The Breezy looks like an airplane that had a happy encounter with a radio tower. After 45 years, it’s still one of those “Oh-my-gosh” airplanes that inspire awe, giggles and the desire to go flying…all at once. Indeed, Carl Unger has taken thousands of smiling attendees up for the flight of a lifetime since he first arrived at the EAA Fly-In in Rockford, back in 1965 perched on the front end of his Breezy. The aircraft was actually built by Carl and two other EAA members, Charley Roloff and Bob Liposky, as a lark. They started construction in 1964 after building a wire model. They didn’t know how much steel tubing they were going to use, so they ordered small batches at a time. A friend gave them a set of Piper PA-12 wings, they bought a new C-90 engine for $1,700, a radio for $800, and the total cost for the airframe was $1,000. Unger donated the prototype Breezy to the EAA Museum in 1990. He and his friends never expected anyone to take a serious interest in their project, but Carl wound up selling over 1,000 sets of plans.
One of those sets went to Joe Dory. He got Breezy fever the first time he laid eyes on the design. That happened in 1995 when a gentleman named Breezy Bob stopped at Caldwell, Idaho during his tour to promote cancer awareness. Joe stored Bob’s Breezy in his hangar that night and went for a transformative flight the following day. He was soon looking for a Breezy of his own and picked up a project within two weeks. Turned out the fuselage was junk and the wings had to be rebuilt. Being an IA and A&P, Joe wasn’t lacking for talents in homebuilding. He ordered a set of plans from Carl and used his contacts at the Kitfox factory to order tubing for a new fuselage.
