Interesting machine there Turbomallard, Great to know even Mt Wittman struggled at times!
the only thing is, I may have lost something in the trans-pacific translation, but i cant pick the relevance of the cartoon dog and "get Smart" Quote clues to the final answer... Can you fill in the gaps for a confused Antipodean? 
Well, I'm just a confused duck, and some people say I'm just confused.

That aside....
The cartoon dog reference was to Wittman's later race aircraft, Bonzo. They were separated by over a decade, and were completely different, but he gave them both the same name, after a cartoon dog. The chief thing was a reference to his first race aircraft, Chief Oshkosh, which won many a race in the 1930s before being reconfigured as yet another racer, Buster. This airplane now sits in the National Air and Space Museum.
While doing research at the EAA archives this last summer, I found a letter that cracked me up. Buster was donated to the Smithsonian (now the NASM) in the 1950s. There was a brewery in Oshkosh at the time that made "Chief Oshkosh Beer." The company sent Wittman a nice letter when the airplane was selected for the museum, and said complementary things about how much it meant to have the airplane next to the Spirit of St. Louis, that it called attention to how good of a pilot Steve was, etc. etc. Then a couple of paragraphs down the letter more or less said "By the way... wouldn't it be more accurate to change the name of the airplane back to Chief Oshkosh, and wouldn't this reflect better on the city?" Gee, not to mention call attention to their product!
I passed this along to an acquaintance at the NASM, and he more or less said, tongue in cheek (I hope) that if it happened today the museum would change the name back after they got the airplane (regardless of the wishes of the donor) and then hit up the company for a sponsorship!
TM