Worthy Work at WAAAM
As part of SVP Portland, the Encore Fellows program provides a source of expertise for nonprofit organizations, helps individuals (Fellows) transition from their careers into social-purpose work, and gives corporations a new way to positively impact their communities. Encore Fellows who have retired from a career are matched with host nonprofit organizations based on their passions, skills, and experience.
A few years ago, Fran Hanchek’s wife gave him a gift certificate for the Model T driving school offered at the Western Antique Aeroplane & Automobile Museum (WAAAM) in Hood River. It is not every day that you get the chance to go back in time and get hands-on experience operating an old car. So when Fran retired from Intel in 2020, he knew exactly where he wanted to do his Encore Fellowship.As he neared retirement, Fran approached WAAAM with a proposal to build a Model T driving simulator. While WAAAM was interested in partnering with their first Encore Fellow, they had other ideas of projects that would be more impactful for the museum. Fran says, “I worked with WAAAM and the Fellows Program Coordinator, Linda Williams, to design a scope of work that met the organization’s needs and Encore’s requirements. The coordinators were easy to work with, especially in guiding me to shape my assignment.”
Due to COVID and the nature of his assignments, Fran only visited the museum a handful of times during his fellowship, but he was able to do a tremendous amount of work at home. These assignments ranged from converting airplane ownership history maps into dynamic web pages, to digitizing the Airway Beacon documents for an in-museum monitor display and online access. He also attached QR code stickers to exhibit signage to link them to the museum’s website, and completed and updated airplane specification sheets. If you visit the museum, be sure to check out the LED physical display of the Airway Beacon map that Fran created!
WAAAM opened in 2007 with 42 airplanes from the personal collection of founder and president Terry Brandt. Today there are more than 180 aircraft and 130 automobiles in 3.5 acres of hangar space. Fran says, “Walking down the aisles, seeing the clean and shiny planes and cars, in fact, seeing the neatness and cleanliness of the whole museum, makes me so proud to have been a part of it all.
”Fran highly recommends the Encore Fellowship program: “My experience has been fantastic! The Fellowship provided a great transition from full employment to retirement, giving structure to my day. I learned some great skills that had been on my list to explore.” He was quite impressed with what he learned while working at WAAAM, including coding, web page creation, and Arduino microcontroller programming. Fran says, “I look forward to continuing to volunteer with WAAAM, and I highly recommend being an Encore Fellow!”