During 1942 the armed services desperately needed military pilots and civilians to be trained to instruct. Many local pilots with a few hundred hours flying time were able to obtain commissions as officers and ratings as service pilots performing non-combat flying duties including instructing. Others entered the War Training Service to instruct military students as civilians.
Several of Mexico Farms young student pilots became fascinated with elementary aerobatics, being especially interested on how to perform slow rolls. One local pilot had begun training in Fairchild PT-19 Cornells and, while home on leave, claimed he could perform slow rolls. At the urging of this local vocal student group he tried several slow rolls in his Piper J-4 Cub Coupe and, upon landing, was shocked to discover that the wing struts were severely bowed, with drooping wings, due to the compression forces on the wings while flying inverted.
On the left is the J-2 Cub slowed rolled by Landis described below, and on the right is the J-4 Cub Coupe that received the damage described above.
A few days later Ronald ‘Torque’ Landis and a well known friend from Bedford, PA, prepared to fly John Ridenbaugh’s 40 hp Taylor J-2 Cub. Jim Fungarola, Torque’s passenger, appeared to weigh at least 285 pounds. Friendly remarks to Torque from the student group inquired as to whether the Cub could perform a slow roll. Torque only smiled in response. It was a low overcast rainy day and Torque and Jim were gone perhaps 30 minutes when a howl from an over-revving Continental engine could be heard. The fast moving J-2 appeared at about 300 feet altitude, and did several beautiful slow rolls ending with a half roll to the inverted position. The Cub could not thus maintain altitude, but remained inverted, and then rolled upright and landed. After taxiing to the hangar it was apparent to the young students that the Cub was covered with engine oil. The oil had spilled from the oil filler cap while the aircraft was inverted but otherwise no other damage was apparent. Torque Landis had displayed what a Cub could do in capable hands, even with a heavyweight passenger on board.
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Wings Over Cumberland 