Have you met Carley McCoy?
C.R. Nelson
From left, Joe Statler, Daniel McCoy, Rhonda Owens and Robin Russell Ammons.
From left, Joe Statler, Daniel McCoy, Rhonda Owens and Robin Russell Ammons.
Dale Spark’s Dominion Post photo from the mid-1980s shows the plane pointing skyward after a fall storm sheered some of its moorings and stood it on its tail. Carley is standing in front of it in the photo, his long beard leaning hard to the left. The caption reads, “The wind was still blowing Tuesday, as shown by his beard. McCoy says he thinks he will be able to get started on the jet after Thanksgiving.”
Anyone who has ever driven through Blacksville, that old frontier town that starts in Pennsylvania and ends in West Virginia, knows what lurks on the high ground above town on State Route 7. No matter how many times I drive by, it’s still a rush when I catch sight of a fighter jet coming in low as I crest the hill.
“An out-of-town couple thought it was trying to land on the road,” owner Daniel McCoy tells me. “They ran over the bank right over there.”
We’re standing along the far edge of that bank, catching the shade created by the big wing blocking the after-six p.m. sun of another scorcher day. Gravel, grass and artifacts – tractors, trucks and trailers from the piston-driven 20th century, an American Picker’s dream, surround us. And in the middle of it all is what I’ve come to see and hear all about.
Robin Russell Ammons has the sandwich tray set out, and there’s a cooler full of soda pop and some big rocks to sit on. Rhonda Owens is here, Cathy Wilson Chistler can’t make it, and when Joe Statler arrives, we can take a photo. We’re here for an impromptu meeting to describe to me The Real McCoy Plane Project, a great notion spawned by the impact of COVID-19 on Cee Bee high school seniors when the virus brought their dreams of parties, proms and graduation day crashing down.
“My niece Joleigh Sollars was in the Class of 2020 and I wanted to do something to honor them and what they’ve gone through,” Robin starts the meeting early for my benefit, to fill me in. “I wanted something everybody could see and remember. The old Clay-Battelle scoreboard is here so it’s the perfect place. Everybody looks at the jet when they drive by!”
The scoreboard is attached to the steel legs under the belly of this big warbird. It’s painted Clay Battelle blue with the Cee Bee logo on the left and the ferocious bee mascot, all stenciled by Robin, in the middle. This is a real blast from the past; back when scoreboards weren’t run by electrodes, back when electric lights were the order of the day.
Joe Statler arrives, and we cluster under the wing to hear the story of how the scoreboard got here. Joe tells me he was on the Clay Battelle school board in 2012. When the football field got a facelift, and the scoreboard was replaced that year, he took the old one home.
Joe’s running joke to anyone who asked back then was that he was scrapping it out. But in the end, he brought it up the hill to be part of Fred – Carley to the world – McCoy’s roadside attraction.
Joe pats the board. “Our goal is to make it operational again. Infinity Electric is getting power to the board and the score will be 20 20 in honor of the students.”
So how did this jet get here, and why?
The story Carley told everybody, including reporters, son Daniel McCoy says, was that he bought the old Korean War F-84 at open auction for a fifty dollar bid at the old Morgantown Airport in 1963 or maybe 4. He hauled it home in two pieces and got it anchored as the landmark of his dreams where his front yard meets Route 7. And there it stood, startling drivers for the next twenty-some years. Dale Spark’s Dominion Post photo from the mid-1980s shows it pointing skyward after a fall storm sheered some of its moorings and stood it on its tail. Carley is standing in front of it in the photo, his long beard leaning hard to the left. The caption reads, “The wind was still blowing Tuesday, as shown by his beard. McCoy says he thinks he will be able to get started on the jet after Thanksgiving.”
The F-84 was remounted and continued to stand guard in the sky over Blacksville as the years etched road dust and grime into its aluminum frame and dulled the U S AIRFORCE written on its side.
Robin remembers it was 1993 when “Rhonda Owens stopped and said ‘Carley we’re gonna clean that plane.’ Then she talked me into helping her. A lot of people got involved, Joe, Bobby Brookover, Andy Price…” The crew of volunteers climbed ladders and used rollers to paint it gray, but when it came to the tail section dangling in space, Carley fired up his old crane and “Curt Henkins didn’t want to but he got in the cage with a roller and painted it.” Robin climbed up and did the finish work, writing Blacksville on the side and adding the flying tiger teeth that delighted me the first time I drove by on my way to Mason Dixon Park. Amazingly, the whole job was done in a day. Gary Steele bought the paint, and everybody pitched in.
And so it stood for the next 27 years. When the scoreboard got added, it attracted kids who got their senior pictures taken with the fighter jet soaring above them. Over time graffiti happened. Someone tagged the flying tiger teeth. Dust and grime settled in, and moss wasn’t far behind. Carley died October 7, 2018, at age 89, and Daniel took over stewardship of the jet, the land and the rest of Carley’s beloved collection of 20th-century memorabilia.
It took the shock of COVID-19 and the changes that it levied on Blacksville – and the rest of the world – to kick start the Real McCoy Plane Project that will give Carley and the class of 2020 the recognition they’ve earned.
When Robin posted the ongoing project on Facebook, friends cheered, and the checks, donations and offers of extra help came rolling in.
When the Dominion Post reported on July 8 that Joe Statler and Andy Price were patching and power washing the plane to prep it for its new paint job, Robin posted the link and excitement grew.
By July 25, Robin posted that donations had almost reached $4,000, Bob Bookover and James Thorne were working on the cockpit canopy, and the jet’s history was being tracked down by Lt. Col. John M Arellanes, commander of the Air Force Reserve Officer Training Corps at West Virginia University. Lt. Col. Arellanes has been up to look at the jet, but the serial number has yet to be found inside the cockpit. Still, the chances are good that Carley’s old F-84 is the 35th one of its kind in the United States, delighting motorists in West Virginia, the 35th state.
When the ROTC cadets get back to WVU sometime in September, they’ll be up to detail the nose and paint the numbers and insignias, Robin tells me over sandwiches as we check the photos I’ve taken, pore over details of the plan going forward and take in a spectacular sunset.
When the project is complete, the jet’s history will be under acrylic and on display, along with a plaque in memory of Carley, written by niece and retired teacher Susan Wilson Rockwell. In beautiful cursive, the rough draft lets us know that Carley served his country as a Marine, played the fiddle and sang, loved history, collected antiques, and once owned the oldest car in the state – an 1899 Schacht. The eulogy ends with these lines: “A friend to all, Carley was a gentle soul, one who truly lived his life as a ‘Real McCoy.'”