HIGH POINT CONFIDENTIAL: To dare in the air: High Point stunt pilot died doing what he loved

HIGH POINT — There’s an eerie tale out there about Mel Robinson, a High Point man who became one of the country’s best-known stunt pilots back in the 1950s and early ’60s.

On June 15, 1961, Bob Newlon — a commercial pilot from Huntington, West Virginia — was preparing to tow an advertising banner behind his small biplane. For this flight, he planned to wear the treasured aviator goggles given to him by Robinson, a brave, swashbuckling flier Newlon deeply admired. He put the goggles on the plane’s back seat and continued getting ready.