Gaining a second wind: Grainger Engineering alumni collaborate to restore WWI relic

Mechanical science and engineering alum Arnie Taube (BSME 1975) and aerospace engineering alum Bruce Ernt (BSA&AE 1965) have found an outlet for their shared passion for aviation: restoring a World War I-era DH-4 lightbomber/observation aircraft to flyable status.

“I am very enthusiastic about airplanes and history, so it was a natural fit,” Taube said of volunteering for the project.

“It was like a breath of fresh air to get back to airplanes,” Ernt echoed. “Working with a 1918 aircraft has been a delight.”

The two alumni, both retired, are volunteering alongside a dozen or so dedicated craftsmen in partnership with the Bleckley Airport Memorial Foundation in Wichita, Kansas. The Bleckley Foundation honors Wichita local Second Lieutenant Erwin Bleckley, an artillery observer who flew in an identical DH-4 with Chicago native Lieutenant Harold Goettler on two missions during WWI.

The AirCo DH-4 light day bomber biplane, designed by British aerospace engineer Geoffrey de Havilland, is memorialized as a widely successful WWI day bomber. U.S. manufacturers produced nearly 5,000 of the 6,000+ total biplanes that saw combat during the war. As the United States Air Force did not form until September 1947, American DH-4s were flown by the Army Air Service.

“The [DH-4] was a very high-performance aircraft at the time,” said Taube, who has been working on the restoration project for more than a year. “It was fast enough and could fly high enough that German fighters had a really hard time being able to fight it or shoot it down.”

As part of the 50^th Aero Squadron, the two were given a mission to attempt to locate the Lost Battalion— nine companies of the U.S. 77^th Division who were isolated by German forces in the Argonne Forest in October 1918. Such an attempt—to locate and assist lost soldiers stranded in enemy territory, all from up in the air—was the first of its kind in U.S. military history.

The pair flew on a sortie in the morning alongside other squadron planes and thought they spotted the battalion’s location. They then volunteered to fly a second sortie to confirm identity of the battalion and attempt to airdrop supplies. During a low and slow pass to drop the supplies, Lt. Goettler was killed by enemy fire. Second Lt. Bleckley took control of the aircraft and attempted to escape the combat zone, but crash landed behind the front line and died from his injuries. Both men were awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor posthumously for their heroic attempt. They are two of four total American soldiers awarded the Medal of Honor for flight action during WWI, alongside Eddie Rickenbacker and Frank Luke, Jr.

The restoration project, slated to finish in 2026, involves fabricating new wooden parts as well as cleaning originals. This particular DH-4 was manufactured near the end of the war and never assembled for combat. It was first assembled by a group based in Bowling Green, Kentucky, who displayed the project at EAA AirVenture Oshkosh in 2018. Unfortunately, the DH-4 crashed during an attempted test takeoff two years later, sustaining heavy damage to its fuselage and wings. This project marks its second restoration.

Taube has been helping with assembly of existing parts, such as the joystick and other controls, as well as varnishing new parts and cleaning originals.

“We have the full set of engineering drawings for the aircraft from the Dayton-Wright Company, so we fabricate parts as needed,” he said.

Ernt has been helping to fabricate wing sections. He will also contribute to control surfaces such as the horizontal stabilizer. “I’m the newest kid on the block,” he said of working on the project for four months. “I got paired with a very skilled woodworker, and I’ve just been blown away by the whole staff that I work with. There’s so much talent and wisdom there.”

Although ten years apart in their programs, the two alumni have led similarly rich careers and both moved to the Wichita area as retirees to be closer to their respective children. Ernt, who grew up in Rantoul, worked his way through school and completed what was then a five-year aerospace program in four and a half years.

“I was very satisfied with the educational aspects that I got out of the U of I,” he said.

He then moved to St. Louis, Missouri, to work for McDonnell Aircraft Corporation before taking other positions in more rural areas. “I wanted to raise my family in a non-metropolitan area,” he recalled. He would later settle in southeast Kansas, working for M-E-C Company for 25 years before retiring as vice president.

Taube had also intended to apply to Illinois’ aerospace engineering program, but life brought other opportunities. 

“When I was entering college, the Apollo program was shutting down and aeronautical engineers were being laid off,” Taube recalled. “I decided that I was going to become a mechanical engineering instead because there are mechanical systems in airplanes.”

Taube had an uncle who worked as a product engineer at John Deere, a connection that resulted in Taube applying to the company for a cooperative education position. He was accepted into the program and alternated between school semesters and internship positions during his time on campus. He was also a member of the engineering fraternity Sigma Phi Delta and has fond memories from participating in the Engineering Open House. He would go on to have a 45-year career at John Deere, frequently volunteering as a judge for EOH in later years. “It was fun seeing the student projects and the different capabilities that the student teams had,” he said.

Within the volunteer community, the pair enjoy a kinship from their connections to Illinois. “We’re the tag team for following U of I sports so we can brag about how our teams are doing to all the Kansas kids,” Ernt joked.

The group hopes to place the finished aircraft, along with a bronze statue of Second Lt. Bleckley, on permanent display in the passenger terminal of Wichita Dwight D. Eisenhower National Airport.

Although the restoration is largely privately funded, Bleckley Foundation welcomes public donations here.