COEUR d'ALENE - Just days before his 95th birthday, Bill Brooks took flight for the last time - never to land on the crystal blue waters of Lake Coeur d'Alene again.

Brooks died Feb. 27 after spending more than a half-century flying fishermen to remote mountain lakes in Canada and taking thousands of tourists on sightseeing flights over North Idaho.

He was an icon on Coeur d'Alene's waterfront.

Brooks came to Coeur d'Alene in 1946 and went into business with Lowell Wallace, who had an established flight training and charter business.

Prior to that, Brooks entered the Navy in 1940, where he got his wings and became a flight instructor.

He brought that experience to Coeur d'Alene, where he taught several World War II and Vietnam veterans how to fly.

"Many of those guys became commercial airline pilots," said his son, Grant Brooks. "And many of them retired already."

Brooks didn't retire until he was 89.

Grant, who is now operating Brooks Seaplane Service, said his father will be remembered for his generous heart.

"He was a real generous man," Grant said. "He would help anyone who needed it."

Wallace eventually sold his share of the business to Brooks, and he continued to build the business into what it is today.

Grant said the company used to focus on fishing charters to remote lakes in Canada, but that became more and more difficult after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York.

"All you needed before that was a charter license," Grant said. "We let that lapse after 9-11 because things got a lot tougher, and insurance became too expensive."

But since the construction of The Coeur d'Alene Resort in the 1980s, tourism increased and so did the demand for aerial sightseeing.

Even though Grant got his commercial flying license when he was 18, he wanted to become a mining engineer, which he did for several years.

He returned to Coeur d'Alene in 1989 because his dad needed another pilot to help with the demand.

"He taught me to fly right here on the lake," Grant said.

Grant said his dad had an impeccable flight record.

"He did some crop-dusting for a while and had an accident doing that, but that was it," Grant said. "He really didn't talk much about the scary stuff."

But Grant did recall one incident when Bill's engine went out when he was flying over Lake Coeur d'Alene.

"But you don't need power to land," Grant said. "He just glided it down and had a boat tow him in."

Northern Pilot Magazine did a piece on Brooks in 2002. In the article, Brooks told of a time one winter when he rescued some boaters on Lake Coeur d'Alene after their boat caught fire.

He also once saved a deer that had broken through some soft ice.

Brooks also told the magazine some interesting stories about his time in the Navy. He once flew a mission to Brazil to pick up some "mystery cargo."

He was working on a need-to-know basis and thought he was picking up a mineral to harden steel. He learned later that it was uranium ore, which was used for the first atomic bomb.

Grant said he and his two sisters will dearly miss their father, as will many people in the community.

There is a celebration of life ceremony scheduled for April 11 from noon to 2 p.m. at Yates Funeral Home in Hayden.