A Liberal native and high school graduate, John Smith attended college at KU, Southwestern
College (KS), and Michigan State University. He graduated with undergraduate degrees in
business and city planning and a Master in Urban Planning degree. He is a certified city planner
and worked for 4 years for the City of Wichita as a planner. After moving back to Liberal in the
early ‘70’s he worked as a planning consultant in southwest Kansas and for the City of Liberal.
He is also a real estate broker and works in property planning, development, and management.
Major community commitments by John have been to the High Plains Heritage Foundation, a
non-profit community foundation of which John was a founding member and its first president.
John was also an instigator, a founder, and the first president of the Liberal Air Museum
Foundation, the founding entity of the Liberal Air Museum, now the Mid-America Air Museum.
John is a licensed pilot for over 60 years with commercial, instrument, single-engine and multi-
engine ratings and is a recipient of the FAA Master Pilot Award.
Tim Strickland
Treasurer
Member since 2014
Biography
From tinkering with radio parts in his childhood basement in Turpin to leading cutting-edge robotics teams in Liberal, Tim Strickland’s career has been defined by curiosity and creativity. Today, he is owner and CEO of TCB Technologies, where he blends AI, blockchain, and mechanical design to build intelligent systems that solve real-world problems—from precision agriculture to securing critical infrastructure.
After earning his B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Oklahoma State University, Tim spent 16 years at IBM guiding emerging-technology teams and pioneering large-scale high-performance computing and blockchain projects. Even amid global initiatives, he never lost sight of his roots: the thrill of debugging a control board or showing a neighbor’s child how a simple circuit works.
Since 2014, he has served on the MAAM Foundation board—now as Treasurer—helping expand its STEM-education outreach across Southwest Kansas. Living in Liberal with his family and grandchildren, Tim believes that early encouragement, community support, and hands-on exploration spark the next generation’s love of engineering—and that by nurturing curiosity today, we build tomorrow’s innovators.
Doug Hibbs
Secretary
Member since 2015
Steve Merz
Board Member
Member since 2020
Ryan Buller
Board Member
Member since 2025
Bruce Stickler
Board Member
Member since 2025
Biography
I have resided in Turpin and Liberal most of my 75 years of life. I am retired from teaching after
27 years in USD 480, two years in Felt, OK and one year in the Turpin School District. I am
also retired from farming and am currently managing Stickler Farms and the Tticler Family Trust
which included 3400 acres of farmland, 100 acres of range land and rental houses.
Aviation hs been a passion my entire life. As a boy growing up in the wide pen spaces of the
Oklahoma Panhandle, I dreamed of flying. While driving the tractor in our fields, I would look
to the blue skies and visualize myself flying an airplane. Finally, the year I turned fifty that
dream became a reality and I have been an active private pilot for 25 years.
Having an association with Liberal Air Museum would allow me to give back to the aviation
community and future generations of pilots, one of which is my grandson who is in flight school
at Southeastern Oklahoma University. I passed on my love of aviation to him.
To paraphrase Leonardo DaVinci, “Once you have experienced flight, you will always look
towards the sky, for there you have been and there you long to be.”
