Eyes bright and glistening with emotion, 98-year-old Joe Grant gripped the controls of the bright yellow 50 year-old DC3. Never truer than at that moment thousands of feet above the North Dakota landscape did the logo “Smile in the Sky” painted on the fuselage have a more poignant meaning.
“I would never have believed this possible,” he said to the group of Saudi students and VIPs accompanying him. “It’s not a dream; it’s better than that.”
Joe Grant, the pilot who flew the Douglas DC3 aircraft that was a gift from Franklin D. Roosevelt to King Abdul Aziz in 1945, had finally returned to the air, piloting a famous marque aircraft. The prospect of flying a Dakota in North Dakota had proved just too much of a temptation.
The flight took place during an open day recently, which included the first showing of a documentary film about an American woman’s first impressions of the Kingdom at the Fargo Air Museum in North Dakota.
“It is a tremendous privilege to be able to combine an opportunity to strengthen the ties of friendship between our two nations,” said Dr. Selwa Al-Hazzaa, chair of the executive board of Friends of Saudi Arabia, “and especially to be with Capt. Joe Grant who played such a significant part in the development of the Kingdom’s air infrastructure.”
The flight was in a DC3 that is part of the museums’ collection of historic aircraft. “We were enveloped by smiles all around and with recollections from Joe’s days in Saudi Arabia from 1945 through 1948,” said Dr. Hazzaa. Such was the demand for the ride, that a second was speedily organized, both with Capt. Grant at the controls.
Friends of Saudi Arabia, the nonprofit group that organized the trip from the Kingdom, was founded last year to foster friendships with the US. During the day’s celebrations, the dean of North Dakota State University, Tom Riley held a reception and round table discussion for Dr. Hazzaa and eight Saudi students who are studying at the university. Riley said he was “delighted” at Dr. Hazzaa’s visit and the presence of Saudi students on his campus.
With the group were H. Delano Roosevelt – the grandson of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the great-grandnephew of Theodore Roosevelt – and his wife, Janice, who is the subject of the documentary. “She is the quintessential American woman – she’s professional, a wife, a mother,” said Layla Davey, a spokeswoman for Friends of Saudi Arabia. “These were her first impressions of Saudi Arabia and it was her first trip there.”
A lively discussion followed the first showing of the film, with questions fielded by Janice Roosevelt and Dr. Michael Saba, executive director of Friends of Saudi Arabia.
Fargo was chosen as the venue to premier the documentary as Doug Anderson, the Fargo Air Museum’s executive director, filmed it. There are also significant historical connections between the state and the Roosevelt family
Theodore Roosevelt, who spent time in the Badlands of western North Dakota, has a national park named after him in North Dakota. Moreover, FDR had announced his candidacy for president in 1932 by sending a letter to the North Dakota Democratic Committee allowing his name to be entered for the presidential primary elections.
