I just recently heard about Don Locker being honored with not one, but two awards from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) last year. The awards and ceremony were all orchestrated by his daughter Brianne, and she managed to keep it a secret!

Last March, 2024, Don was vaguely aware of some unusual activity at home and at Locker Brothers Airport-many trips to the grocery story, airplanes being moved around, secretive behavior, odd phone calls, chairs being lined up, vacuuming the hanger, for goodness’ sake! Relatives and friends from out of town started showing up.

And then, on March 2, the surprise was revealed-daughter Brianne had submitted his name for two awards given by the FAA  to pilots and airplane mechanics who have devoted fifty or more years of their lives to the industry. Brianne’s secret had been kept-no mean feat- and Don had no idea what was going on!

So, the stage was set. People showed up, and Don was honored for his fifty years of doing what he loved-flying planes, building planes, working on planes. What a deal!

Dan Vengen from the Lubbock FAA office told me that he gives about twenty of these awards a year to either pilots or mechanics, but only one or two people qualify for both. So, Don receiving both is quite an accomplishment. Brianne was made aware of these awards from a friend Don went to mechanic school with and knew her dad should be recognized, so she saw to it that it happened.

Photo courtesy of Don Locker

Don grew up working on his dad Morgan’s airplanes and loved it. He earned his pilot’s license at seventeen, then his commercial license, started crop dusting and also gave flying lessons. He graduated from Muleshoe High School in 1970, tried college and hated it. So, then it was to Amarillo where he finished mechanics school at Texas State Technical Institute, now Texas State Technical College (TSTC).

He continued to work for his dad, but later went to work for Bill Read at Pleasant Hill, New Mexico. Don worked there until Bill retired, after which Don’s brother Fred leased the business, and Don continued working there for seventeen years.

These days Don still does some spraying, flies for pleasure, still works on mechanics, and keeps his licenses current. He also continues to build airplanes from kits, the second one shown in this card from Tim and Tammy Black. Nephew Luke Bruns has that plane. Don is now working on his fifth plane.

Photo courtesy of Don Locker

This turboprop he built, shown here outside, was one prominently displayed in that cleaned up hanger during the award presentation.

Photo courtesy of Don Locker

Dan Vengen felt like an award to someone who had spent fifty years in the business deserves more than the paper certificate from the FAA.  So he makes a plaque of finished oak plywood and mounts the laminated certificate on it. Then, people who came to celebrate with Don signed it on the back to wish him well.

Photo courtesy of Donna Locker

After Brianne submitted Don’s name for the awards, Dan and the FAA plowed through about a ream of paperwork! Anyone who has had their pilot’s license revoked is not eligible for any award, and Don had kept his all up to date and certainly had not had it revoked. But much more information had to be dealt with before the awards were finalized. Don was given the file of paperwork afterwards.

Friends and family showed up from as far away as New York and California to applaud Don getting this “old man’s award,” as he laughingly called it. Dan Vengen said there was an “immunity hour” when people could share stories and tales about Don and none could be held against him. There might have been some doozies!

Photo courtesy of Don Locker

But what fun! And what an honor.

Photo courtesy of Dan Vengen

Congratulations, Don.

Thanks to Don, Donna Locker, and Dan Vengen for their help with this story.