General aviation has lost one of its most effective and outspoken advocates. Max Karant passed away on February 1 of complications related to kidney disease. Though he was 83, few around the office here at AOPA thought of Max as anything but a dynamic force in general aviation history, an accomplished pilot, and a prominent mover and shaker during general aviation's expansionary period from 1946 to 1978. During that time, Max served AOPA as its first senior vice president, as well as the first editor in chief of AOPA Pilot. In the former capacity, he was instrumental in formulating strategies beneficial to general aviation. In the latter, he fulfilled the responsibility of communicator, acting as an insistent — and often lonely — voice of advocacy.
In fact, Max founded AOPA Pilot. In 1958, Max saw the need to distance AOPA from Flying magazine which, since the association's founding in 1939, had carried monthly inserts ("AOPA News" and "The AOPA Section") mailed to those Flying subscribers who were AOPA members. The first issue of AOPA Pilot came off the press in March 1958. It consisted of 98 pages and, save the covers, had just a few twocolor pages. Within a few years, the average page count climbed past 120, and full-color pages filled the feature well.
Editorial work came naturally to Max. As a young man, he worked as a newspaper reporter in the Chicago area, serving stints with the Evanston News-Index and the Chicago Herald-Examiner. At the News-Index, he was able to mix his early interest in aviation with his usual reporting beat, which included city and police reporting. According to former AOPA President J.B. (Doc) Hartranft, Jr., Max was "probably one of the first investigative reporters there ever was." Hartranft attributes Max's aggressive style of advocacy to his early learning on Chicago's city desk. "He had an uncanny sixth sense about when someone was lying," Hartranft said from his retirement home in Maine. "He'd latch on to a story, and wouldn't give up. He had an incredible determination to get to the bottom of things for his news reports."
Eventually, aviation began to claim more of Max's interest. In 1947, he was instrumental in promoting a flying taxi service that used Piper Cubs. The idea was to use the Cubs to take businessmen from smaller, outlying airports to larger ones in metropolitan areas — a novel twist that presaged today's hub-and-spoke airline system. By early 1948, he was working as Flying's managing editor. At the time, Flying's office was located in the Transportation Building at 608 South Dearborn Street in Chicago. Down the hall, Hartranft toiled in AOPA's registration office.
It didn't take long for Max and Doc to link up. In May 1948, Hartranft hired Max as both AOPA's assistant general manager and editor of AOPA Pilot, the new title of Flying's AOPA insert.
In his new capacities, Max was able to focus attention on general aviation in ways that had never before been available. One of the first orders of business was a personal quest on Max's part. Born with an eye condition that deprived him of conventional depth perception, Max had been denied a medical certificate. However, he persuaded the federal air surgeon to change the rules after demonstrating that those with his disorder could, in fact, perceive depth cues. The result: the first of many changes and inputs in the medical certification of general aviation pilots. Max earned his certificate — and went on to win just about every rating.
One of Max's first crusades was for stall and spin awareness. This led to a series of articles about the dangers of buzzing and, in the mid-1950s, an AOPA push for installation of angle-of-attack indicators on general aviation airplanes. In 1950, Max and Doc led the effort to establish the AOPA Foundation — an educational organization that evolved into today's AOPA Air Safety Foundation.
Once AOPA's offices were consolidated in Bethesda, Maryland, a suburb of Washington, D.C., airspace issues began to claim Max's attention. At every turn, general aviation bore the brunt of self-serving and one-sided proposals brought before the Civil Aeronautics Authority (CAA — the FAA's precursor). One proposal, brought by the Air Line Pilots Association, would have banned general aviation from airports used by air carriers. Max objected vociferously before Congress and the CAA, and prevailed. Another proposal would have caused an abrupt transition from radio range to VOR navigation. Max argued for a transition period, so that general aviation pilots would have time to buy the expensive new equipment. He won again.
Then, in 1955, the CAA almost was persuaded to scrap the new VOR network for one using TACAN. This proposed policy reversal, prompted by the military, once again brought Max into the spotlight. The VORs would remain.
And then there were the products and buzzwords that Max invented. He designed a small ruler loaded with pilot information — he called it the "Air Aid" — to make it easier for pilots to file flight plans and perform navigation calculations without the need to lug around cumbersome manuals. He and Hartranft coined the term unicom (for universal communications) to provide a common frequency for pilots flying at uncontrolled airports, obviating the pressure for the expansion of towered fields. He even persuaded watchmaker Breitling to endorse an official AOPA pilot watch, dubbing it the Navitimer — a name that remains in use today.
Max's persuasive talents even extended to foreign affairs, according to Hartranft. As part of an aviation delegation to Cuba, Max met in Havana with Cuban strongman Fulgencio Batista. The issue at hand was Cuba's transition from radio ranges to VORs, and Batista wasn't buying. Arguments ensued and tempers flared. In a huff, Batista called an immediate recess to the talks.
Then, while the dictator fumed in an adjoining room, Max disarmed everyone. He sat down at a nearby piano and played. Up to this time, Max's impressive piano talent had been sort of a secret. As he played, the contingent quieted, and Max had their full attention. Batista emerged from his snit, asking that Max join him for lunch. During that lunch, Max persuaded Batista to work out a transition to VORs, "much to the chagrin of the State Department, which was cut out of the process, I must say. But Max's plan was implemented," said Hartranft, adding, "You know, Max always played in the key of F, and he couldn't read a note of music. But if you hummed a few notes, he had it."
Max's globetrotting wasn't limited to Cuba. In his more than 13,000 hours of flying, he made five Atlantic crossings and even circumnavigated South America. Many of his flights were in N13K — a 1964 Piper Twin Comanche that Max personally watched go down Piper's assembly line in Lock Haven, Pennsylvania.
It was Max's persistent representation at sessions of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) that led to the International Council of Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association's being named as general aviation's official representative to ICAO.
Max's life as a bureaucrat-busting general aviation advocate was marked by input into virtually every issue that faced aviation through the 1950s, 60s, and 70s. At each step of the way, Max stood for the little guy — the pilot who wanted to be safe, fly without an oppressive set of rules, and who had a keen eye on his wallet. Max would be the loudest when trying to convince bureaucrats that general aviation pilots were anything but the wealthy playboys of popular belief.
"Max really was one of a kind," recalls John L. Baker, AOPA's president from 1977 to 1990. "He wouldn't let go of an issue and…saw things as either black or white. There was no gray. And his righteous indignation came to be accepted by the industry. Of course, after awhile, he made a few enemies. But that's because Washington isn't comfortable with those who won't compromise. Compromise is the way of Washington, but compromise wasn't in Max's vocabulary…he would make his opinion known. Max didn't get ulcers. He gave them."
Baker recalled the time when Max, on the eve of his retirement, appeared in his office bearing what was obviously a faked birth certificate. It was back dated by a year. "Look, I've got one more year to go!" Max exclaimed.
Though Max retired in 1978, he still visited the office on a regular basis. Staff members could count on Max to stick his head in their offices and make a few good-natured wisecracks. In 1978, AOPA inaugurated the Max Karant Journalism Award. This annual award is made to those who deliver fair editorial treatment of general aviation in the general media — be it print, radio, or television. "I applied for it once, but they said I was biased," Max once joked.
"Max was one of the pioneer employees of AOPA during general aviation's growth years in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s," said Phil Boyer, AOPA's current president. "We will truly miss him."
AOPA, following Max's wishes, will carry his ashes in N13K on a final flight. The Twin Comanche will make a flyby of Washington National Airport (where Max kept the airplane), fly over FAA headquarters, pass over KRANT intersection (named after Max upon his retirement), and then fly east over the Atlantic Ocean, where Max's ashes will be dispersed.
Max had recovered from a stroke several years ago. Upon his return to AOPA headquarters in Frederick, Maryland, he sat down at a table in the Communications Division, patted it, and said, "I'm home now." That's how much he cared about AOPA, and about general aviation.
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