Kingdon Kerr (unfinished)

Kingdon's unusual first name selected from the phone book by his mother. He showed an early interest in mechanical engineering, rigging a burglar alarm for his bedroom window, which his mother tried to open one night. The window crashed shut and an alarm sounded, to Kingy's great delight, "Hoorah, it works!"

After graduating high school in 1927, he joined brother Elwood on a four-month adventure in the South Seas (see Elwood's page for details). After he returned, he applied to the aeronautics program at University of Illinois. He married Margaret, who left her librarian course at UCLA to accompany him to Chicago. After two years, Kingdon felt more knowledgeable about aeronautics than his professors, so opted not to complete a degree. Instead, he transferred to the Boeing aeronautics training program in Seattle, then started a lifelong career in Aeronautics with Boeing in San Francisco.

Kingdon was an avid photographer and documentarian of his family life and travels. He left behind boxes of slides, film reels and camera equipment, which son Bob saved for years. During the 2020 pandemic, daughter Judy needed a project to stave off boredom, so scanned all the slides. A selection of these appears in the three slide shows below created by granddaughter Marcelle, who also digitized many of the film reels. In later films, Kingdon began scripting action to tell a story. His photographic legacy and children's appreciation of it inspired the family section of this website.