Residential "Air Park" Is Planned To Honor Chuckey Aviation Pioneer

An Aviation-Centered Family

Steve Hensley perhaps came by his interest in flying through a sort of family osmosis, his brother sometimes speculates.

The Hensley brothers' father Robie Hensley (himself a flyer who created a sensation some years ago by landing his plane on temporarily closed highway 11E and taxiing into the Chuckey Post Office Parking lot on the day he retired there as postmaster), was a riveter in a military aircraft factory in Chicago during World War II, building C-47s, which Ted Hensley described as "the army version of the DC-3." Their mother, Zetta, also worked at the factory.

Steve Hensley was taken to that factory as a baby, and perhaps bonded with the aviation world there, his brother speculated.

As they grew up in Chuckey, the Hensley brothers (Steve most of all) dreamed of having a private airstrip near their home. Their pilot father favored the idea. Zetta Hensley simply "thought we were all nuts, " Ted Hensley said.

When the land on which the airpark is being developed became available several years ago, Ted Hensley wanted to buy it, but wondered how best to pay for and use it.

Steve Hensley, recalling that old dream from boyhood, pointed out that the land was ideal for an air strip, and suggested the land could be paid for by sale of home sites from part of the property.

So Ted Hensley bought the land and developed on it what he calls "the best grass airstrip in the state of Tennessee." The airpark idea drew from there.

He made visits to every nearby neighbor to discuss his plans and also had state planner Carroll Gouge visit the site to okay the concept.

In the meantime, money generated by tobacco raised on the land make the payments on the property.

The airpark "will not be an airport - not commercial at all - but strictly private." Hensley said. FAA guidelines must be followed, and residents of the airpark will maintain the airs strip through common ownership or some other legal arrangement.

The property is in an area well suited for an airpark, Hensley said. "The whole area is flat", he said. "Once you top the Massengill Hill, headed toward the mountains, you enter a huge bowl-shaped flat place."