Without knowing it from each other, several Vintage Kiwi members have been emailing, calling and working to save New Zealand’s first home built glider, the Hall Cherokee ZK-GBT.

Several people got to hear a few months ago that there was a glider stored at the Waikato Polytech, apparently in good condition, but was now going to be destroyed and end up as fire wood, simply because it was in the way.

We quickly found out it was BT, but it was hard to find out where it exactly was stored (I got phone calls from Rotorua, Huntly and other places – until Roger Brown told me at Drury he had it all sussed out and would go a Saturday and pick the thing up.

All this after MOTAT had been contacted and although they could be interested, they didn’t want to have the glider since its logbooks were gone…

Anyway, Roger along with Les Riesterer and Stu Rogerson (all Vintage Kiwi and Piako Gliding Club members) took off with two trailers to salvage the firewood and as you can see on the pictures the glider is in good shape, stored at Matamata for now, and will soon be restored to display condition. Eventually we would like to see it in a yet-to-be vintage gliding museum; but for the time being it could be permanently displayed at a gliding club somewhere in the country, or used as display glider at Vintage Rallys.

All in all a good effort to save an unique glider in New Zealand. Without Vintage Kiwi this one would definitely only have been a memory and some pictures in the future.

Congratulations, and thanks to everyone involved!

Click on images to the right to view enlarged copy.  
Top set: Rescue team of Roger Brown, Les Riesterer, and Stu Rogerson moving the Hall Cherokee to safe haven.
 
Bottom set: the final "resting place"... NZ's first homebuilt glider in pride of place thanks to the dedication of Vintage Kiwi members.

Read the 1961 Gliding Kiwi story on this glider