A few years ago, I unexpectedly flew a plane. It's true. I went to Timmerman to write a story about the airport and somehow ended up with my hands on the wheel of a small airplane, an instructor walking me through it.
I have a booklet marking my first hour of "flight training" as proof, should I ever decide to give it another go.
It was definitely fun, and, while I did actually take off and fly, my instructor landed the plane, which is likely why I'm still here today.
Every now and I again, I come across the photos I took that day. Now, I make no claim on being either an airplane pilot or a great photographer, but the combination of dabbling in those things resulted in some decent aerial photos of the city, some of which made it into the original story.
When I stumbled across them today, I decided to share them here, along with some great advice I received that day from my instructor, Daniel Gerard ... "don't drop the camera out the window."
The Courthouse, with wing
Downtown, with wing brace
The East Side, including Bradford Beach
Miller Park
Marquette Interchange
My house
Westown
Downtown, looking pale
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
