Fly-Worthy Paper

Over the next two Mondays (December 12 & 19, 2011), the Girls' and Boys' Adventure Clubs will respectively learn how to make paper airplanes.  If you know anything about humans, you'll know that paper airplane making is a huge rite of passage to grown-up-hood.  I've never made any, but I've seen lots of them that people have tried out.  It is definitely much more difficult than it looks.

Basic, Common Paper Airplane Design

Lightning-fast speed demon design

The hat makes it all work

Having a aerodynamically pawsome design makes paper airplane flying more about actual flying and less about crashing into the ground and stubbing the snout of the whole business.

Scowl-Face made this one, I'm guessing

(Call it a hunch)

So how do you learn how to make cool, fly-worthy paper airplanes?  Well, you come to my Library's programs, if you're a member of the Library's Girls' and Boys' Adventure Clubs.  If not, you could consult an authoritative book, like one we have in our Evergreen Indiana Collection.

Got an Evergreen Indiana Library Card?

Then put an online hold on that slobberpup!

The Kids' Guide to Paper Airplanes, by Christopher L. Harbo (Mankato, Minn. : Capstone Press, 2009) provides designs and instructions to craft many different paper airplane styles.  It is simple and straightforward.  Why, even Scowl-Face could figure things out.

Remember that most paper airplanes have sharp, pointy edges, particularly at the front, so be careful where and when you fly them.  Safety first!  Make sure that spectators are well out of harm's way.  Then let 'er go!  See what happens.  It's paper, so you can experiment with different designs and reuse ones that don't work as well as others.

If you'd like to find out how you can join the Library's Girls' and Boys' Adventure Clubs, you should call (or have your grown-up call) the MPL Youth Services Department at (317) 831-7323.

Not a Fly-by-Night Thing, These Paper Airplanes,

Cauli Le Chat

MPL Roving Reporter

Library Programs News Beat

P.S.  "Flying" was included in The Beatles made-for-television movie, Magical Mystery Tour (1967).  It was released on the movie soundtrack album just three weeks before the film aired on BBC1 on December 26, 1967.  Critics were rather harsh in their reviews.  It was broadcast in black-and-white, as were all programs on BBC television at the time, so the vibrant color sequences were drab and lifeless.  Watch the movie in color (copies on DVD are readily available) to see what British audiences missed 44 years ago this month.

P.P.S.  "Fly by Night," by Rush, appeared on the album by the same title (1975).