Ever think about flying around the world in a single engine plane? Only about 100 pilots have ever done it. Henry Schirmer Riley and James Lee Pirtle are two of them. Dr. Riley accumulated more than 6000 hours of flying and instrument rating in his lifetime. The aviation community in Madison, IN has embraced Schirm's lifelong leadership. They honored him by forming the Schirmer Riley Aviation Scholarship. Awarded yearly, it is witness to Riley's encouragement of youth and adults in aviation. Riley's picture with Comanche N5425P at the Rock of Gibraltar hangs prominently in the flight planning and conference room at Madison Indiana Municipal Airport.

James Lee Pirtle attributes his flying interest to age 10 when he began to construct model airplanes in his spare time. His interest in building and flying model airplanes continued into his high school years and finally into adulthood, which found him flying them at Madison Indiana's airfield. Jim got around to looking at model airplanes and said to himself, "If I am ever going to fly, now is the time" He started flying in 1966. Jim bought his first airplane, a Piper Cherokee in 1966 and over his lifetime, amassed over 4,000 hours in various aircraft.

So how did these two come to develop a flying collaboration that has taken them to pretty much everywhere on the planet and were named the first honorary citizens of Nome, Alaska? The pair met in 1966 when Pirtle shared a hospital room with Riley's father. Their friendship grew from their common interest in flying. In 1983 the pair decided to fly Riley's 1958 single-engine Piper Comanche across the Atlantic Ocean to the Malta Air Rally in Europe. They were the first Americans to enter the Malta Air Rally. The President of Malta accepted gifts from the people of Indiana and Kentucky and he sent gifts to the Governors of Indiana and Kentucky which were presented on their return.

The two had flown almost halfway around the world so they asked why not fly around the world? It took two years in planning both men were in their 50's when they started this adventure of a lifetime. The plane required two extra 90 gallon fuel tanks as they would be required to travel from Honolulu to Oakland,California non-stop, the longest leg of the trip. With a full load of fuel, the range of the aircraft increased from 800 miles to about 3,500 miles.

Two days before departure during the shakedown flight the glass fuel gauges on the auxiliary tanks broke. here was no way of knowing how much fuel was in the tanks. The DME and The storm scope also quit working. Luckily they where able to get the repairs done so that their adventure could begin. Their trip started from the Madison airport on July 20, 1986 and took them 39 days. They returned to the Madison airport on July 10, 1986 after traveling 26,970 miles. The pair teamed up to write “Two Pilots One Engine.� It is a sum of the events that the two went through on their journey, Before Riley died in 2010, he and Pirtle had retired from adventuring and Riley made the statement that they had left as friends but returned as brothers.