Flights of fancy: Model maker uses simple materials to make miniature airplanes

WEST JORDAN — Glen Smith takes the making of paper airplanes to new heights.

Using only simple materials such as paper, cardboard, glue and paint, Smith creates models of airplanes that capture not only detail of design but also a fascination with flying.

Smith has been into airplanes "ever since I can remember. I started out with those stick models that were powered by an elastic. As a kid I put together some of those models that came in kits."

But there were too many little parts and pieces to really make the kits fun, he said. "I always wanted to make something that would be just my own."

It would take him a while to get to that point. But he never lost interest in airplanes.

In the Army, he became an airplane mechanic. "This was just after the Korean War had ended and before the Vietnam War started. I wanted to be a helicopter pilot, and I qualified to attend the school. But then it closed down. They told me I could hang around for a year as a mechanic, and maybe something would open up."

But Smith had just married and decided to use his educational benefits under the G.I. Bill and attend the Spartan School of Aeronautics in Tulsa, Okla., to learn more about mechanics.

After graduating, he hired on as a mechanic with Hughes' Air West. "That was taken over by Republic. And then Republic was taken over by Northwest." Smith still had a job, but it was in Minnesota. "At that time my oldest daughter had asthma, and doctors thought the Minnesota climate wouldn't be good for her. So, we decided that the family would stay here in Utah, and I would commute to Minnesota."

That started back in 1997, and it worked pretty well, he says. The company allowed him to take his vacation one day at a time, so he often was able to spend three-day weekends in Utah. "I had a little one-room apartment in Minnesota for the time I spent there."

And that's where Smith began making his model planes.

"It was lonely there, and I needed something to do. But I didn't know quite how to do it. I wanted something simple that wouldn't cost too much. But I didn't think I could make anything halfway decent out of paper."

One of the other men in the electric shop was "a 'starving artist,' I guess you could call him. He worked to pay the bills, but he really liked to paint. I told him it was neat to have a hobby like that, and he asked me what I would like to do. I told him that I'd like to build model airplanes, but I didn't know how. He told me, 'Just work at it.' He kept asking me if I had started, so after a few weeks, I decided to try it."