From Grumman to Daher

good evening everybody including Bruce how are you i'm thrilled to see some of our uh friends from Grumman here tonight perhaps a few friends from Elliot i'm not sure about that but uh I know they were helping publicize this uh tonight's program is all about Grumman and and his transition through the years uh Ken Toby is going to tell us about the history of Grumman about uh a lot of the displays you have behind us here and uh Brian Westfall westfall thank you uh it represents Dr uh the current uh operator of the plant at uh Wamfield i'll turn it over to Ken i don't have to sing okay you can sing if you want

bomb bomb thank you and good evening folks thank you for inviting us um are you ready for a couple of historic messages tonight okay first I must introduce my wife Maddie she's here taking my picture we just celebrated 62 years of marriage and thank you very much right now I'm going to take you back a 100red years 1926 Leroy Grumman and four partners started a company in a cluster of garages in Baldwin Long Island New York bordering the Great South Bay they started designing and building airplane parts one design was for pontoons used on amphibious aircraft along with other landing devices and in 1930 they they designed and got a contract to build the first

fully retractable landing gear for the US Navy the name of the airplane XFF-1 fighter from then on they got many contracts for various aircraft parts and moved a couple of times few larger facilities they were in several locations with parts coming in from all over to to build and uh I knew a couple of people when I was real little that worked for them that did piece work i don't know exactly what that is but I think if you hurried through making a whole bunch of parts you got paid good okay soon everybody got to know Grumman Aircraft Engineering Company over the years they designed and built 17,000 military aircraft many many of them different

cap capabilities it earned them the Presidential Medal of Merit from the United States government all their products and employees gained the name the Grumman family grumman expanded to a variety of different products other than aircraft gman canoes pierce all yachts US mail delivery trucks passenger buses and a business jet the first name was Grumman Gulfream now it's G4 and G5 if you find care to find out more there's a book titled The Grumman Story and it's in the library and uh they gave me a book when I uh left Long Island to move to Florida and I used it to do some of the tactical messing messaging that I did to uh help with the

museum grman had a monthly newsletter called the plane news it was edited in Beth Page and it was sent to every plant in the country it kept us informed of what every plant was doing and was sent by a by each by a site employee it was circulated via computer copy machines and mail as folks retired each area started a retiree club if there were enough people of course they also sent out and received newslet newsletters the Steuart one was the Grumman Treasure Coast Retirey Club News the club secretary sent in monthly information from the meetings to Beth Page where they ma they mastered them and were mailed to members of the clubs for everybody

to read i was a member of one of them clubs i was vice president okay I'm going to begin right now with the Elliott Museum they they call it the Grumman Legacy Exhibit at the Elliot Museum we moved to Steuart in 1979 when I was able to get a transfer with Grumman i worked in their final assembly plant six in Calverton Long Island and after eight years of experience and knowledge of working on actual aircraft I moved to the Steuart site i stayed there for 20 years and saved a lot of memorabilia and if you look around the room you know what I'm talking about i retired from them in 2001 i stayed a member

of the retiree club and they were all getting shut down one after another because the company got sold i named them Grumman Heritage folks so no matter what company they work for or retired from they they were a part of it we still meet every other month in May of n 2022 Mr rob Steele the CEO of Elliott was a guest speaker at one of my lunches he knew Gman played a big role in Martin County when he came here and he had thoughts of making a permanent Grumman Legacy exhibit at the museum but he had no thoughts of when he would even start gathering information i told him to contact me when he was

ready and I would volunteer to help it wasn't until the fall of 2024 that the curator from the Elliot a nice lady named Chessie Ricker and I met at the museum and I answered all her questions she came to one of our heritage lunchons and she questioned all our group all of about 20 of us and she got some ideas and brought them back to the museum i then brought her books full of pictures and information and in January of 2025 she called me up she says "I have to quit i've got a sick mom i'm going to have to stay home with her." And she she steered me to Jess Robinson who was going

to take over for her well we had another talk session another visit to a lunchon and she questioned if she could get a tour of the day plant ironically Mr brian who's here this evening came to our aid and gave us a complete tour of one assembly from a detailed part to a major assembly right up to the paint shop it was fascinating to see it even though I had worked there and done all of these things that I was watching all over again in April of 2025 I was asked to call the daughter of the first manager of the Grumman site way back from 1950 her name is Nancy Melrose you may know her

i think she's associated here somewhere okay when her dad passed away all of his models pictures and memorabilia went into storage and she found them when her mom passed away she all she wanted to do was bring them to me to donate to the museum i got them all to Jess and in August when everything was put together from the three of us the exhibit opened when I saw it that's when I decided I wanted to volunteer there if you have not visited that you will find the history of the airfield dating dating back a hundred years and I can't stand here and talk to you about that for hundred years i I I never

knew some of this stuff it was fascinating what went on in Stewart no in those years my advice is that you read everything if you go and and you visit the Corman exhibit i'm going to go to page three yes ma'am please we can't hear you oh I'm sorry okay I will i'll be good this is titled 75 years of Grman Heritage in October of 1950 Grumman executives visited the Steward area to begin the planning of a new aircraft manufacturing facility soon production began and business was underway new jobs were available to Martin County residents in a thriving industry steuart's dying tourism business came back when commercial travel became available in Stewart the lease began

with a 2.5 year period after which could be renewed for 10 years and then for 99 years i couldn't believe this when I read that 99 years grman Corporation was to pay $250 a year rent to Martin County per that 1950 agreement they leased portions of Wamfield and they named it plant 77 groman used that name in the early 50s primarily during the winter months for conducting flight testing they manufactured parts and subasssemblies for various aircraft for the Navy Marines and Coast Guard the company assisted and took an active role in a community and introduced an air show for a model of the new crop dusting glider called the A Cat with demonstrations right there

at Wam Field well when I moved here it was all flower farms and I used to see those airplanes feeding the fertilizer to to all of them flowers the company assisted and took an active role and uh they offered a special kids day at one time sponsored by the Steuart Kowanas Club and they had a a research building hanger and they took the kids for a tour of the Air Force flying box car which was a submarine killer navy aircraft were also on the screen with movies on missiles and air sea rescue and the Blue Angels flight team from the US Navy gman built the first jet plane that the uh that was used i

lost my place okay the Blue Angels flight team bought the first jet plane from from Stu from Grumman and uh it was used for the uh Yeah okay the Blue Angels okay did I say that okay in 1960 Grumman and NASA drew a contract negotiating the orbiting astronomical satellite they called it the AOA i was still in Long Island at the time and they used to announce over the loudspeaker what these these things were doing they were going out and searching i don't know what they were looking for out there in the middle of nothing but uh that's what the job was in 1960 they also invented or worked on to build a modern flight

simulator so they could train aircraft pilots they did this all here in the Steuart plant in the 1962 also for NASA they constructed parts for the Apollo lunar module which landed on the moon there's a model of that in the LA Museum go take a look at it real cool looking in 1964 they began to hire 5060 new employees for production to begin to work on the OV1 Mohawk aircraft for the US Army this led to new hanger being built for that production stuart also had contracts with design and construction for the Navy hydrooil PGH PGH-1 was named the flag staff and they also built a civilian 55tonon 50 knot hydrooil named the dolphin it

was used as a ferry for the Spanish shipping firm Maritime and Tarries grman founder Leroy Grumman lived until 87 until the year 1982 but not before he successfully reached the space age and the changing of the company name to Grman Aerospace Corporation in 1973 the F-14 air section and weapon system and a and a workforce that grew to 750 was working at our Stewart plant in 1975 they built and opened the control tower which was manned by three experts in control and operations commu communications were were alive and and living well in in into well I don't have the date here but anyway it's still there it's moved to another location but it was first

up on a building next to Grumman it had a green tinted gas glass that was visible in all directions and Stewart Tower was what you they would call if someone came into the into the airspace uh in the Grumman area in the late 1970s into the 80s Steuart grew with employees and received the growth at the airfield stuart contracted from Sakosski five major assemblies for the CH53 helicopter there's a picture over there somewhere take a look at it i worked on that guy the construction of aund they built a 100,000 square foot building with a contract for Boeing to build 767 wing center sections they also modified engines for the DC8 and the workforce increased

to almost 1,300 people gulfream 4 and folks began in 1986 and in 1992 the Boeing 777 wing flaps engineering was released for the F-14A Tomcat like it was used in the movie Top Gun and there's a model of the F-14 at the LA Museum and every time I get a bunch of kids that come in here I make sure I show them to them they took u the the reason for the upgrade was they took the engines that Pratt Whitley made which were changed to General Electric engines the engines were shorter so it required rework done to the firewall section of the tail section made in Stewart new parts and rework was required and installed

before being shipped to Calverton where they were joined with the rest of the airplane after all the modifications were finished and the first F-14D rolled out the door they flew one over Grumman and gave it a flyby they called it the Super Tomcat everybody was out in the field watching this guy go by all the while at while that was going on Grumman existed in Stewart volunteers there were involved in numerous endeavors they volunteered at United Way at fire departments as ambulance drivers in churches Boy Scouts Girl Scouts bandparents guess what we were bandparents little league baseball football teams and the Martin County Fair they held fundraisers from pizza trucks for nursing homes and orphanages

we participated in canned food drives also school supplies they got involved playing golf they went bowling and other sports we delivered turkeys for Thanksgiving and Christmas everyone had some a service club that they were comfortable with like the VFW the moose lodges elk lodges and the military clubs as well and the famous March Dimes Walkathon businessmen in and around Stewart prospered from all our employees my wife Maddie worked for the eye doctor that supplied Grumman with safety glasses she was asked if she would mind coming to the sto to the plant and fit them so the men or ladies didn't have to go back to her office to get it done she saved time and

money for both sides her office also gained if there was a family member that needed glasses they usually got the business in 1994 Northrup bought Grumman Aerospace for $1.2 2 billion they changed the name to Northrup Grumman Aerospace they had many plants in different locations and began to move all military assemblies to some of them they asked employees to relocate if they wanted to to those plants i was asked to stay and work on a conversion team that was moving parts from Northrof plants to the Stewart plant we were just completing the task when the start of what became Desert Shield just before the Gulf War was development they purchased and upgraded upgraded Boeing 707

passenger jets for reconnaissance and made black boxes for the electronics right in Stewart the A6 intruders were brought to Stewart to be converted into fuel tankers for the Boeing aircraft milligville Georgia built the Kevlar belly for the equipment and that came to Stewart via truck for installation of all the equipment they went to Melbourne and were flown out there until they were retired after the war northrup Grumman tried to close down the Steuart plant but Boeing would not let them move their products to a Northrup plant so they sold the plant to VA aircraft industries in the year 2000 they held a party for the 50 years celebration of the Steuart site can't believe I

can't believe this 50 years ago they got everybody outside and they took a picture with a shaped like the number 50 from a very high ladder i searched for that picture in my displays in my house in my garage i couldn't find that picture i would have loved to brought brought it in here to show you guys around Thanksgiving time in the same year they sent out a notice that they were offering a retire early package for anyone born before 1946 as long as they retired before January 31st 2001 i took the package and found about 60 of us were going to take the take the uh buyout they had free sessions on how to

make a smooth transition for all the benefits and insurance i must say things went very well for me and I don't regret it the folks that stayed set up a retirement party for all of us at the Steuart Elks Club there's picture books around here and I'm sure if you look through them you'll find pictures somewhere of that event also and Maddie continued to fit eyewear at VA anyway VA sold the plant to Triumph aircraft i really don't know the date and Triumph didn't like the fact that Mattiey's office was the only one offering that service so she was told not to continue going there all the folks that knew her though continued to go

to her office anyway after a few years Boeing was not happy with the service that Trump the Triumph was giving them and somehow gave the contract to Deer Aerospace there they the air seems to have gotten the Boeing contracts under control and kept the remainder of any original Grumman employees who did not retire out or if they worked as job shoppers i think I can far as I can go with that the year 20 25 was the 75th anniversary of the Steuart site and we celebrated on September 14th with 75 years of government heritage at the Elks Club and I want to thank you very much for your attention i now have the pleasure of

introducing a training chairman from their airspace who will bring you up to date on what's happening at the old Grman Stewart site now it's an honor having you come and share a little bit of that history of Grumman and what has gone on over at the field in the last 75 years they're ready please welcome Brian West all right so I'm gonna before I start I'm going to have a show of hands how many people have heard of Dier before okay pretty good pretty good some audience I give this presentation to and they're looking at me like "What i thought it was Dar." No it's Dier we are a French company so half the letters

in the word don't count that's how that works i'm German so I can make pun so let's start off with who we are right so Dier is a family-owned company we've been around since 1863 so there's a lot of legacy in this room between Grumman and what Dyier is bringing here so there's a lot of history that we're going to bring from two different cultures here i love to see it as an oldest ally of the US i think it's sort of cool too so what do we do well we are an airplane manufacturer first and foremost we're building two different airplanes we build these in France there's a TBM and a Kodiak airplane that

we build but what we do here in Stewart is why we're here today is we are building a structures for Boeing and for Gfring we'll talk a little bit more about those details in just a minute one cool factoid I always like is Dier is the oldest continuous manufacturer of airplanes in the world we've been making airplanes since 1911 so quite a long time little background about Dier so Dyier is a family-owned company you don't hear that too often when it comes to aerospace companies but yes it is a family-owned company you can see the founder here and along with a more recent photo of just some of the family that's involved right there's 400

stakeholders from the family still involved the deput deputy deput CEO is a dier uh the chairman of the board who just recently retired was a dier the CEO of logistics division is a dier family member so that's a continuation of of a familyrun company which I think is great because you really have that home feel when you come to work right it's not necessarily a business it's a family some key factoids these are from 2024 so they're a little bit different now uh in 2024 we had 14,000 employees we are now up to 15,000 employees really big thing as you may know there's more and more people who like to fly so there's 2.5 years

of already pre-sold airplanes that we make right that's not even including the Boeing side right but between our TBM and our Kodiak airplanes two and a half years of it have already sold so if you really want an airplane I get in line now you're going to be waiting a little while countries that we're present in 15 the US represents a large portion of sales here but an interesting fact is one upand cominging country that's buying a lot of airplanes is Brazil seeing a lot of sales of private aircraft in Brazil so we're opening up new ventures there $2 billion in revenue so you have a billion dollar company here in Stewart it's a it's

a big deal other things here talks about revenue here again we talked about international markets distribution of revenue between industry and services dire actually has four different divisions so it's not just aircraft and industry is what we are at Steuart but we also have logistics and a services division so there's a lot of split in what we're doing here's the cool map so top left you have Sandp Point Idaho we recently acquired that that is currently the manufacturing site of the Kodiak airplane beautiful beautiful landscape you'll be able to see a video about that in a minute then farther down we have Ngalas so we're doing composite repair composite work subasssembly work there we have

a site of about 50 employees that represent the industry division a lot of the work that's done there goes to Airbus airplanes we're working with both Boeing and Airbus on the very bottom there you have Mobile Alabama two things are happening there's a lot of logistics that are working with Airbus there's an Airbus site in Mobile we also have a training center there which is very close to my heart as the training manager at the site we have our corporate office in Fort Lauderdale which has about 20 individuals now we just opened that in 2023 and that's rapidly growing pompo Beach has our MRO for TBM airplanes so if you're an owner of an TBM

you're going to go there and then of course Stewart which is the largest site in the US currently we're employing about 550 individuals and we are always hiring okay so a little bit about Dair they've been recent into the US market that's why I asked the question how many people had heard about Dair i'm so happy so many raised your hands it's really great to see uh you're going to see more and more of Dier in the US that's going to continue to expand there's continued investment that's going to happen here um Steuart Florida is a really big thing because the new final assembly line which I'm going to show you a mock drawing of

is going to be the home of the TBM that's the plan to have a final assembly line for TBM and the Kodiak eventually right here on the flight line so you're going to see more of these planes here which I think is really exciting and again this is sort of a recap of the other spots that we have in the US okay so we're going to go backtrack with what Ken talked a little bit about when it came to Triumph triumph came here in 2010 and then we acquired it in July of 2022 so we've been here we're going now into our fourth year i've been with the company three years now um again the

expand the goal was to expand into the US and we have taken over a lot of work all the same work that was originally here we're still doing it so we are handling Boeing products it's a 767 trip 7 and then for Gfream we are doing uh the G650 the 700 and the 800 so two major programs are still happening here at the site and we're continuing to bid for new work we're hoping crossing fingers for something made with 737 soon because this is about heritage tonight in a lot of ways I think it's really important to realize heritage still exists here at the Steuart site so in HR once you are hired you are

walk down a hallway towards a cafeteria and then ultimately out into the the corridor where you're going to be working in the main buildings and in this hallway there's all these newspaper clippings we have a article about the 50th anniversary that's there we have photos of uh clamshells being built in 1974 there's pictures of boats that were actually originally manufactured here at the Steuart site as well so this is still alive and well uh as part of the communications team I continue to update this and so future generations can continue to see the history that's at the site okay okay so here is the KC 46A tanker so this is one of the things that

we're working on here at Stewart on the top left this is going to be what we call section 48 so section 48 is one of really the only thing that we have that makes us an ITAR site so we are fully secure lockdown DoD type of site i don't recommend trying to jump the gate the security would enjoy it but I don't think you would uh but yes so we are an ITAR site which means that you need to provide proof of citizenship before you get there you have to have driver's license to get in uh you have to have fancy badges that make arms go up and things like that it's very high-tech um

but we do the clam shell for section 48 so what's really cool about section 48 so section 48 when it comes to the tanker is where the boon comes out and the boon is what will connect to a fighter jet in midair to refuel it so that's what we're building there uh the clam shell or the section 48 is shipped in two halves and then it's assembled all together with the vertical and the horizontals in Everett Washington we ship most of our parts by train right outside all the way to Ever Washington that trip takes 27 days you don't want to miss a delivery if push comes to shove we can ship it by truck

takes about 10 days and if the GM has his hair on fire we can ship it by something called an antinov which is what they ship tanks in for the military and we can get it there in one day at a cost of $1.5 million that's only happened once let's hope it doesn't happen again okay so what else do we have here uh bottom left we have what many people when they come to visit and they see the thing on the bottom left and they go "Wow those are great wings that's amazing." I go "That's not the wing that's the horizontal that's the little tail part that's on the side of the airplane that's what

that is." wing is a lot bigger but we do the horizontals for 767 for the the tanker and the freighter the freighter is important too right you're getting your packages on freighters so if you're getting your UPS package your Amazon package good chance it's coming on a freighter so it's important variation of the airplane that we're building too bottom right that's probably the biggest one that is the most important one that's the jewel of our site in a lot of ways that is the wing center section i have a 3D model of it so after my presentation you can feel free to come up to that that is the heart of the airplane that's the

heart of the 767 it's where the wings connect it's where the fuel goes it's a center of the fuselage no plane is getting built without that it's three stories tall it's a couple hundred thousand rivets that are installed in that thing i've probably got about 150 mechanics that work on that alone just that build right there it's been around we've been making the wing center section since 1980 so that wing center section is older than I am how long we've been building those things but it's it's it's a beautiful build and then top right which is actually an interesting factoid it's the doors 767 doors and it's the hardest build we have i would say

the average mechanic who's been in there is probably about 30 years so you've got to have a lot of years to be building doors and if anyone remembers the news a couple years ago doors are very important none of our doors have fallen off an airplane let's just be clear okay i think one thing that's really important here when we're talking about the airplanes and what we do here at Stuart it's a little bit different than what you may be familiar with in modern times right in modern times there's a lot of automation there's a lot of robots there's a lot of machines there's a lot of conveyor belts not here at Steuart these mechanics

are craftsmen they are artisans these planes are handbuilt almost entirely we have two or three robots but the vast majority of what we do is handcrafted so a lot of experience comes into this there's a lot of training that goes into it to make sure that we're doing the right thing and making sure these airplanes stay in the sky next up here is we have GFream so there's the G650 the G700 and the G800 the G650 is now technically defunct we're moving on to G700 G800 and we are doing the flaps for this airplane so if you're watching a TV show and you're seeing an executive that's sitting there with a old-fashioned a big private

plane he's probably in a Gulf Stream gfreams are really popular here especially if our president is down south and a lot of air traffic is rerouted here you see a lot of private jet liners that are coming in a lot of those are Gulfream tiger Woods has a Gulfream michael Jordan has a Gulf Stream you'll see that land here with his big typical insignia of him dunking a ball uh Kid Rock also has a Gfream that comes in here his emblem is a little bit different and if you want to know what that is you can talk to me after my discussion um but this is a actually a really delicate build too uh GFream

is very very thin when you're talking about Boeing you're talking about something that's very thick material gfream is like paper thin one little bump and you've dented it and you've got to start all over so there's a lot of care that goes into that uh at the bottom in the B bottom photos there you can sort of see what the inside of a of a flap is okay there's a lot of those struts that come across those are ribs and then what we'll go over that is skin so just like a body you've got some ribs that are going to give you the structure and skin will go over that gentleman who's pictured in there

is actually our current supervisor Dante uh he's been with us for a few years and uh this particular build has is going on three shifts so we're pretty much working this particular build 24/7 okay next up is the trip 7 so the trip 7 obviously you're familiar with that one that's a commercial airliner a lot of you may have flown on a trip 7 this is a little bit of a newer build that we have here it's composite so it's a little lighter than what you're typically used to uh compared to the 767 which is a much thicker animal uh the trip 7 we do a lot of the flight control surfaces so we're doing

inboard flap outboard flap aon so again anything that's sort of delineated there in the photos anything that's sort of moving and controlling the airplane that's what we're building there cool factoid here is our supervisor is Paula Yates some of you may recognize that name she's been at the site for about 40 years now and she is very much loved okay I promised you a mockup of the new final assembly line so one thing that the county is working on an initiative is they want to beautify the airport so a lot of the older buildings are going to be knocked down uh the first one was just knocked down this year this is going to be

replaced by this new final assembly line which is going to be where the TBM is going to be built so you'll start to see that it's right outside it's right at the corner of our lot right behind the new reach center which is a really cool initiative too if you haven't heard about the reach center so a little bit about the airplane that's coming here it's currently built in Tarps France i consider it the Ferrari of the skies okay for its class it is the fastest airplane it has great range it pretty much can go almost all the way across the US um I consider it really again the Ferrari of the skies it really

is a beautiful beautiful plane if you're interested in seeing the plane you can see it at the Steuart Air Show it's there every year i'm usually there as well to talk about it um it's a really really great airplane uh the engine in this is a Prattton Whitney it's a Prattton Whitney engine which is in this airplane then we have the sister airplane which is the Kodiak the Kodiak this one I call the Jeep of the skies so this is the airplane where you want to go ice fishing in Canada and you want to land on an ice shelf this is the plane you're going to take you can equip it with pontoons it is

rough tough durable it's going to get the job done we have two we have the Kodiak 100 and the Kodiak 900 the 900's a a little bit faster a little bit bigger these are very popular with government agencies including the Forestry Service they love these planes to go find forest fires right why because they can find a pasture and they can land in it they can go search out what smoke and things of that are know are happening uh the Florida Forestry Service owns two of them and they bring those to the Steuart Air Show so you can actually see both of our airplanes usually we park them right next to each other and you

can get a hands-on view of what those look like the Kodiak the plan is for the Kodiak eventually to make it to Steuart as well so you'll be able to see both of these airplanes flying at the airport so again a little bit of a recap there so on the top you can see the really both the airplanes there full size the TBM again very much like a Ferrari it's fast it's cool prestige bottom one is the Kodiak gets things done here's a little quick video here of of them flying so that just gives you a little brief introductory on what the planes are doing and what they're looking like okay so another thing that

we're looking into as a company is because we're always looking towards the future we're looking into a lot of electric airplanes so we have developed an electric flying airplane it was demonstrated to the EU as part of an initiative for uh green conservation uh it did fly it did work it lasted about 20 minutes the uh plane had six propellers on it and a ton of solar panels to get it up there but we're starting to see initiatives when it comes to what we can do with electric powered airplanes too so we're going to continue to see growth there another thing that we've been working on recently are drones we are starting to get into

drones as well so that was just a recent press release that came out okay perfect so thank you so much again my name is Brian Westfall i'm the training manager at the Dyer Stewart site if you have any questions after I am totally willing to answer them i have a couple cool things over on the side which again is 3D printed wing center section so you can take a look at what we're building there i also have brought some test plates which we use with uh our newbies right so when they come in in their training we test them out on test plates so you can actually take a look and see what fasteners are

going to look like on an airplane and what we do all day long can you spell your name last name w S T P H A L well you got that N we build airplanes there's a lot of complicated things going there okay i was curious where's where's most of your design work done is that in France design work for the TBM is done in France design work for the Kodiak is done in the US and obviously for our customers it's done in the US for Boeing and Gulfream good question out of curiosity what is the retail cost of a Kodiak the 900 I believe right now is 1.8 million what's the TVM that's in

the low 3 3.2 3.3 does everything you build get shipped out in those unusual looking rail car the vast majority yes they do they come in those specifically built rail cars yes why does it take 27 days to get from here down there are quite a lot of stops that are happening on the way and it's not necessarily going in a straight line it's going way north before it goes west to pick up a big These are good questions what does the designation TBM stand for you know I don't know the answer to that probably French i don't think I've never been asked that question i actually don't know it probably is French it probably

is an abbreviation of a French name thank you so there's actually one last thing thank you very much hi how are you hello i was inducted in by Boy Scout long time ago so and they told me I was a trying to think of the actual words they used anyway it means trusted friend and somebody yelled out "Isn't that what the lone tanto called the lone ranger?" And they said "Yeah." So that's what he called me in the name stick so here we are we're going to make you an honorary left hand closest to my heart when I say you're terrific for inviting us here to do this for all these people thank you both

of you for being here and and sharing the history and the future okay uh of what's going on in our community we got a gift for you tonight just a minute i was busy on this glass is engraved the word grin uhhuh there's six of these and they're for you and you can either drink your wine or water or anything you want out of them and if you'd like to give them away to the museum or somebody that works for the museum be our guest well thank you very much you're very welcome uh it's been I've got I've got to get that out of my I'll never see straight again yeah it it's been my

pleasure to have you be a part of our little organization here uh I got to give you a fender to remember me by a groom in blue i lost how about we put it around my neck tuck it into my collar there we go there's five more of them in here for you thank you so much you're very welcome thank you for introducing me there Mr brian appreciate it i use this and I have a gift from Native American that I got and I do it at Eagle Courts of Honor and each one each Eagle Scout will get a picture from me if I get invited to you know and Kim as much as he

has this history of Grumman he's also involved in the local scouting organizations and 48 years he's Yeah he's not sitting around you know letting grass grow under him or over again thank you everyone for being here tonight uh looking forward to seeing you next month we're going to have a presentation uh regarding the history and the archeological finds at the Tahoe mansion uh please stay tuned now we I just so you're aware the city is going to have something going in the big room we're going to be here and I may keep keep your eye on your thing i may announce that we're going to start it a little bit later or maybe have some

coffee beforehand just so we can maximize our exposure okay thank you for being here tonight