International F-104 Society

INFORMATION

The International F104 Society has been established in 1989 by two fanatic F-104 enthousiasts. One of them (A vd Zeeuw) wrote a book about the F-104 within the series "Vliegend boven Nederland" published by Flash Aviation in the Netherlands.
In 1990 the society started to release a small news-letter called ASSASSIN with all kind of information and latest news about the F-104 Starfighter.
This simple A-5 format magazine was released every 3 months. In 1990 a lot of Starfighter-enthousiasts all over the world reacted and became a member.

The name of the magazine "ASSASSIN" was choosen because a book once stated that this nickname was used for the 104 during the Vietnam war in 1965-1967. However in 1992 it became clear that this was not true. Pilots who flew the F-104 in Vietnam told us that this name was never used and that the most used nickname for the 104 has always been the "ZIPPER". Since this name sounded very nice as magazine name we decided to change the name to "ZIPPER" in 1993.

By that time it had a number of interesting subjects which were: ARCHIVE (telling the story of all Starfighters build in the world one by one), COUNTRY-CORNER (giving the latest news country by country), AIRFRAME (technical information about for example ECM, RADAR, avionics etc), MOVEMENTS & TRIPS (information from trips made by members), CRASHES & ACCIDENTS (information about crashes and incidents from the late fifties till the nineties) and ADVERTISEMENTS (from members).
In between the magazine slightly changed from an easy created printer-quality newsletter to a high quality magazine with colored cover.

In 2005 the latest ZIPPER magazine was released via surface mail. Since it was purely based as a non-profit task it took too much time from only a few people and it was decided to change from real paper magazines to electronic magazines which can be downloaded from the internet. This was quite a change but kept the 104 soul alive and the 104 Society community together. This was the main reason to continue our operations via the internet from the year 2006.
In 2006 we also were faced by the tragic news that one of the establishers of the IFS died. We were all shocked and also for him we want to continue the activities within this society. The F-104 Starfighter was his life and we dedicate this work to him.

The Society has now members in Holland, Germany, Jordan, Italy, UK, Canada, USA, Belgium, Sweden, UK, Ireland, Taiwan, Turkey, Emirates, Pakistan, France, Spain, Greece, Denmark, Norway and Japan. Among those members are ex-Starfighter pilots and technicians from various countries as well as the current owners of flyworthy civil registrated Starfighters.

See also our :International F-104 Society Starfighter Pilot Members Gallery

To be a member we only have a few requirements:

(1) The F-104 Starfighter takes an important part in your life and it is your favorite aircraft.
(2) You support the basic principle of the International F-104 Society to keep the 104 alive now and in the future.
(3) You are willing to help the Society by providing interesting information, history and photo material (if you have).

When you want to become a member, which is completely for free, please contact us via email and we will give you all information you need and we will add you to our IFS-mailinglist which assures you to receive IFS-information via news-flashes now and then.
Of course it is also strongly recommended to visit our IFS forum once and a while. The IFS mainpage will always keep you up to date with the latest news and activities since somethimes IFS members do not receive IFS mail regulary due to their provider configurations.

!!!!!!!!!!! KEEP THE 104 SOUL ALIVE !!!!!!!!!!!!!

The international F-104 Society is totally run by volunteers and the membership is for free.
Of course we are always interested in donations to finance the webspace and to be able to increase the
number of photographs and possibly videos in the future!! Thanks in advance!!

For information, corrections, additions etc.. please contact : IFS info


This page, and all contents, are Copyright © protected by U.S. and International law for the F-104 Society Inc. The Netherlands.