I can't believe I have this book. At least Volume I. I was doing some computer work for the "head dude" of the Target 550 streamliner team (Marlo Treit) and my eyes strayed to a bookshelf in his "office" (part of an aircraft hangar on Oregon.) I only saw the binding edge of the book, but I knew right away that L & K had to Be Laurin & Klement, and Škoda was a no-brainer. So I snatched it out of the shelf and begin leafing thru it. Minor problem: My Czech is slightly rusty (ok, it's non-existent.) But I could make out enough to understand the photo captions. I really got sidetracked and had to take my "homework" (a sponsorship proposal PowerPoint thing) "home" with me...that is, back to the motel, so I could finish it up without interruptions.
When I'd talked to Marlo, he told me that after he bought 2 Czech Air Force MiG 19s
), he hired a mechanic who was originally from what's now the Czech Republic. He was the one who got the books. Well, after a while, Marlo realized that he'd bought a couple of white elephants. Yeah, they were authentic, functional (although un-armed), but he said that the pre-flight check list was a book about an inch thick. And the post-flight check list was almost twice the size...written in the Czech language. Even with the mechanic who could read the check lists, there wasn't enough time in the day to get one ready to fly, and certainly not enough time for 1 or 2 people to do the post-flight "czech procedures."
So the MiGs and the mechanic went away (I shudder to think about the hoops he'd gone thru to get not 1, but 2 Soviet fighter jets through US customs. And Marlo is Canadian, although he's lived most of his life in the US) but the books remained. While I was talking to him about the book, I did a little on-line research and found out that the book (Volume I) is worth over $200 for a "used -acceptable" condition copy. This one looks like it'd been opened once or twice and treated very delicately. Anyway, I told Marlo that I wasn't trying to talk him out of it, just marveling over the fact that he had a copy of such a rare book (at least in the US.)
When I left his place to head home (the long way...I visited a couple of friends along the way, and then visited my sister and her family in Auburn, Washington) Marlo told me that he'd put something in the back of my Suburban, but I wasn't supposed to open it until I got home. Yes, it contained the book, but it also contained a 12-gauge, double-barreled shotgun that a friend of his had for sale and I'd been slightly curious about it. Sawed-off shotguns aren't very legal in the US and REALLY aren't legal in the state of Oregon, which has some of the strictest gun laws in the country. I couldn't even carry my pistol with a Utah permit. But I've always had trouble being "socially correct" (hell, I couldn't even keep my crayons inside the lines in the coloring books when I was a wee lad) so a shotgun like that appealed to me. I'm told that it's about 100 years old and had been used as a "riot gun" by a law enforcement agency.
Back to the book, Marlo's told me that he has Volume II somewhere and will send it to me. He said "I can only think of 2 people who would have any idea what these books are. And I'm not as interested as you are, so they're yours." Wow!
I'd love to do a critical review of the books, but all I can say is that there's a treasure trove of vintage photos and it's very nicely printed and bound. I'd suggest that anyone with an interest in vehicles from Austro-Prussia and Czechoslovakia (and/or Czech Republic) rush right out in a buying frenzy and get one, but I only found 2 of 'em for sale on the web. It would be a very small frenzy.
Ray the Rat, aka:
