'The Spirit's Journey' tells of Conecuh County's early aviation history

Dave McKenzie with his book, 'The Spirit's Journey.'

Many of you will remember reading in The Courant’s March 6 edition a front-page story about how the Federal Aviation Administration recently presented former Evergreen resident Dave McKenzie with the prestigious Wright Brothers Master Pilot Award. That story made mention of the fact that Dave is the author of a book called “The Spirit’s Journey,” which was published in 2011.

Over the weekend, I finished reading Dave’s book, and I found it to be one of the most entertaining books that I’ve read in a long, long time. The book chronicles McKenzie’s life as an accomplished aviator and automobile designer, and it also details the years he spent in Evergreen, where his father, George Dewey “Mac” McKenzie ran a welding shop on Pecan Street.

Dave’s book is especially interesting because it details much of Evergreen’s early aviation history, including an account of the first airplane to ever land in Conecuh County and the formation of Evergreen’s Civil Air Patrol in the 1950s. According to Dave, Robert Fowler was “undoubtedly the first pilot to bring an airplane to Conecuh County when he passed through on Jan. 11, 1912, flying a Wright Model B, which he landed two miles east of town (Evergreen) and north of the L&N railroad tracks. He serviced his airplane there from the train that was following him on the first successful transcontinental flight from west to east.”

Dave’s book is so detailed that you might even find yourself mentioned in the book. Dave does a lot of name-dropping, and he makes mention of a lot of people that you probably know. Individuals mentioned in the book include Dr. W.R. Carter of Repton, former Evergreen High School football coach Wendell Hart, his mother Jewel McKenzie, his brother Jimmy McKenzie, former Evergreen City School principal W. Paul “Mr. Mac” McMillan, former Evergreen Mayor Lee Smith, grocery store owner O.B. Salter and dozens of others.

Dave’s book is also hilarious. He pokes fun at all sorts of events from his childhood and teenage years and details pranks that he and his friends pulled all over town. One such escapade involved the balcony at the Pix Theater, cans of vegetable soup, the Evergreen Fire Department and “mass hysteria.” Another caper involved a bag of potatoes, “tailpipe stuffing” and the Evergreen city police.

Dave’s book will also give you an idea of how tough a guy he is. In his heyday, not only did he hold down a full time job at Ford Motor Co., but he also flew planes, taught new pilots and competed nationally in various aircraft aerobatic competitions, winning more than a few of them against some of the country’s best pilots. However, in 1980, Dave suffered a near fatal airplane crash that left him grounded in the hospital and in physical therapy for months.

Not long after that, in 1981, he was a front seat passenger in a car that was struck by a train at a busy intersection. This too landed him back in the hospital, but he went on to recover and returned to competition as one of the nation’s top aerobatic pilots. Today, he’s retired and lives in Howell, Mich.

In the end, if any of you are interested in reading “The Spirit’s Journey,” copies of it are available for sale at Middleton Field in Evergreen. They are $20 each. They are also available through Barnes & Noble and Amazon.com.