As most of you probably know by now, back in October our parent company, Bonnier Corp., named me the new editor of this storied magazine, succeeding a couple of very fine pilots, Mac McClellan, my longtime boss, who had headed the title for more than two decades, and Michael Maya Charles, who was with Flying for two issues.
I’m not a new name to the readers of this magazine. I started here 15 years ago, in 1995, fresh off a five-year stint working for a number of sport aviation magazines on the West Coast. How I got the job in the first place is a story of unreasonable optimism that improbably paid off. One day out of the blue I decided to send Mac a letter to see if there were any openings at the greatest aviation magazine in the world. I got a reply, which was more than I’d expected. In the very nice letter — we still used paper back in those days — Mac said, essentially, thanks for the interest but there were no openings.
