I wish this Father’s Day I could write about my 95-year-old father John O. Emmerich Jr. but such longevity was not in God’s plan. But I can write about my father-in-law Bob Knight, who was honored this week at the Madison airport by the Federal Aviation Administration, receiving the nation’s most prestigious aviation award.
Surrounded by dozens of fellow pilots, FAA officials, family and friends, Bob was handed a plaque that reads, “Fifty Years of Dedicated Service in Aviation Safety. The Department of Transportation Federal Aviation Administration. The Wright Brothers Master Pilot Award presented to Robert Terrell Knight June 11, 2024 in recognition of your 50 years of exemplary aviation flight experience, distinguished professionalism, and steadfast commitment to aviation safety.”
The family joke was we first had to convince Bob that this wasn’t a trap by the FAA to arrest him.
There's an old pilot saying: There are old pilots and there are bold pilots, but there are no old bold pilots. And then there is my father-in-law Bob Knight. As a Presbyterian, I know a little something about divine providence but there is no better walking talking example of this than 88-year-old Bob Knight. He’s still flying. It’s the grace of God.
I had the honor of doing the write up and interviewing Bob during the presentation and ceremony. Here are some of the highlights of my write up:
Bob may have been the oldest commercial pilot to fly private clients solo in the history of the United States, perhaps the world. The Guinness Book of World Records says the oldest commercial pilot is a 92-year-old Japanese pilot who is still towing banners. But he doesn’t fly passengers. My Google search was unable to find an older passenger-carrying commercial pilot than Bob Knight. He is one of a kind.
My wife Ginny grew up in Taylorsville with a grass landing strip in their backyard. They nicknamed the strip “Smith County International.” The family of four flew everywhere – to the mountains, to the Bahamas, to New Orleans and back for dinner.
As Ginny describes it, every time a plane flew over Taylorsville, the locals would look up and say with a thick rural accent, “Well yonder goes Robert Terrell.”
Bob's first memory of flying is when he was four years old. He flew his pedal airplane right over the edge of the porch. By age 14, he was really hooked, reading about the World War II flying heroes. His first flight was in a Cub. When he got in the plane, he told the pilot "No straight and level." By the end of the flight he was a little nauseous, but he didn't throw up.
While taking a class at the local junior college in Laurel he soloed in a metal monoplane Luscombe after just six hours. "I was shocked when the instructor got out of the plane and told me to go around." He graduated to a four passenger $3,400 Tri Pacer. He would use it to fly to auction sales across the southeast, supporting his family business as a John Deere tractor dealer. He got a commercial rating.
Next, lifelong friend Pete Walley directed him to a 1955 Cessna 180. With an instrument rating he flew his family all around the country: to the Rockies, to the Bahamas, to Costa Rica, to New Orleans for dinner. Everywhere and anywhere.
Bob recalls the good times flying out to Chandeleur Island, 30 miles off the Mississippi coast. "We would land on the wet sand, which was compacted. Then we'd just fish in the surf."
Thanks to Jimmy Carter and the embargo, the family business declined as interest rates rose to 21 percent. Nobody could finance anything, including tractors. So Bob left his John Deere dealership for Baton Rouge and became a professional pilot, fulfilling a lifetime dream, flying attorneys and businessmen around the southeast
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One of his biggest clients had Bob fly him to auctions all around the south. Interest rates were high, the mail was slow and the Internet and email did not exist. Bob's airplane could get checks moved faster than the mail and his clients used Bob's plane and flying prowess to make money from this. Bob's V-tailed Bonanza was his steed.
One day, he awoke from his hotel room to find his client morose and in distress. Turns out the bank was demanding payment and he couldn't get the money there in time. After a few questions, Bob realized he could airdrop a bag of $100,000 in cash near his client's business and they could rush to the bank in time for closing. They had just a few minutes to spare.
Murphy's Law quicked in and the plastic bag was blown back from the prop wash into the V-tail. So Bob had to land in a nearby field, pulled the plastic and the cash off the tail and tried again with added weight to the bag. This time he was successful. His client's employees made it to the bank in time and Bob and his client lived to fly another day.
"I never knowingly hauled anybody with drugs or narcotics," Bob said. Once a DEA agent confronted him on the tarmac and asked some questions. Bob's response: "There's only one kind of dope that ever gets on this plane and you're looking at him." The DEA agent moved on.
After a while, Bob expanded his fleet to two V-tailed Bonanza and two twin-engine Aerostars. "I don't own planes. They own me," he liked to say.
Bob's secret to keeping clients was simple. Go around the weather and avoid the bumps. He recalled one client who would say the same thing as he got on the plane: "Bob, you know the rules. No bumps." Bob knew it was a perfect flight, even in rough weather when the passenger awakened just after landing and said, "we are already here?"
Bob was careful with passengers, but by himself he was fearless. "I've been blessed to have made it through a lot of stupid stuff. By some standards, I was a renegade pilot. It's a God thing that I'm still alive. It's taken me a long time to realize that God's in charge and not Bob Knight."
The forced landings are numerous. Once with his wife and daughter returning from a commercial flight to Europe, he had to land in a frozen field in Delaware in the middle of winter. Unknown to him, the plane had been pulled out of its hangar for a few days and got rained on hard. Because it was freezing cold and he thought the plane had been inside, he failed to check the sumps.
The field was rough from frozen cattle footprints. Even so, he had to take off and land three times before his wife and daughter would get back in the plane.
One moonless night, his single-engine Bonanza lost power over a dark forest north of Baton Rouge. He managed to land on the tiniest opening imaginable, avoiding a huge oak by several feet. His passenger was uninjured. Bob ended up with some metal along his spine and an inch shorter, but it didn’t slow him down.
Just a few years ago, one of the engines in his Aerostar failed on takeoff. The Aerostar is a fast and finicky plane, not tolerant of the unskilled. This would have been a fatal event for most pilots. But even at 83 years old, Bob Knight was able to land the plane safely and walk away. The plane was totaled.
Then shortly after the Aerostar crash, Bob was checking out his new Bonanza engine near Taylorsville. The engine crankshaft failed at 3,000 feet. Piece of cake for Bob. He spotted a private strip, put her down and walked away.
Then there was the forced landing when his friend "Frog" was flying. Another catastrophic metal failure. Oil covered the windshield. The damage was so bad the prop even feathered. "Frog" declared that he was going to put it down in a muddy field. "The Hell you are," Bob said. "You're going to put it down on that long runway (pointing to a road). I'll watch for power lines and signs and you do just what I tell you to." They pushed it off the road into a private driveway. "Man, that guy's eyes were this big around when we rolled up into his driveway."
The Bob Knight flying stories are legendary in pilot circles. One person told me how he would land on the highway, taxi to a filling station and fill up to avoid paying the avgas tax. Then he would take back off.
One flying instructor told me how Jackson International was socked in. Commercial jets were “going around” because they could not land. Then along comes Bob Knight and plops down on the runway, no problem. The controller in the tower met Bob on the runway and gave him the card of an instrument instructor. “Bob, you have got to get your instrument rating,” the controller demanded. It was a different era.
He hand flies instrument approaches in minimum conditions that I wouldn’t even consider attempting with my state-of-the-art autopilot. Piece of cake for Bob Knight.
I remember a wonderful moment way back when. I was flying with my family somewhere over Texas when a familiar voice came over the frequency. “Hey, hey, Wyatt. It’s Bob. How’s my favorite son-in-law? Beautiful day to be flying.”
Once he came to pick me up at Hawkins Field. A nasty thunderstorm kicked up. I refused to get in the plane. Off he went.
Another time he was flying his family back from a skiing trip. He picked up ice over the Mississippi River and just barely made it to his grass strip. “My max airspeed, max power and stall speed all converged into one.”
Just a few years ago, he flew his twin-engine Aerostar into Taylorsville International. The next morning the dew was heavy and the grass on the strip was high. We all insisted that he not take off and he agreed. Moments later, he slipped away without us noticing. When I heard the engines crank, I got down on my knees and prayed. Away he flew.
Bob reminds me of my maternal grandfather, Bob Buntin, who was a Gulfport judge in his later years. During World War I, Bob Buntin was a test pilot. Out of his group of 20 test pilots, he was the only one to survive. He did so by curling himself into a ball and jumping out of the plane just before it crashed. He did this three times. I shouldn’t even exist. But I do.
When I look at the smiling face of Bob Knight – and he is always smiling and laughing – it is though I am looking straight into the face of divine providence. He was meant to be.
Bob Knight is a living breathing example of God’s promise of providence and personal redemption. He got there by God’s grace through the crucible of the human struggle. And he knows it. As a result, he has given back to his fellow man, helping hundreds of people overcome addiction in their lives. I am blessed to help honor him this Father’s Day.
