Everyone who ever flew one loved the eccentric flying qualities of the Hispano-Franco company's Aeromarine Runabout. It turned on a dime -- usually the moment you relaxed your death grip on the joy stick. It had a faster rate of dive than any other aircraft in the sky -- giving the pilot little chance of recovering from an momentary loss of attention before hitting the waves. Most of all, beware take-off in choppy seas. The spinning propeller had little enough clearance even in calm water. The plane's only real virtue was that it was easy to tie up at the dock, thanks to the handy claat attached to the fore deck, which hardly ever separated from the wood once the original four screws were increased to six. The example illustrated was briefly owned by William (Hopalong Cassidy) Boyd, who won it in a poker game. Thinking he had won a ranch, he had it sunk at first sight. It was raised 60 years later and restored for Michael Jackson's "Neverland."