By Nick Sestanovich

Doug Ford, a former Air Force lieutenant colonel, Solano County Board of Education trustee and Reporter columnist, died in his Dixon home Thursday after a battle with prostate cancer. He was 87.

Ford was born in Georgetown, Ill., in 1931 but moved to Tillamook, Ore., with his family when he was 3. It was there that he developed a lifelong interest in aviation when his father took him to see a Soviet aircraft that had flown over the North Pole from Moscow to Vancouver, Wash., in 1937.

Ford began building model airplanes and earned his private pilot’s license in 1950. He was accepted into the Air Force’s Pilot Training Program in 1951 but was moved over to the navigator training program after failing to pass the vision test. He retired from the Air Force in 1979, having reached the rank of lieutenant colonel.

Source: Doug Ford, former Solano Board of Education trustee and Reporter columnist, dies – The Reporter