It’s been four years today since Bob Mikesh passed away. Bob was a great friend, and it was one of the high points of my career to work with him on several projects over the years I knew him. For those that don’t know, Bob was the curator at the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum for many years, one of the few true experts on Japanese WWII aircraft in this country, and just a truly fantastic human being. About 28 years ago Bob called me saying that Tom Hitchcock over at Monogram publications wanted him to redo his two softcover books on Japanese WWII cockpits into a huge hardbound book. Bob wanted to know if I’d be willing to create a technical drawing for each and every instrument panel for every aircraft (about 75 total aircraft, many with multiple panels), and of course I said yes. I had helped in minor ways with some other projects Bob had done, but nothing of this scale, so I was glad to jump into it and get to work with him closely over the next few years. The resulting book is still one of my favorite works from my career, and I doubt anyone will ever tackle this particular subject in the depth that Bob did ever again.
https://airandspace.si.edu/stories/editorial/robert-c-bob-mikesh
