Harold D. Hoekstra

Aeronautical Engineer

Harold D. Hoekstra, 103, a retired aviation expert with the Federal Aviation Administration, died of cardiopulmonary arrest Oct. 10 in Arlington, Va. He had lived in Arlington since 1941.

Mr. Hoekstra was born in Chicago and grew up in Battle Creek, Mich. At 8, he watched in awe as a barnstorming Wright Brothers biplane took off from a baseball field in Battle Creek. That experience inspired a career and a lifelong fascination with flight.

He graduated from the University of Michigan in 1929 with a bachelor’s degree in aeronautical engineering and, in the early 1930’s, worked for several aviation companies such as Crosley, Curtis, Ford, and Stinson in the Midwest and Upstate New York. He was influential in the design of the Crosley Moonbeam and the Stinson Reliant.

In 1936, he took a job with the FAA (then a part of the Commerce Department), where his primary responsibilities involved establishing flight safety standards for commercial aircraft. Later, at the dawning of the jet age, he was responsible for working with many international aviation agencies to establish safety standards for jet-powered civil aircraft.

He was awarded a number of patents and was elected a fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, the Society of Automotive Engineers and the British Royal Aeronautical Society. He also was elected to the Tau Beta Pi national engineering honorary society.

Mr. Hoekstra retired in 1969. During his long retirement, he had three hobbies, “airplanes, airplanes, and more airplanes.” On family vacations, he visited airports, and at home he read aviation magazines. He had held a commercial pilot’s license, and he continued to fly private planes until age 85.

He also was an inveterate writer of letters to the editor. In a 1983 letter to Aviation Week and Space Technology, he remarked that the $20.5 billion price tag for 100 B-1B bombers could provide housing for more than 1.5 million people. “Too bad we don’t seem to be able to switch more effort from swords to plowshares,” he wrote.

In a 1983 Aviation Week letter, he proposed runway traffic lights to prevent landing and takeoff collisions.

His wife, Laura Hoekstra, died in 1992.

Survivors include four children, Elizabeth Kovacs of Wilkes-Barre, PA, Thomas Hoekstra of Midlothian, VA, Ann Geis of North Huntingdon, PA, and Dirk Hoekstra of Los Altos, Calif.; nine grandchildren; and 10 great-grandchildren. You may contact Tom Hoekstra at 14311 Shelter Cove Rd., Midlothian, VA 23112 or at giotom@comcast.net.

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