AOPA Pilot Magazine - March 2008 - (Page 29) PILOTBRIEFING The best of the best Members vote for the best AOPA Pilot covers from the past 50 years BY IAN J. TWOMBLY A magazine’s cover is in many ways its prime identity. It’s the first glimpse of what’s to come after the issue arrives in the mail. It’s what sells publications on the newsstand. It proudly displays the name, or flag. And above all else, it’s a great way for fantastic photos to be showcased. The design of AOPA Pilot has changed much over the past 50 years. The first issues of the magazine featured photos that looked nice, but had nothing to do with the content inside. Today, the magazine features cover stories that draw the reader inside for more. In celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of the magazine, we asked you, the members, to vote on the best covers from the past 50 years. Voting was broken down by decades, starting with 1958 to 1967, and so on. Here then are the winners. 1958-1967 May 1959 The magazine has featured odd or unusual airplanes on the cover at various times throughout the years, but perhaps none as odd as the Taylor Aerocar. N103D was serial number two and one of only six ever built. Incidentally, the photo had nothing to do with the inside content of the magazine, which seems peculiar today—especially when you consider this issue marked the association’s twentieth anniversary. 1968-1977 January 1972 What is it about beautiful landscapes and flying? In this case, members thought enough of the rather majestic photo to award it the most votes of any cover from the past 50 years. Forget the Cub, the Voyager, special issues dealing with the future of general aviation, and AOPA’s fiftieth anniversary. Pilots want to see Bonanzas and glaciers. This photo was taken by Bob Auburn as the V-tail Bonanza passed over the Chetalothna Glacier in Alaska’s Denali National Park. Auburn was half of a husband and wife team that spent almost four months in the state filming a show called “Flying Alaska.” 1978-1987 January 1986 Longtime AOPA Pilot Art Director Art Davis snapped this memorable photo of Burt Rutan’s Voyager before its historic nonstop flight. The shoot was something of an exclusive for the magazine and was just one example of how it has been at the forefront of general aviation through the years. In fact, the photographs and accompanying story 1958 Trivia: Inventions appeared in the magazine almost a year before Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager took to the skies and circled the globe without refueling. It created an aviation buzz that the world hadn’t seen in decades. Computer modem. Remote control. Microchip. AOPA PILOT • 29 • MARCH 2008
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