Currently Owned by: Larry Golomb

STATUS: Restoration in Progress

LOCATION: Danville, PA

The first Bill of Sale for No. 4 was on October 23, 1967 when it was purchased by Motorless Flight Enterprises of Glastonbury, CT. However, the ship’s history actually started earlier, when George Moffatt, in a handwritten note to the FAA on January 13 [date not clear] that he had discovered that tail number N1194, which he’d reserved a year earlier, had already been painted on a ship scheduled for delivery to William Foley (Motorless Flight Enterprises). Moffatt asked the FAA to assign N1194 to Foley’s ship, and to reserve for him a new three digit (or three digit and a letter) tail number for his ship which Schempp-Hirth said would be ready in about a month. [That apparently was Cirrus No. 23, q.v., but it came with tail number N1216 so it’s not clear what happened to George’s request for a three digit number.] Still, Peter Salinger’s book* on Schempp-Hirth indicates - apparently erroneously - that the ship was imported by George Moffat.

This aircraft flew under a series of Experimental type certificates from its original delivery in the US until 1980 (there is no FAA record of a renewed Experimental certificate after May 30, 1980). The first application, on March 5, 1968, was made by William Foley, but the second application - on May 8, 1969, was signed by Gleb Derujinsky as agent for Motorless Flight Enterprises. The third application, on May 18, 1970, was signed by Edward G. Burnet, this time as agent for registered owner William Crawley.

These data are consistent with the anecdotal evidence that links Gleb Derujinsky to No. 4, even though he never appears in the records as an owner. Derujinsky, apparently flying No. 4, placed 5^th overall in the 1968 US Nationals at Elmira, NY, flying the only Cirrus in the contest. In the movie "The Sunship Game", produced in the seventies, No. 4 (with contest number "CI") was flown by Gleb Derujinski in a Regional contest at Sugarbush, and at the 36th US Nationals (which Moffatt won in No. 23). It was reported that Derujinsky had also extended the wings to 18.8 meters sometime between April, 1969 and September, 1969, as had Moffatt with No. 23 in April of 1969. That would also explain the Experimental type certificates.

In the application for an Experimental certificate in 1970, Burnet referenced for the first time the ship as a "Cirrus - B", and this designation was retained thereafter on applications. In a conversation with Tilo Holighaus in 1997, he indicated that Schempp-Hirth had never made a "Model B" designation, nor had it provided any "kit" to extend the wings; apparently this designation on the certification application forms was/is a creation of the owners.

At any rate, according to a Bill of Sale dated March 26, 1970 Motorless Flight Enterprises sold No. 4 to William E. Cawley of Richland, WA. (Apparently Motorless Flight Enterprises was the owner of record while Derujinsky flew the ship in 1968 and 1969.)

Cawley sold it to Adrian G. Schat of Bishop, CA on May 22, 1973, and just a few months later, on February 1, 1974, Adrian sold it to a partnership of Jay Dement of Vista, CA, Otto Henning of Mission Viejo, CA, and Terry Little of Placentia, CA.

They flew it until 1976, when the current owner, Robert J. Wicks, bought it. On November 6, 1978 Bob obtained FAA approval to change the tail number to N49ME which he had reserved earlier.

Wicks flew it until 1992 (putting ca. 650 hours on it); a major restoration was undertaken which never got truly finished before the ship was sold to Larry Golomb, of Mifflinville, PA