Photo Courtesy of Mark Seeman
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Photo Courtesy of Mark Seeman
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Ed was born in Newark New Jersey in 1936 and grew up in Hoboken New Jersey. He attended the University of Connecticut, received his dental degree from Tufts University school of Dental Medicine and received his periodontal training at New York University College of Dentistry.
He served two years as a Captain in the United States Army Dental Corps stationed at Fort Hood Texas.
He was a clinical assistant professor at New Jersey College of Medicine and Dentistry. He is a past president of the New Jersey Society of Periodontists and a current member of the American Dental association, Middlesex County Dental Society, Northeastern Society of Periodontists, New Jersey Society of Periodontists, American Academy of Periodontology, and the American Academy of Osseointagration.
He has a dental practice limited to Periodontics and Implantology in Woodbridge NJ since 1965.
On the aviation side, he is a member of the AOPA, EAA and Ye Anciente and Secret Order of Quiet Birdmen. He has over 5,000 hours of flying time since receiving his pilots licence in 1970. He holds a commercial licence, instrument rating, CFI, CFII, mutli engine and sea plane rating. He flew his Cessna 210 N2160S with his family in the 1980's to the United Kingdom and flew to Australia in 1986 and then flew his plane around the world in 1988. His last Atlantic crossing was in 1997 when he flew to Paris and London.
He is married since dental school to Bobbie who owns a Century 21 Real Estate Agency in Metuchen NJ. He has two children Michael and Marcie and 5 grandchildren.
He has known Dick for about 12 years. Dick has convinced Ed that although he has flown around the world before, he flew eastbound and now this trip will be westbound, with new islands to be discovered and incredible sunsets yet to be seen.
 Photo Courtesy of Richard Sollner
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Dick was born in 1925 in Queens, NY, raised in Brooklyn (don't let it get around). He enlisted in the Naval Aviation Cadet Program in March 1943 while a senior in Brooklyn Technical High School. Three and a half years later he received his "Wings of Gold".
He served three years in the Caribbean in a land based, anti submarine patrol squadron. He was designated Patrol Plane Commander in the Lockheed Neptune P2V while still an Ensign.
After the Navy and a siege of tuberculosis he was found healthy enough to fly for Eastern Airlines in 1953. With Eastern he flew for thirty-one years, the last eighteen as Captain. He flew the DC3, Martin 404, DC4, Constellations, DC6, DC7, Lockheed Electra, Boeing 727, DC8, and the last five years the Lockheed 1011 Tri-Star.
Since retirement in 1984 he has been flying his Twin Comanche to such places as Victoria, BC, Portland, OR, Mexico City, Cancun, Guatemala City, and as far as Munich, Germany via Greenland and Iceland. His most ambitious trip was in 2002 when he flew around the world westbound with 82-year-old Co-Captain Bill Moore. In recognition of that accomplishment He and Bill were each awarded the New Jersey Governor's Aviation and Space Medal.
Dick is a member of the International Fellowship of Flying Rotarians, AOPA, EAA Chapter 643 and Vintage Aircraft Chapter 7, Flying Farmers. He is a member of the Somerville Hangar of Ye Anciente and Secret Order of Quiet Birdmen. He is also involved in the construction of a Pietenpol homebuilt, a two holer monoplane (circa 1929).
Dick has seven grown children, two in aviation. His son John, a former Marine F18 pilot, is now a junior Captain with United Airlines. His daughter Anastasia, a Continental flight attendant, is also an instrument rated multi-engine commercial pilot with a flight instructor rating, working on instrument and multi-engine instructor certificates and instructing at Trenton airport.
Dick has made pilgrimages to Kitty Hawk, Oshkosh and Sun n Fun.