yes he was. I helped out the guys in the tuscaloosa club organizing the first couple, then harkey sort of took over the "birmingham event", and I moved to florida a cople years later.
I still remember when harkey got his first heli, a schluter Junior 50. I went to his house and worked with him to get it setup and test hovered, on crossed-stick training gear. That had to be late 80's,maybe 1990. Slung the lead out of one blade (we built wood blades back then, with lead in a slot, and he didn't mix the epoxy properly). The vibration slung the reciever battery out and I still vividly remember it bouncing and shaking in his driveway, inching towards Jan's 300Z, as we furiously tried to get a broom handle underneath and jerk off the fuel tubing. We were successfull, thankfully. Weeks or months later, the lead from the other blade came out in hover. A couple years later he had his gall bladder out and the surgeon asked him afterwards what the little piece of lead was in his belly. That's how he got the nickname "leadbelly". He knew some part had hit him, there was a little cut in the belly, but never knew the lead had lodged inside.
