Bill was Editor-in-Chief of Business & Commercial Aviation from 2000 to 2020. During his stewardship, the monthly magazine received scores of awards for editorial excellence.
He is the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement in Journalism Award from the National Business Aviation Association; the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Aerospace Media Awards; the Aviation Journalism Award from the National Air Transportation Association; and an Aerospace Journalist of the Year Award for Business Aviation.
Previously, Bill served as Managing Editor of Aviation Week Television. He was the top editor for both Flying and Professional Pilot magazines, as well as a member of the senior editorial staff at Reader's Digest. He also managed communications for FlightSafety International.
Bill has authored or co-authored three aviation books, was an essayist for National Public Radio, wrote aviation documentaries for The Discovery Channel and has written for numerous publications including The New York Times, Smithsonian Air & Space, Popular Mechanics and The Associated Press, among others.
An active aviator, Bill holds a Commercial Pilot license, along with multiengine, instrument, seaplane and glider ratings.
LOCATED AT SASKATCHEWAN'S lateral midpoint, some 50 miles west of Regina and about 115 due north of Scobey, Mont., Moose Jaw is home not only to the Canadian Forces Snowbirds, the country's precision aerobatic team, but also to the NATO Flying Training in Canada (NFTC), drawing contractors and student fighter pilots from the United States, Europe and Canada. The base has grown to become the largest employer in the region.
OUR DEAR FRIEND, the late, great Greenhouser, Torch Lewis, took considerable pride in the fact that he'd attended all but the first four NBAA conventions -- up until 2002, when his doctors forbade it. (Of course, that's the one in which he was celebrated with the association's Platinum Wing award for lifetime achievement. And then he was gone.) Frankly, I never understood why he placed so much import on that record.
After graduating from the U.S. Air Force Academy in 1964, Ritchie finished first in his pilot class and was assigned to fighters, first flying F-104s as a test pilot, then F-4s in Vietnam. It was during his second combat tour that he downed five MiG-21s in a four-month period in 1972, becoming one of two aces in that conflict. After an unsuccessful run for Congress in his native North Carolina, Ritchie moved to Colorado to work for Joe Coors. He later served in the Reagan Administration and formed his own speaking/consulting business.
