[Author's Note: Portions of and information from the Summer 1988 edition of American Kite have been used in this article, with permission from the author, Daniel Prentice.]

By Mary Alice Murphy

If you are a fan of flying kites and intend to visit Whitewater Mesa near Glenwood, N.M. on Saturday, April 7, 2018, you should know that you might be traveling through areas that birthed an organization of those who enjoy kites and the resulting newsletter. The event is sanctioned by the American Kitefliers Association.

Aficionados of flying kites probably have heard of the AKA and its original newsletter, Kite Tales. They may or may not have heard of Bob Ingraham, originally of Painted Post, New York, who had moved to Silver City, N.M.

At age 16, Ingraham knew he wanted more than anything else to fly, kites and planes.

In summer 1988, Ingraham was interviewed by Daniel Prentice for the publication American Kite. Ingraham that year was 77, but continued his fascination with flight, whether by airplane or with a kite. Prentice described Ingraham as "one of the elder statesmen of kiteflying."

As an experienced writer and avid kite flyer, in 1964, Ingraham wondered if other adults "shared his passion for kites. … (he) decided to start a newsletter and a kite club in southwest New Mexico to find out."

According to Prentice's article, from that small start to 1977, Ingraham and his wife Hazel produced 41 magazines and helped organize numerous kite clubs around the country. The club grew into the American Kitefliers Association and his newsletter, Kite Tales.

He continued flying kites after his move to Silver City to keep his children entertained. But after they left home, he wasn't sure about continuing to fly kites as an adult and what people would think, so he would find out-of-the way places to fly them. But that changed with his start of the club and finding other adults as enthused as he was.

Ingraham wrote to Ed Aff, vice president of Philadelphia Federal Reserve Bank, because he had read an article about Aff making and flying kites, to find out if other adults had an interest as Ingraham did. Aff sent him the names of seven guys. Nine grown men became the start of the American Kitefliers Association. The original members included Francis Rogallo, Benn Blinn, Anthony Ziegler, Will Yolen, George Endicott, Walter Scott, Frank Weisgerber, Dr. F.C. Jewell and Ingraham.

At the time, Ingraham owned an office supply store in Silver City, Western Stationers. But the newsletter became so popular, he sold the store in 1968 and was working as a newspaper writer, but had to quit that job, too. Printing a newsletter was no easy task in those days. He typed practically every word on an old typewriter and pasted it up by hand. He said, in the article, that Hazel proofread the publication and kept all the records. They printed it at the local newspaper shop, then they had to collate the pages and staple them at home before sending them.

Because it became more expensive to put out the magazine, Ingraham began building delta kites for sale, and successfully sold more than 4,000 of them. He said his handmade ones were superior to those made at the time of the interview, because each wing had "independence. So, you've got that factor of adjusting to the wind turbulence, which a rigid kite doesn't have. It never dies or turns over in loops."

By 1977, the organization and the magazine had become "such a burden that when Valerie (Govig) asked to buy it, it just seemed like the right thing to do," Ingraham told Prentice. Although he had a lawyer draw up the contact, "for some unknown reason, we failed to stipulate that the magazine should continue to be called Kite Tales. She changed it to Kite Lines and that broke my heart."

In 1978, the magazine and the association were made separate entities. The AKA is today a nonprofit organization dedicated to sharing kiting with the world. The website, kite.org, says the entity has thousands of members in 25 countries, with the goal of striving to "promote public awareness of the pleasures and educational opportunities that kites provide."

Mark Richard, local architect, said in the early 1990s or thereabouts he was helping to promote tourism to the area and came up with the idea of a kite festival. He asked Ingraham at the time about what time of year would be best. "I thought spring would be, but he said October, so we tried to coordinate the Cielo Encantado Kite Fiesta right before or after the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta."

"We had different categories and prizes for the winners," Richard said. "We had the smallest kite, the largest kite, the most beautiful and the longest. One year we had one that filled the stadium up by the water tanks and the smallest was the size of a postage stamp. We also had kite fighting. We had lots of different style kites, from the regular triangular to box, to delta to parakites. We had people come from Japan, from Texas, from all over. We even had night flights where people would rig up lights on their kites to fly them. After several years, about three, I think, I turned it over to Anthony and Laura Howell and Dave Turner, who did it for several years, along with Rick Miller."

Richard also said they had an Ingraham Award for outstanding contribution to kiting. "We had Beth Menczer make a Mimbres style bowl and it was put into a handmade box with a plaque on it. The first year an American-Japanese man won and the next year a kite shop in Texas won it."

The Howells recounted their four or so years of managing the fiesta. "We tried to hand it off, but nobody would take it over. It was costing us money. Rick Miller used to travel and teach kite workshops all over the country and to Europe and Japan."

Anthony Howell said he would make single-line fighter kites. "Rick and I built most of our kites ourselves." "Miller won nationals one year with Anthony's kite," Laura Howell said. "We thought the fiesta would grow, but it didn't, so we quit doing it."

To celebrate the joy of flying kites, attend the AKA-sanctioned Whitewater Mesa Fun Kite Flying Picnic, on April 7, beginning at noon and lasting until 5 p.m. The venue is Whitewater Mesa Labyrinths, at 355 Bursum Road. For more information, see article at http://www.grantcountybeat.com/events-calendars/local-events/43101-american-kitefliers-association-to-sanction-whitewater-mesa-fun-kite-flying-picnic

While you're in the Glenwood area on Saturday, check out the Dutch Oven Gathering at the Community Park, which will start at 10 a.m. and end around 2 p.m.