt flyer, and was selected as "Miss Florida Aviation" by her fellow pilots. Mrs. Frankman flew her first stunt airplane from Tampa's Peter O.

Knight airport in the late 1940s. She won the International Aerobatic Championships for Women in the "Little Stinker Too" three years The 39-year-old construction worker who stirred a controversy when he docked his houseboat in an exclusive Beach Park subdivision canal will be leaving soon. Paul Smith, whose 50-foot houseboat "Canadian Queen" is docked in front of some of Tampa's poshest homes, told The Times yesterday he'll leave Sunday for the nearest dry dock service. The boat needs maintenance work, he said. Smith docked in the area a few weeks ago, but his new neighbors didn't rush out to welcome him.

Instead, they complained to high city officials that the boat threatened their property values. They also complained of what they called loud parties aboard the vessel and of underwear being hung on the boat's exterior. Smith said no parties had been given on the boat, and that was the only a rticle of clothing hung out on the boat. But that was enough for the Tampa city council, a majority of which told The Times they want residential boats banned from residential areas. Councilmember Jan Piatt pointed out that Smith's dockling was perfectly legal, even though she thought it shouldn't be allowed.

In the wake of the controversy, the council has named a committee to write an ordinance banning such moorings in residential areas. Smith insisted his leaving doesn't have anything to do with all the complaints. But he said the council was taking action because they were "pressured by the power structure." "When the town comes to where someone can pick up a phone and evict someone, that's not a free country," he said. Smith also criticized the council for not naming a member of a boating organization to the committee. Cindy Harris, Smith's roommate, said a Times article abput the incident had caused motorists to drive by and "gawk." "At least seven people came by and waved.

One yelled 'celebrities'," she said. Houseboat to shove off Paul Smith and Cindy Harris, occupants of a houseboat moored in a canal of the wealthy Beach Park subdivision, have announced they're setting sail this Sunday. But it's not because their rich neighbors have complained, it's because the boat needs some maintenance work in a dry dock. The controversial 50-foot "Canadian Queen" has led the Tampa City Council to take steps which will probably lead to, a ban on houseboats in Tampa's residential areas (Times photo by John Bard). Police beat Boy, 2, dies after falling; manslaughter charge filed A 23-year-old Tampa man has been charged with manslaughter following the death of a 2-year-old boy, police said today.

Anthony Glover, 2510 Central was being held on a $25,000 bond after a previous aggravated battery charge against him was changed to manslaughter, according to police. Capt. Joseph Cammarata said Christopher Pinkney died Tuesday night on his second birthday from injuries he received after falling down a flight of stairs in a Central Avenue housing project Sept. 5. Cammarata said the boy fell down the stairs after he was spanked by a man as punishment.

The youngster died at Tampa General Hospital Tuesday as a result of internal injuries, Cammarata said. Gun sale turns to robbery A prospective shotgun salesman was hit over the head terday who, police said, hit a female clerk on the arm with a gun. Lt. L. W.

Bennett said the gunman entered the National Finance 2912 W. Hillsborough shortly after 3 p.m. yesterday and demanded money from an employe. The gunman escaped with $138 in cash. No serious injuries were reported.

Man shot over repossession The manager of a local loan company was shot in the arm yesterday after a dispute involving the repossession of a car, police said. i Mark Hammond, 24, manager of the Merit Finance 154 S. Dale Mabry Highway was not seriously injured after he was shot by one of three men who entered the office to discuss the repossession, Lt. L. Bennett said.

The men fled from the loan office and Hammond was taken to Good Samaritan Hospital by friends, police said. $220 taken from glovebox PLANT CITY Burglars made off with $220 in cash from the glove compartment of a car parked next to the First National Bank on Wheeler Street, police said today. Sgt. Frank Butler said burglars apparently inserted a wire through a crack in the window and unlocked the car door sometime before 4:45 p.m. yesterday.

He said the car belongs to bank employe Doris Bryant, 20, of Rt. 6 Box 625. Holdup man robs cleaners A robber who held up a dry cleaning business Tuesday, escaped with $25, sheriff's deputies said. Clerk Gladys LaWall at the Spotless Cleaners. 6900 N.

Armenia told investigating deputy Dennis Novak that a man armed with a chrome revolver entered the business Tuesday afternoon and demanded money. Gunman hits motel for $71 A motel on Fowler Avenue waxs robbed of $71 early yesterday's sheriff's officials said. Lt. David Mitchell said it man armed with a pistol confronted clerk Dana S. Beyerlc at the Quality Inn North, 210 E.

Power! The holdup occurred shortly after 1 a.m., he said. with his own gun by a would-be buyer and robbed of $70 yesterday, police said. Benjamin Stalling, 56, told police that he was showing a potential customer a shotgun last night at his home, Lt. J. T.

Youngblood said. The customer took the weapon, hit Stalling over the head with it, and also took $70 from the victim's wallet before fleeing the residence at 110 E. Watrous Ave. Stalling was not seriously injured and there were no arrests, police said. Finance firm hit by gunman A Tampa finance company was robbed by a gunman yes.