2002.07.TARPA_TOPICS by TWA Active Retired Pilots Assn.

EDITOR

John P. Gratz 1646 Timberlake Manor Pkwy Chesterfield, MO 63017 (636) 532-8317 jpgratz@earthlink.net ASSOCIATE EDITOR David R. Gratz 1034 Caroll St. Louis, MO 63104 dgratz@kcnet.com GRAPEVINE EDITOR Gene Richards 221a Levelland Ln. 0 ( 2 09) 492- 0 391 Modesto, CA 9535 gene_richards@hotmail.com HISTORIAN Felix M. Usis III 1276 Belvoir Lane Virginia Beach, VA 2 34 6 4- 6 74 6 (757) 4 20 -5445 1 73 6 44 . 334 @ compuserve. co m FLOWN WEST COORDINATOR John S. Bybee 2616 Saklan Indian Drive #1 Walnut Creek, CA 94595 (925)938-3492 jbybee4@attbi.com INTERNET WEBMASTER Jack Irwin 2466 White Stable Road Town and Country, MO 6 3 1 3 1 (3 1 4) 43 2 -3 2 7 2 jack@smilinjack.com TARPA TOURS COORDINATOR Jean Thompson 11 Shadwood Lane Hilton Head Island, S.C. 29926 (843) 681-6451

OFFICERS AND DIRECTORS, 2000 - 2001

PRESIDENT

FIRST VICE-PRESIDENT

SECOND VICE PRESIDENT

SECRETARY/TREASURER

SENIOR DIRECTOR

DIRECTOR

PAST-PRESIDENT

Robert W. Dedman 3728 Lynfield Drive 20 Virginia Beach, VA 23452 (757) 463- 32 rwd@sybercom.net Charles L. Wilder 14 Underhill Rd. Howell, NJ 07731-2316 (732) 364-5549 clwilder@prodigy.net H.O. Van Zandt 1810 Lindbergh Lane Daytona Beach, FL 32124 (904) 767-6607 hopvz@compuserve.com Rufus Mosely Box 1871 1192 Foley, AL 36536-1871 (251) 955rufus767@gulftel.com Harry A. Jacobsen 848 Coventry Street 0468 Boca Raton, FL 334 8 7 (567) 997jojhaj @gateway. net Rockney Dollarhide 1 Riverside Farm Dr. Crescent, MO 63025 (636) 938-4727 rdollar@tetranet.net Jack Irwin 2466 White Stable Road Town and Country, MO 63 131 (314) 432-3 2 72 jack@smilinjack.com John P. Gratz 1646 Timberlake Manor Pkwy Chesterfield, MO 63017 (636) 532-8317 jpgratz@earthlink.net

PAGE 2 ... TARPA TOPICS

PRESIDENTS MESSAGE We are now entering a new era of TARPA and that is because we have opened the door to "all" of our people. This was the right thing to do. We launched a campaign to "stuff' all of our pilots mail boxes and hoped that they would join us as the last of the TWA'ers. As Topics goes to press, we have been successful in securing 68 new members, many of who are under fifty, Imagine that! We want to welcome one and all and hope that you will enjoy, contribute, and hopefully, serve, as that is what keeps our organization alive. We have not had a convention for two years so we are hoping that everyone is eager and willing to come and participate. I promise you that we will have some very exciting events for everyone. Example: have you ever been on the only U-boat captured at sea? You can walk through the cramped quarters and wonder about those young men (average age 20 to 24) and what were their dreams for the future! Well, you can do it in Chicago. Have you ever visited beautiful gardens and wish they were yours? Well, you can for a day. So much is in store with exciting things to do, after all, it is Chicago, but, the most important piece of the puzzle is you! Are you coming? I have said many times, so much work goes into planning and executing a convention. Been there, done that..would we do it again...no way..did we enjoy it, yes. We loved the feeling of getting our friends to our locales, to savor our food, visit our favorite places and to enjoy what we think is great. Lets give the folks in Chicago the favor of coming to see and participate in what THEY have planned for us. Believe me, Ilse and I will be on most tours. We love seeing other people's beautiful places. Finally, I hope that we have settled into our new "parent airline's" ways and that we are grateful for what we have attained. This does not in any way suggest that we will not continue to fight for better boarding priorities and more coverage on medical plans but we HAVE accomplished an awful lot when you consider what we started with...almost nothing. I have been blessed with a wonderful, hard working board so I take this public opportunity to thank each and everyone for their time and many contributions. We have a lot of business to transact at our convention and we will have a surprise or two. I sincerely request your presence at our annual gala. As always, blue side up,

Bob Dedman

PAGE 3 ... TARPA TOPICS

EDITOR'S NOTE As you can see, this issue of TOPICS features the 2002 TARPA Convention in the heart of Downtown Chicago. We are excited by the chance to visit one of our favorite old layover cities and former Domiciles, and to have an opportunity to make up for the loss of our Convention last year in Philadelphia. John Rohlfing and his helpers have arranged a First Class program starting with a really great hotel located in the center of all the action. It is close to all the must visit spots. They also offer excursions and activities to satisfy almost every taste. The grand finale will be a Banquet more elaborate than ever. Barry Craig used all his talent and experience arranging this extravaganza. We hope that you will come join us to see all your old friends and to meet our new members. There are almost 70 new Members since the last issue of TOPICS. The Otis Bryan oral history article is continued. Otis again speaks of the many famous WW II leaders that he got to know and the many exotic places he went setting up the ICD operations during those difficult days. We include some of the letters and photographs of those famous leaders from Otis's scrapbook. We are also fortunate to have several interesting stories from Members; Haggard, Jinnette and Rawlings. They describe events of a widely disparate character during World War II. Another Member, John Zachem recounts his experiences of recent years after retirement. Subscriber Ona Gieschen sent us two history pieces, which she compiled, from other sources. One is a story of one of the first Connie flights as seen by a very young New York United Press reporter, Betty Harvey. The other includes a tale of an early day air photo shoot from the Skyliner along with an elaboration of the event by TARPA Member Ray Craft. Cover notes describing Bob Buck's latest book, "North Star Over my Shoulder" are included for your information. We believe that this book is a must read for any TWA Pilot of a certain age, in fact for all TWA pilots. Bob recounts his long years of flying from his mid-teens until retirement as a 747 International Captain. He concludes with a description of the joy of flying sailplanes with his son USAirways Captain, and TARPA Subscriber, Bob Jr. The story has many similarities with the careers that many of us enjoyed but, along the way, Bob did so much more of the sort of things that the rest of us can only envy. The many friends he made over the years makes a veritable who's who of the aviation industry. The book is available at all major bookstores and at simonsays.com and amazon.com. It deserves a place in every TARPA Member's library.

Photos in this issue of TOPICS courtesy of: Otis Bryan Jr., Ona Gieschen, Wayne Haggard, Barney Rawlings, Betty Slegman and the Chicago Convention and Tourism Bureau. PAGE 4 ... TARPA TOPICS

SECRETARY/TREASURER REPORT MAY 6, 2002 As of May 6, 2002, the membership is as follows: (R) Retired: (E) Eagles:

968 6 53

(A) Active: (H) Honorary: TOTAL:

105 4 15 2138

There are also 57 subscribers to Topics, and 17 who receive complimentary copies. We have added 66 new members since the last Topics, they are listed in this issue. Here is the financial report for the 1st four months of 2002: 1/1/2002: Opening Balance Income Expenses Cash Flow Balance 4/30/02

$40,276.67 $37,44 1.2 5 $3 0 , 1 55 . 5 6 $ 7,285.69 $47,562.36

H. O. Van Zandt is trying to update the e-mails of all members. Please send your correct e-mail address to: hopvz@com p userve.com. Please note my new address for future correspondence: P.O. Box 1871, Foley, AL 36536-1871, Phone: 1080. 2 1 E-mail: C:\Documents and Settings\Dave\Local Settings\Temporary Internet 5 955Files\Content.IE5\WX670HQN\ST rpt 5-6-02.doc rufus767@gulftel.com. My phone number and email have changed since the last Topics, I hope for the last time! See you in Chicago.

Rufus Mosely Hans Treder (spouse- Hanna) 9714 E. Gamble Lane Scottsdale, AZ 85262 Roger Moore 16239 Pepperview Ct. Chesterfield, MO 63005 John Thomas (spouse- Cleo) 3584 Willow Beach St. Prior Lake, MN 5537 2 Milo Raub (spouse- Edie) 15805 E. Country Lane Platte City, MO 64079

Welcome, New Members Bill Hoar (spouse- Jane) 63 Howland Rd. South Kent, CT 06785 Christopher Cutler (spouse - Carla) 58' Winding Stair Way O Fallon, MO 63366 Larry Balliet 4305 Alla Rd. #3 Marina Del Rey, CA 90292 Paul Zahn P.O. Box 296 Mammoth Lakes, CA 93546

Frank Mooney (spouse- Paula) 1990 Palo Alto Av. The Villages, FL 32159

Rich Tonelli (spouse- Karen) 931 SW 296th St. Federal Way, WA 98023 John Wilke (spouse- Rowena) Box 1064 Lakeside, MT 59922 Larry Earhart 727 Turrentine Trail St. Louis, MO 63141 Donald Gregory (sp- Patricia) 1921 NE 68th St. Gladstone, MO 64118 Mo Singer (spouse - Sondra) 12097 Elm Court Auburn, CA 95602

PAGE 5 ... TARPA TOPICS

Wayne DeLawter (spouse - Patty) Box 104 Holicong, PA 18928

Kurt Schmidt 307 Hanley Lane Franklin, TN 37069

Chuck Cascales 383 Chapel Ridge Dr. Apt. A Hazelwood, MO 63042

Martin Penning (spouse - Constance) P.O. F40741Box Freeport, Bahamas

Jay Wolf (spouse - Francoise) 86 Cascade Circle Chanhassen, MN 55317

Ken Aikin (spouse - Linda) 20 NW 39th St. Kansas City, MO 64116

Norman Johnson (spouse -Greer) 7753 85th Lane Largo, FL 33777

Bob Waggoner (spouse - Marie) 805 Sea Cuff Way Oceanside, CA 92056

Milo Griffin (spouse - Marietta) 1261 Pine Ridge Cir. # C-2 Tarpon Springs, FL 34689 Ernie Hadfield (spouse- Jan) 16464 Farmers Mill Ln Chesterfield, MO 63005 (S) Madeline Overturf (spouse - Jack) 3006 Marilyn Road Colorado Springs, CO 80909 Arnie Kellen (spouse - Peggy) 25022 W. Palmer Court Antioch, IL 6000z Scott Brause 1095 Canter Road Atlanta, GA 30324 Roger Allen (spouse- Judy) 9 Sharon Drive Wellington, NV 89444 Steve Lamorette (spouse - Cynthia) 4169 Avery Lane6 0 Bridgeton, MO 3 44 John Swanson (spouse - Mary) 11415 Oxbridge Court St. Louis, MO 63146 Larry Wolfe (spouse - Susan) 108 Willow Wood Lane Pacific, MO 63069 Christopher Castell (spouse -Michelle) 11 Douglas Drive Amherst, NH 03031 Albert Holcomb (spouse - Rochelle) 5022 Broadlawn Dr. S.E. Cedar Rapids, IA 52403 Jerry Rekart (spouse - Nancy) 3 Cherokee Dr. Brookfield, CT 06804 Greg Barklage 22 Plymouth Ct. St. Charles, MO 63304 Tom Weitzel (spouse - Bea Mueller) 1914 Sprucewood Way Port Orange, FL 32128 Chris Skadberg Box 125 Knife River, MN 55609

William Stevens (spouse - Shirley) 9706 Hidden Lane Woodstock, IL 60098 Scott Schwartz (spouse- Ann) to Iris St. Redwood City, CA 94062 Tanya Wyanski 3110 Hill St. New Smyrna Beach, FL 32169 Rick Wise (spouse - Cindy) 522 Big Horn Basin Ct Wildwood, MO 63011 John E. Barrett (spouse - Patt) 1238 Willowgate Lane St. Charles, MO 60174 Doug Craighead no Mountain View Lane Deering, NH 03 244 Stanley Burak (spouse - Lynn) 9456 Ruby Falls Court Weeki Wachee, FL 34613 Dan Humphrey 102 Broadmoor Av. San Anselmo, CA 94960 Jeffrey Hoesel (spouse- Diana) 11 Smokey Ridge 6Court St. Charles, MO 3304 Kevin Horner (spouse- Jody) 14067 Highway E Curryville, MO 63339 Roc Roberts (spouse - Esmeralda 8922 86th St. Live Oak, FL 32060 " Dusty " West (spouse- Lee) 7031 N. Cosby Av. Kansas City, MO 64151

Rick Kisling (spouse - Joy) 9 Colonial Drive Bethel, CT 06801 Marc Bryan (spouse - Joanne) 255 Glen Court 11 Cutchogue, NY 935 Nick Matranga 2263 River Forest Drive Mobile, AL 36605 C. W. Allen (spouse - Betty) 22 Wheaton Point Court Chesterfield, MO 63005 Dave Haase 9146 Stitt Road Whitehouse, OH 43571 PAGE 6 ... TARPA TOPICS

Jefiley Johnson (spouse - Jill) 13175 Ladybank Lane Hemdon, VA 20171 Steve Ash (spouse- Tracy) 936 Race Track Rd. Centralia, IL 62801 Tom Madden 6470 Mourning Dove Dr. #402 Bradenton, FL 34210 Steve Hult 834 Du Pre Court St. Peters, MO 63376 Martin Robart (spouse - Kathleen) 10932 Ridge Forest Dr. St. Louis, MO 63123 Willian Gashel (spouse - Julie) 3660 Applewood Lane Rockford, IL 61114 Cynthia Mandel 22727 4th Av. W #104 Bothell, WA 98021 Andrew Mandel (spouse - Debi) 12054 Hiram Place NE Seattle, WA 98125 Peter Eilertsen (spouse - Nellie) 208 Kawatuska Lane Loudon, TN 37774 Craig Cambria (spouse - Renee) 2511 Ponderosa Drive Ridgway, CO 81432 L. Clark Billie, Jr. (spouse - Ilyne) 27 Belmont Square Doylestown, PA 18901

Tarpa Convention 2002 Chicago September 17th Thru September 2 I st Join old friends in the "Second City" to see all that made Chicago, "My Kind of Town" to so many. A lot has changed since we had a domicile and downtown layovers there. It's an ideal spot to gather with old friends and to meet our new members after missing the chance to visit Philadelphia.

PAGE 7 ... TARPA TOPICS

Did Chicago

You

Know

Produced

that

the

First:

steel frame skyscraper stainless steel building electric iron and cooking range Pullman railroad car grain reaper reactor to produce electricity from atomic energy cafeteria window envelope co-educational public high school railroad sleeping car the bifocal contact lens the winding watch the Butterfinger and Baby Ruth candy bars the caramel-chocolate turtles the bowling tournament Shrimp de Jonghe Cracker Jacks Schwinn Bicycles And

...

The title "Windy City" was given to Chicago by New York Sun editor Charles Dana in 1893. He was tired of hearing long-winded politicians boasting about the wonders of the World's Columbian Exposition held in Chicago the same year. Note: In case you wondered, the Cubs haven't won the World Series since 1908. PAGE 8 ... TARPA TOPICS

TARPA 2002 Chicago SCHEDULE for September 17 - 21

"Tour" Information for TARPA 2002 Chicago

Wednesday, September 18 Museum of Science and Industry Come visit Chicago's world famous original hands on museum. The museum is one of the country's pre-eminent centers for informal science and technology education. Permanent exhibits include: The Farm; Idea Factory; Take Flight; Aids: The War Within; Coal Mine; U505 Submarine; All Aboard the Silver Streak and much more. From many long-time favorites too dazzling high tech exhibits, you'll make you own adventure. Explore the ever-changing adventure at the Museum of Science and Industry. Tour includes round trip transportation aboard our private motor coaches, museum admission, and special 4o-minute OmniMax tickets (Presentation to be announced.) Lunch on your own at the all new Food Court available at the museum. Total tour time 6 hours. Cantigny Tour includes: McCormick Museum Take a step back into history with a virtual tour of the home of Colonel McCormick, former editor & publisher of the Chicago Tribune. This 35-room mansion is filled with European antiques, paintings, rare books, and Asian art that McCormick collected during his travels around the world. First Division Museum Commemorating the distinguished service of the men and women who have served our nation since its birth, the First Division Museum portrays the history of the 1st Division, the Big Red One, of the U.S. Army. By using realistic, interactive exhibits of the Division's history and a gallery of temporary installations, the museum honors the service of the everyday soldier. You may tour the collection of restored military vehicles and equipment that surround the museum. Gardens Our 15 acres of manicured gardens include numerous formal designs, a rose collection, and the Idea Garden, demonstrating unique gardening projects for adults and children. The grounds also include large shaded picnic grounds and marked nature trails along the perimeter of the park. Tour includes round trip transportation aboard our private motor coaches, admission, and picnic luncheon. Luncheon: Turkey wrap with ceasar or honey-mustard dressing, chips, fruit, cookie, and soda.

PAGE 13 ... TARPA TOPICS

White Sox vs. Kansas City The Chicago White Sox take on Kansas City in this evening baseball game at Cominsky Park. Tour includes round trip transportation aboard our private motor coaches and box seating at the game. Game time 6:05pm . Join us and we'll buy your first cold beer!

Thursday, September 19 Chicago Botanic Garden Visit the Chicago Botanic Garden with its magnificent gardens on tranquil lagoons. On 385 acres of spectacular beauty ever changing with the seasons, it is the third most-visited botanic garden in the United States. Owned by the Forest Preserve District of Cook County, the Garden is a living museum that includes 23 gardens, 81 acres of waterways, 9 islands, 6 miles of shoreline, 15 acres of prairie, and 10o acres of woods. Tour includes round trip transportation aboard our private motor coaches, Grand tram tour with a 45 minute narrated overview of the entire Gardens, private tour of Rose Garden or English walled Garden, and luncheon. Your choice of Grilled Steak Rustica Sandwich, served with gourmet salad, or Asian Crispy Noodle Chicken Salad served with fresh baked bread, both with beverage and homemade brownie. Lake Michigan Dinner Cruise Enjoy the spectacular beauty of the Chicago skyline by night on the Spirit of Chicago. The 3-hour cruise includes complete buffet dinner, live dance band, two glasses of wine (or beverage) per person, all taxes and gratuities. If we have enough participation we will be assigned a private deck just for TARPA. Boat disembarks from Navy Pier, both a must do while in Chicago. Tour includes round trip transportation aboard our private motor coaches and complete dinnerdance Cruise. Friday, September 20 Architecture River Cruise Marvel at the soaring towers of Chicago's Loop from sparkling river vistas. Presented by the Chicago Architecture Foundation, this 9o-minute tour, aboard Chicago ' s First Lady, spotlights 53 historic and architecturally significant sites. Boat disembarks from across the street of the Hyatt so we will walk to the dock. Tour includes gourmet sandwich luncheon from Earl's Deli and 90 minute narrated cruise. Saturday, September 21 Chicago Historical Society The cities oldest cultural institution and keeper of its memories. Visit the museum to trace Chicago's growth from wilderness outpost to the architectural, cultural, and social mecca of PAGE 14 ... TARPA TOPICS

our times. Permanent galleries include: We the People: Creating a Nation (1765-1820); On the Paper Trail; Out of the Loop: Neighborhood Voices; A House Divided: American in the Age of Lincoln; Illinois Pioneer Life and Ft. Dearborn; The Great Chicago Fire; a special exhibit Building Images: Seventy Years of Hedrich Blessing Photography. Tour includes round trip transportation aboard our private motor coaches, guided tour, and plated luncheon, all taxes and gratuities.

Note: Actual tour times may vary by September. Please reconfirm at registration desk in Chicago. Tours may be available on site for slightly higher price. Suggested Self Directed Tours â&#x20AC;&#x201D; All Days Lincoln Park Conservatory Located next to the Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago's largest park, this horticultural collection, including a 50-foot tall fiddle leaf rubber tree dating from 1891, expands into four greenhouses and is well worth the visit. Adler Planetarium & Astronomy Museum Reach for the stars at the Adler Planetarium & Astronomy Museum! Discover the wonders of the Universe in exciting new interactive exhibit galleries. Embark on a voyage in the world's first StarRider Theater or explore the heavens in the Sky Theater. Enjoy heavenly snacks and meals set against the Chicago skyline in Galileo's. The Field Museum From Kremlin Gold to Star Wars to Sue. The Field Museum provides a unique and dynamic experience for its visitors. Discover Sue, the largest and most complete T. Rex ever found! Shrink to the size of a bug and go on an Underground Adventure, descend into an Egyptian Pharaoh's tomb, watch a glowing lava flow, be dazzled by sparkling gems, come nose-to-nose with the man-eating lions of Tsavo. Shedd Aquarium Water your imagination at the John G. Shedd Aquarium, a mesmerizing introduction to aquatic life from around the world. From awe-inspiring whales, frolicking sea otters and lively penguins to streamlined sharks and exotic eels, Shedd Aquarium is home to a myriad of fascinating, colorful aquatic animals. The global collection includes more than 8,000 aquatic animals representing more than 65o species.

PAGE 15 ... TARPA TOPICS

Museum of Broadcast Communications The Museum of Broadcast Communications is one of only two broadcast museums in America, housing historic radio and television memorabilia, an extensive archive collection of over 85,000 hours of television and radio programming and home to America's only Radio Hall of Fame. The museum offers state-of-the art radio and television studios; where visitors have the opportunity to go "on-the air," plus a wide array of interactive exhibits and kiosks. The Art Institute of Chicago ' One of the world's finest art collections dating from 3,000 B.C. through the 1990 s.

Terra Museum of American Art Collections highlight 19th and early 20th century American art. Selections from the collections and special exhibitions are on view throughout the year. Navy Pier Navy Pier, a Chicago landmark since 1916, re-opened as a world-class recreation and exposition center in July of 1995. The Pier's spectacular exhibition facility, Festival Hall, is designed to serve small to mid-sized conventions and trade shows that have outgrown hotel meeting space or simply desire a unique, new venue. The restoration and reconstruction project preserved the Pier's architectural beauty, while integrating features to serve a new generation of residents, tourists and business visitors. Buckingham Fountain Visitors can enjoy a dazzling music, light and water show, which runs from dusk to 11pm; every hour on the hour and lasts for 20 minutes. Lincoln Park Zoo One of the last free zoos in the country. Home to one of the largest families of great apes. Visit the newly renovated Kovler Sea Lion Pool, a traditional meeting place for generations of zoo visitors and home to harbor and gray seals and California sea lions. Shop on the wild side at our new Wild Things! Retail store then walk upstairs to Big Cats Cafe, a rooftop restaurant that overlooks the Kovler Lion House outdoor lion and tiger habitats. Watch the zoo's three new lion cubs frolic among the pride as you dine. Minutes from downtown at Lake Shore Dr. and Fullerton Parkway. And much, much more. The above are just a few of the attractions available as "Self-Directed" tours that are available to you. Come to TARPA 2002 Chicago and enjoy the camaraderie of your fellow retirees and this fine city. Your TARPA 2002 Convention in Chicago will be memorable. PAGE 16 ... TARPA TOPICS

A Spring Day - 1945 by Wayne L Haggard Picture this if you will. It is a day in April 1945 . YOU are in the China-Burma-India Theater. You are a member of the l0 th Air Force, 12 th Bomb Group, 82 nd Bulldog Bomb Squadron, B25s. You are based near the village of Fenny on the India/Burma border. It is 0400 and a light is shined through your mosquito netting and someone calls your name. You acknowledge and roll out, get dressed and head for the mess hall where you take on a load of powdered eggs and Spam. Then across to the briefing room, which is another, thatched bamboo `basha'. You pour a cup of coffee and swallow an atabrine tablet and speculate with your crew as to where you'll go today. At 0500 the Exec Officer enters, attention is called, acknowledged and you take your seats. The Exec goes to the front of the room and removes a cloth from a large map with a red dot on it. your target for today. Briefing from various people lets you know your route to and from the target, the IP, altitudes to be flown, expected weather, bomb load, fuse settings, expected AAA, and fighter opposition. You're told how much fighter escort you'll have, if any, and what squadron, (some are better than others). Direction to nearest friendly forces in case you are shot down and other specialized information. Your target is a Jap division's main storage facility. We will bomb that from 9000' then drop down and do a road sweep. A road (or river) sweep is done at low level; the purpose being to take on targets of opportunity. On the sweep, we are briefed to -Kill everyâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;thing that breaths or has wheels," We are also briefed that the Japs have been dressing as civilians and using everything including ox carts and water buffalo for transport - we will not kill elephants or train engines. (train cars still OK.). Our forces expect to retake Burma in the near future and we will need the elephants and engines for our own transport. We will send 12 B-25's, each with six 500 lb bombs. After the bomb run we will split into two six ship formations and each sweep a different road. We will redline it down to about 300 feet then spread out in loose formation so as to give each plane room to maneuver and fire. We will sweep about 150 miles. Too much time and the Japs can get organized and be waiting for us. We hack our watches and each crew piles into a couple of Jeeps and heads for the airfield. We take off form up and fly to the target, do our bombing and road sweep. Each B-25 has 4 to 12 pilot controlled fixed 50-caliber machine guns either on the side of the fuselage or in the nose of the plane. These guns fire fast and overheat fast, you fire short bursts and allow the guns to cool PAGE 17 ... TARPA TOPICS

between bursts. If the 50 ' s get too hot they will continue to cook off single rounds after you quit firing. After the road sweep you form up in tight defensive formation and head for home. If you have been over zealous with your trigger finger your guns start cooking off single rounds. Only your crew can hear these but every fifth one is a tracer. When a tracer goes off everyone can see it. Because you are in formation they won't hit any of your planes but the guys will see the tracers and you will sure hear about in the club tonight. Anyway, back on the ground you check for holes in your plane and head for debriefing. There you tell about all the things that you helped today to no longer breathe or have round wheels. Outside the debriefing room the Flight Surgeon dispenses "Mission Whiskey", two ounces of authorized and official G.I. bourbon. Then off to the showers and after that maybe join in a game of softball. Spam for dinner.

Experimental Flight Department by Earl Jinnette After two years in flight inspection on the first production line an opening in the experimental flight department became available. My boss, Adrian Watson, offered the job to me. I was ecstatic! Being a flight inspector on the latest Lockheed designs and developments was more than I'd even hoped for! I was initially assigned to a B-34 we were using for flight tests on the Wright 3350 engines. They were destined for the Boeing B-29's as well as the prototype Constellation, which was about to be completed in final assembly. The 3350 engines used propellers much too large for the B-34, consequently the nose of the bomber had to be cut off about 2-1/2 feet to facilitate the large arc of the huge propellers. The engines created two bulbous protrusions resembling a "well endowed" female and we soon christened her the "sweater girl." The name was accepted and eventually painted on the nose. Less than a year later the first Constellation was rolled out of the factory and I, along with another inspector, was assigned to the new high performance passenger airliner. It was called " 1961 "and it was several weeks before I became aware of the fact that " 1961 " was actually the Lockheed serial number for the prototype constellation. We never called her the "Constellation" or even the "Connie." It was always referred to as " 1961 ". The military was interested in the Connie as a troop transport; consequently it was painted the usual dull olive drab of all Army Air Corps planes.

PAGE 18 ... TARPA TOPICS

Lockheed's experimental flight dept. was a very small group of mechanics and only three flight inspectors on day shift, with two on night shift. Our hangar consisted of one corner of Western Airlines' hangar, which was not even large enough to house one P-38, which also was in experimental stage. All work was done outside, rain or shine. This was years before the now famous "skonk works" came into existence. The manager of experimental flight was Rudy Thoren. In charge of the whole experimental flight division from basic design on down to flight tests was Hall Hibbard. His assistant was Clarence Johnson, who was known to the gang as "Kelly." We rarely saw Hall Hibbard, but Kelly Johnson was often on the line to keep abreast of progress, especially on the Connie, as that was his baby, and his own design. Kelly Johnson, years later, became recognized as the foremost aircraft design engineer in the world, with sophisticated projects such as the now famous SR-71, accredited to his talents. Occasionally Jack Northrop would spend a few hours on the flight line, mostly talking to the test pilots, namely Milo Burcham and Tony Levier. I was unaware that Jack Northrop, years before, had been chief design engineer at Lockheed but had left in 1928 to form his own company. He too, was an amiable individual and still maintained the best practical aircraft design was his "flying wing. " It was over fifty years before it was proven to be the most efficient design which was incorporated in the model B-2 stealth bomber of today's advanced military design. Kelly Johnson was a dedicated engineer and rarely took any time off. He finally took a two-week vacation; probably at the urging of Robert Gross, Lockheed President. When he returned he was welcomed back by several engineers and not a few mechanics. He was well liked by all the experimental flight group. When he got around to the Constellation I was assigned to, I greeted him along with the rest of the crew, and asked, "Kelly, how was the fishing?" "fishing?" He inquired. I said, "I knew you just came back from vacation and I assumed everybody went fishing for relaxation!" He said, "you know what I did. "I've no idea," I answered. He said, "I got out my two old college calculus books and worked all the problems in them!" I was dumbfounded! Only Kelly would consider such a thing as relaxation! After the prototype constellation was successfully test flown, the second Connie built came off the assembly line painted with full TWA colors. It was destined for the Military, as were the first twenty airplanes but Howard Hughes managed to sneak the number two Connie into a publicity stunt. It was to be a record setting non-stop coast-to-coast flight. Hughes was to be pilot and Jack Frye, TWA President, was to be co-pilot. They agreed to switch positions half way across the continent to equally share the acclaim. The flight was a great success and set a new record! PAGE 19 ... TARPA TOPICS

Jack Frye, I saw frequently, as the plane was being readied and, occasionally, Howard Hughes would show up on the scene but he preferred to make most of his visits at night. I might mention, each Connie as it came off the assembly line had two, three cell flashlights on the pedestal between the pilot's seats; one on each side of the pedestal in a clip designed for the purpose. I, knowing they wouldn't last long took one off the first Connie, merely to prevent some thief from stealing it! I'm still using it. I carried it in my flight kit during my stint in the Air Transport Command and also my thirty-two years with TWA. Rudy Thoren and Jack Frye apparently became good friends as well as just having a common interest in the Constellation. Years later, after I'd checked out as a flight engineer with TWA, I saw the two of them numerous times flying together and occasionally they would spend time in the cockpit, as Jack often did when old time captains were flying, this particular time Felix Preeg was flying and Jack enjoyed recalling the early days of TWA. Jack was sitting in the "acm" chair and Rudy Thoren was perched on the step at the "26o" bulkhead, as it was called. It was summer operation and we were required to wear the white hats, which most of us disliked, for various reasons. Felix Preeg, however, being an old navy pilot, failed to sympathize with our complaints. Eventually Jack , inadvertantly, knocked our hats off of The navigator table onto the deck and apologized for the accident. I told him we all disliked the hats and he wanted to know why. I said, "besides being impractical, I personally, think we look like a bunch of ice cream peddlers!" Jack's reply was "you don't know how lucky you are!" "How's that? I inquired." Jack said, "several years ago my wife designed a uniform for the pilots." He then proceeded to describe it. He said it had red epaulettes, a Sam Brown belt and I can't recall all of the accoutrements included in the description, but ended by saying "any high ranking Mexican Army Officer would have been proud to wear it!" I inquired, "what happened to the uniform design?" Jack replied, the pilots said they would quit flying before they would wear the damn thing! "

PAGE 20 ... TARPA TOPICS

A Blast from the Past by Barney Rawlings My B-17 crew was shot down in 1944 while I was serving in England with the 303rd Bomb Group of the 8th Air Force. I escaped capture after our crash-landing in Belgium and returned to England by way of France, the Pyrenees, Spain, and Gibraltar. Some of my crew became POWs and others were hidden by local Belgians until the U.S. Army fought their way from Normandy to Belgium. Four of my crew were badly wounded by machine-gun fire, and one died soon after we pulled him from the burning airplane. The citizens of Solre-St. Gery, the small Belgian town near the pasture where we came down, later erected a monument to our crew. I have a photo of John Gratz taken at that monument when he visited it during a tour of Belgian a few years ago. I made many friends in Belgium after the war, and two of them - Francoise and Benoit Dorignaux - were going to fly to New York last September to visit me. They were going to fly from Brussels to New York on September 11. Well, of course, that trip had to be cancelled, but they'll try again this coming June. A couple of days ago I was surfing the Net to look up some WW II information, and I was astounded to see that Air Force historians have stored a photo of my old B-17 crew and the monument at Solre-St. Gery, and a remarkably-accurate account of the mission to Frankfurt from which we failed to return. I read on, with mounting amazement, to find my crew was believed to have been shot down by Hauptman Heinz Knoke, a leading Me-1o9 fighter pilot. Well, that was pretty interesting. I had never known who flew the fighter that shot us down, so I kept reading about Captain Knoke and learned many things I didn't know, or had forgotten. For example, in 1943, a group of war correspondents in England were granted permission to fly as observers on B-17 and B-24 bombing missions. The U.S. Army Air Forces were starting their daylight bombing program, and the top commanders wanted the publicity. The correspondents included well-known names like Walter Cronkite, Andy Rooney, and Homer Bigart. On the first mission flown with correspondents aboard, a B-24 was shot down and a correspondent named Bob Post was among those killed. The pilot who shot the B-24 down was Captain Heinz Knoke. Knoke joined the Luftwaffe as a teen-ager and was a high-scoring Me-1o9 ace by 1943. He was born in 1921 and scored 52 victories, during which career he was shot down several times and survived. As the German forces retreated after D-Day, Knoke 's Me-1o9 outfit was ordered back from Belgium to Holland, and Knoke was seriously hurt in an auto accident on the way to his new duty station. He never flew again. After the war he was a celebrity, wrote a book - "I Flew For The Fuehrer" - and was elected to the new German legislature. He died in 1993 . It of to my

was almost an honor to have been shot down by Heinz Knoke. Unfortunately, his official log victories stored in the Net does not show an entry for January 29, 1944, so I am disappointed report that there seems to be an error in the Net data. After all my research, for all I know, crew was shot down by a Luftwaffe Aviation Cadet named Fritz Schmitt.

PAGE 21 ... TARPA TOPICS

2Lt Bernard W. Rawlings - back row second from left Editor's note: There is a lot more to this story and Barney put it all in his book, "Off we went (into the wild blue yonder)". The gist of that incredible tale is Barney's survival, escape and evasion from the crash site in the border area between Belgium and France to the Pyrenees mountains across the border into Spain. The people Barney met along the way and the dangers they faced make it seem more like a Hollywood script to readers of today than a story of real people doing what they could in a common cause. It is a book well worth your time and it is still available. Contact Barney Rawlings 25 Vicki Lane, Colchester, CT 06415 or at olfygu@castne.om .

Crash site of "G.I. Sheets" Nom de Guerre of Barney Rawlings' ill-fated B-17. PAGE 22 ... TARPA TOPICS

UNITED STATES AIR FORCE ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM (PART II) An Interview of Otis F. Bryan by Dr. James C. Hasdorff December 14 -15, 1982 in Greeley, KS FOREWORD One of the oldest and oft-used sources for reconstructing the past is the personal recollections of the individuals who were involved. While of great value, memoirs and oral interviews are primary source documents rather than - finished history. The following pages are the personal remembrances of the interviewee and not the official opinion of the US Air Force Historical Program or of the Department of the Air Force. The Air Force has not verified the statements contained herein and does not assume any responsibility for their accuracy. These pages are a transcript of an oral interview recorded on magnetic tape. Editorial notes and additions made by US Air Force historians have been enclosed in brackets - When feasible, first names, ranks, or titles have been provided. Only minor changes for the sake of clarity were made before the transcript was returned to the interviewee for final editing and approval. Readers must therefore remember that this is a transcript of the spoken, rather than the written word.

I understand that Field Marshall Montgomery [Sir Bernard] taxed his patience.

I didn't know him, but some of the stories I heard, no one could get along with him.

He had an ego 3 miles wide from what I understand. Did you have any other associations with Eisenhower other than what you have mentioned here?

Yes, I saw him several times, and I flew him before he got his own plane over in England there. He first had a DC-2, but to go on trips like that, he'd always be with the President. He was always happy. Then we saw Mamie [Geneva Dowd], his wife, and a friend of ours in Washington. When he came home, he had the big dinner in New York, the reception, the formal thing, that Governor Lehman [Herbert H.] gave for him. Everybody in New York—the group there, hundreds of people, all formal. We were invited. As I went down the reception line, Governor Lehman, the mayor of New York, and General Eisenhower were all there shaking hands with us as we went by. We got within 4 or 5 feet of General Eisenhower—and I hadn't seen him for a year or two at the end of the war—and he saw me. He said in a loud voice, "Jesus Christ, Otis, where in the hell have you been?" That upset the governor, but that's the kind of fellow he was.

Was he one of these fellows that had a photographic memory in regard to names? I understand some of those people, like Eisenhower, had a knack for that.

I never noticed if he did. I doubt that, because I recall now some questions he would ask. He had a good mind. He had a photographic mind for important things that he wanted to remember, but I don't think he—not like "Jim" Farley you're speaking of— would remember names too well. He'd remember names sure, of his friends, but I don't think he had any kind of unusual memory in this regard. PAGE 23 ... TARPA TOPICS

Editor: These three letters from then General Dwight D. Eisenhower to Otis Byan indicate the extent of the relationship formed between these two men during the early years of Trans-Atlantic Operations. The regular service was very instrumental for Allied success.

PAGE 24 ... TARPA TOPICS

You mentioned General Marshall [George C.] several times. How well did you get to know him?

Not too well, but fairly well. I flew him on several trips. Of course, you'd usually have dinner with them on the trips. I was always invited to have dinner with them and be around them. He was very much interested in that first Presidential flight. He told me when I went back toâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;he was at Casablanca. When General Arnold called me in, General Marshall was there and he told me about going back to Bathurst to get President Roosevelt. General Marshall took over right then and he said, "If you have any problem, you take this." He gave me a little letter that said, "Otis Bryan is in complete command of this aircraft"" and so forth, and, "he is not to be interfered with by any officer of the US Army. His decision will be final." Something to that effectâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;very polite. I never had to use it. A couple of times I probably should have, but I'd rather talk my way out than to cause somebody to get into trouble. I didn't get to know him too well, but he was very friendly and very nice on the occasions I did have with him. I knew Eisenhower and Roosevelt quite a bit better. He was a brilliant tactician. He was the one that had the military mind, General Marshall did.

I understand that he had such a striking appearance, and almost commanded any situation to the point where he over-awed those in his presence. In fact, I read where President Roosevelt even called him, "General Marshall." He never used his first name.

That' s true. Here you can see--

[Reading note from General Marshall to Mr. Bryan] `With appreciation for his skillful piloting to Africa. With warm regards, George C. Marshall."

I flew him on two or three trips to Africa. You can see there what you're talking about. He was not a stuff-shirt or anything like that. Not like King [Fleet Admiral Ernest J.]. But he was just always very- friendly. You could see, he just dominated any group he was in.

A very commanding presence. PAGE 25 ... TARPA TOPICS

Right.

Did you have any dealings with King?

No.

I interviewed his son-in-law, Gen "Fred" Smith [Frederic H., Jr.] several years ago.

I suppose King was a nice fellow, probably, if you got acquainted with him. He ran a very tight ship in the Navy and he thought he had to be tough, and he was tough. I think it was more like a "Patton act." He put a lot of that stuff on. It probably was not really King, but his act.

In the notes here, it mentions that you also met Gen Curtis LeMay [Curtis E.] some time back in your early career. Could you discuss that?

Yes, I met "Curt" at the 2d Bombardment Group at Langley Field, when I checked out on the B-17s in 1936, at the invitation of Bob Olds. I became acquainted with Curt at that time. He was just a lieutenant colonel, I believeâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;no, a major. All of us, or most of us, flying large aircraft had discussed the navigational facilities that would be necessary to operate a highflying aircraft over long distances. Of course during such conversations, celestial navigation was probably the most talked of. So Curt had done quite a bit of work in the field of celestial navigation and I was very much interested in learning about this. So I spent quite a bit of time with him discussing this, and finding out about things and so forth. After I came back to TWA, when the people from KLM came over and it looked like we were going to have trouble with Europe, then I set up a school at TWA and trained about 15 or 20 pilots as celestial navigators; including myself. I took the course very seriously. He was a very likable fellow; he was rough and tough. He moved right on up through the ranks to become commanding officer of Strategic Air Command. He made his name, I guess, on being commanding officer of the B-29 group in the Pacific. He replaced "Possum" Hansell out there in that group.

That was my association with him. It was nothing outstanding, except I was just friendly on this particular subject with him. H:

Did you, at that time, foresee that he was going to rise as high as he did?

No. I think he surprised many people.

Why did you feel that way?

Well, he was a rough type ofâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;in the services, usually you have two types of officers. You have the diplomatic type that usually prevails around Washington, and then you have the combat type out in the field. You might say that you have a third type, the

PAGE 26 ... TARPA TOPICS

administrative type, to run the group. Well, Curt was strictly the combat type. He was a rough, tough guy, and you never saw those kinds of fellows get up much beyond the combat units. I thought you would probably see a more diplomatic type of man get to the position of four stars, or something like that. War does some strange things. B:

It does at that. In Washington, particularly, they've been trained and going through the school at Leavenworth—the Army school and staff school—that's at Maxwell isn't it? The Chief of Staff school. Where is that down there? The training for top officer command.

Command and Staff school?

Yes. They're usually more for the diplomatic type of officer that can handle men, and handle personnel. Curt was like a buck sergeant. That's the way he handled people.

Kind of rough?

Yes.

Did you run across Frank Andrews[Maj. Gen Frank M.] back during that period?

There was General A Andrews. He was at Langley Field when I went there. I met him and talked to him two or three times. That's the only time I ever saw him. I don't know what happened to him. There are some that hold that he would have been the top man in the Air Corps had he not gotten killed.

That's right. I remember some people saying that he was' the outstanding one. I remember that.

Did you have any appreciation for him?

No, I didn't know him that well. I think the only time had contact with him when I was down there was at the Officers' Club or something like that, a social contact.

Were there any other officers that rose to prominence during that period that you rubbed shoulders with?

There-was "Bennie" Childlaw [Gen. Benjamin]. He got up pretty high. I don't know how high.

Four-star.

Let ' s see whom else I might have—Ira Eaker [Lt Gen. Ira C.] There were probably others.

How well did you get to know Ira Eaker?

PAGE 27 ... TARPA TOPICS

I got to know him fairly well. He was the commanding officer in the European theater in England. Down in London, I talked to him quite a few times. And then in Washington I heard from him and so forth. Fairly well—not "buddy-buddy," but these people were friendly. You'd get to know them, and they'd know you and know your family, what you did, and so forth. They'd sort of keep their eye out. It was a very nice relationship, but it wasn't a case of going out and playing golf with him because no one had time to play golf in those days.

Did you visualize then that he would become such an articulate spokesman for airpower?

Who now?

Ira Eaker. You know, he wrote a number of columns through the years.

Yes, I had a letter from him not too long, ago, a few years ago. He was in, Washington. No, I liked-Ira. I wouldn't say that I observed that. I suppose he had it, but I just didn't sense it.

Getting back to your Presidential trips during the war, in the book The Flying White House, it mentions the fact that Churchill, at the Cairo conference, came rushing out in his bathrobe to bid FDR [President Roosevelt] farewell. Pictures were made of the occasion, and it embarrassed him to no end. Could you comment on that incident?

It was early in the morning. We were taking off from the field there—I forget the name of the field—and it was about 6:00 in the morning when we were getting everything ready out at the end of the runway. Here this car came running out to the end of the runway. I stopped and put the steps down. It was Churchill. He got out in his bathrobe

PAGE 28 ... TARPA TOPICS

to come to tell the President goodbye. He had missed him; he had overslept. So President Roosevelt—he got amused. He got the photographer to take a picture of him. Churchill didn't like that. He raised hell about it. The President got his picture. So he told him a friendly goodbye and we took off. H:

I' ve never seen any pictures of that in history books or anything. He must have kept it pretty close.

I expect President Roosevelt kept it in his own files.

After the Cairo and Tehran conference, was this when you flew the Yalta trip then?

Yes. At the Yalta trip, the Air Transport Command had the Sacred Cow, and they had set up a pilot, Hank Meyers, and his crew to fly it. I was not supposed to—it wouldn't be necessary for me to fly him anymore because I was running this other thing. When the time came to go, General Arnold called me over, and told me he wanted we to handle the flight. So then General George [Lt Gen Harold L.] Air Transport Command, talked to General Arnold and said that he wanted his crew to fly it. So it got to be a little touchy thing and I stayed out of it. Then the President called me over and said, "Look, I don't care what goes on there, but I want you there and I want you in any emergency to make the command decisions on the plane. You're the top pilot." This thing between General George and General Arnold— "I want you there. I'm telling General George that you are to be there as my representative." I never told Meyers or any of the other people that. No one knew that. I don't know what the President told General George, but that was my position. I had to watch and if anything had gone wrong, I had the authority to take command. I flew the airplane part of the way. Meyers' crew—none of-them knew about this. I didn ' t think it was necessary to tell them, and I didn't tell them. I didn't tell anybody about it. That's what happened on it. My position was what you would call a command pilot today; have somebody do the controls. There were two very short flights. We flew from Malta over to Yalta and then we flew from Yalta across the northern Mediterranean over to Deversoir, about 70 miles east of Cairo, where he took a ship back to the States.

According to the book, The Flying White House, "Also ignored in the official account of the' Yalta' flight `was pilot Meyers' unhappiness with the FDR staff over the naming of Bryan as his copilot for the Sacred Cow." He thought it was a "political move. Did this cause you much concern?

No. Who said that, the copilot or somebody?

H: B:

This was in the book by J.F. terHorst and Col Ralph Albertazzie [Ralph D.]. I read that book. There were mostly rumors in that book; a few facts. I guess a part of it was factual, but they raised a lot of questions. No, that didn't bother me. I never knew about anything like that. Meyers and I were good friends. He called we afterwards,

PAGE 29 ... TARPA TOPICS

when they wanted him to fly Truman [President Harry S.]. They asked me to become Truman's pilot and I toldthem I couldn't because of my work with the airline. I said, "Well get Meyers. " Meyers called me several times and asked me about things. We were good friends. This was just made up by somebody. H: You'd never believe that when reading this. The book also noted, quote, "So while Bryan had to be taken along, Hank treated him only as a passenger, said Smith." Was this the case? B:

No.

H: Smith was the copilot on that. I interviewed him some years back, and he never mentioned any of this either. B: I ' m surprised at that—Smith was a pretty nice young chap. I never knew him too well. H:

Like you say, the book probably doesn't have too much accuracy in it then.

That certainly was not the case—no problem. Meyers died several years ago. We were friends; I had no problem whatsoever. I had a touch of ptomaine poisoning or something when we were on the trip and I stayed in my room a couple of days sick—in the hospital there.

How did you contact that?

You get it from eating stuff on the trip and things like that. That's prevalent during that time.

Was it readily evident that President Roosevelt's health was rapidly deteriorating?

Yes.

I've seen pictures of him at the Yalta conference and he looked like death warmed over during that period.

I was standing in back of that when that picture was taken. [Shows picture]

PAGE 30 ... TARPA TOPICS

It's been alleged that because of his poor health, that he wasn't in his finest form during the negotiations that took place at the Yalta conference. Do you think that's true?

No. He was feeling bad; you can see that, Two years before when we were at Casablanca, he was robust and healthy, but here he wasâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;you can see, he is drawn in the face there. "Pa" Watson died on the way home on the ship, and then Roosevelt passed on about 2 months later.

Was there much concern amongst the crew that he wasn't going to be able to make the trip very well?

I never heard about it. Admiral McIntire was the one that was with him all the time, the doctor that took care of him.

They had some movie films of him at the conference, and you could tell the way he moved around -and greeted people that he was evidently in very bad shape.

Yes. He didn't look good. I talked to him on theâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;he liked for me to come back and talk to him once in awhile on these flights, when it was clear weather or something like that. I talked to him as we went across the eastern end of the Mediterranean. He thought they did an excellent job at Yalta. He said that Stalin only wanted four things to come into the war against Japan. Going over, everybody was saying, " Well we 've got to get Russia in the war against Japan. " He said Stalin wanted four things. He wanted the northern half of Sakhalin Island back that the Japs took from them in 1904. Then he wanted an open port on Siberia. Then he wanted to clean up the line-between Russia and China, and then something else. Roosevelt took the position that these were very small things that they agreed to in order to get Russia in the war against Japan right away. He talked just, in that vein, you know. He didn't say anything, or didn't indicate anything of these things that the media made.

Like the occupation of Eastern Europe and all that?

All that stuff.

When you left Yalta, where did you fly the President then?

We went to Deversoir, which was a field about 70 miles east of Cairo on the canal. He took, I think it was the cruiser Memphis, from there back to Washington. At that time, that was before they knew about the atomic bomb. General MacArthur [Douglas] was training the Tenth Army to invade Japan and he expected to lose a million troops on the initial assault. Everybody was upset about the situation. They thought the main important thing was to get Russia in the war against Japan. So when they made the assault from the east, they would be also engaged in the west. It was then 6 months later, after Japan was defeated, and the atomic bomb and everything, well then people turned around and said, "Well, what in the hell did they agree to these things at Yalta for?" (laughter)

PAGE 31 ... TARPA TOPICS

Did you meet Gen Larry Kuter [Laurence S.] at Yalta?

Yes, he was General Arnold' s aide. I've met him several, times.

Did you get to know him very well?

No, not too well, only just as an aide. I would contact him, and talk to him, but that ' s about all. You know, he wrote a book about his experiences at Yalta. Airman at Yalta, I think, is what it was titled.

I don 't know. I didn ' t know him that well. Of course there was planeload after planeload of people at Yalta. It got to be a big thing. The first trip there was a few people and the President.

Did you have any contact at all with Stalin yourself while you were there?

Yes, he talked through an interpreter one time. I just happened to be at a meeting where they were and he wanted to know what I knew about the Russian pilots and so forth. Just personal type questions. It was only maybe a 5-minute conversation.

You had no real opportunity to--

No, I couldn 't answer many of his questions because I didn 't know them well. I know that I looked at their planes and talked to some of the pilots. They had planes more or less like the " Spitfire, " and even stripped down more. They were very light and very susceptible-to enemy fire.

Your son made a note here that there were practice runs for these Presidential flights. Was that the case?

I think he is referring to the one from Cairo to Tehran. Admiral McIntire told me, "Never take the President above 8,000 feet because of his heart condition. " From going to Cairo and Tehran, the terrain was above 8,000 feet. The only way I could get there was a circuitous route, going through a valley across the mountains into Tehran. I made a practice run up there to make sure I could get through the valley and stay at 8,000 feet. The President enjoyed seeing the country flying down low. It was a nice, cool day; no bumps or anything. On the others to Yaltaâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;we made it right over to Yalta and back from Malta, but that was just flying over and back. No need for it.

Yalta is a resort area, isn 't it, for the Russians?

Yes. It 's more or less like the southern California area; maybe a little colder. Maybe like San Francisco, that type of place.

Was the weather pleasant during the conference while you were there? PAGE 32 ... TARPA TOPICS

Yes, very good. It got pretty cold one night, but otherwise very good. Where the airport was on the other side of the peninsula. That was a little different territory; that's colder than over where Yalta was. Yalta was on the warm side. It would be likeâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;I can't give you a good analogy of it, but it would sort of be like the weather at Palm Springs versus the weather at the Los Angeles airport.

I guess those high mountains there are what moderates the temperature, isn't it?

Yes. Well you get the warm winds on the east and south side and on the west side you get more or less north winds.

Your son has a note here, about your relationship with the Air Force crews, especially Hank Meyers, and the fact that it may be a bit tense. But you say that wasn't the case at all.

No. That came out in that book, The Flying White House. That came out where this copilot, Smith said some things that were not true. I don't know-, I didn't know he was that kind of a guy. You see, he didn't know this other situation. Meyers had the reputation, of being sort of a little on the wild side of flying, and I think the President's group knew it. He was General George ' s pilot. The President, he liked the way I flew. He selected our crew over Pan American's because he liked the way we handled things. He just got accustomed to it and he had confidence in me. He didn't know who Meyers was or anything, a strange fellow. He might have been the best in the world, but he still wanted somebody there that he knew and had confidence in. That's why I was there.

Did you ever have occasion to fly Harry Truman?

No.

Did you ever have any interface with him at all?

I used to play poker with him once in awhile. Jack Frye lived in Washington. He'd invite congressmen over and they'd have a poker game. If he didn't have enough to fill out a game, he'd call me and ask me to come over and sit in with them. I did that two or three times when Harry Truman was there.

He is the one that initially was looked down upon by historians, but as years went by, he was elevated in stature.

Truman was not the smartest man in the world. He might have been intelligent in some field, but he was not the type of individual that you would consider being Presidential timber. He was a man.

But on the other hand, they say he had a surprising grasp of history, that he was well read in, even ancient history.

I wouldn't know anything about that.

PAGE 33 ... TARPA TOPICS

Playing-poker with him, he didn't elicit any of that.

No. (laughter)

Was he as salty as he's been cut out to be?

I don't think so. I think it's overdone. He made that decision to go into Korea, you know. Of course that gave him a degree of toughness even against the group up at Long Island—United Nations. That gave him a stature of being tough and so forth. -I think he played on that. Then his fight with the newspaperman over what he said about Margaret.

Yes, that was quite notorious. For how long a period during the war were you actually on leave from TWA?

Well, it would be just these trips. It would usually take about a month. I'd be in uniform for about a month or 6 weeks.

In other words, you'd go right back to the company again?

Yes.

But you never knew when you would be pulled away again, did you?

No, and those were the only three trips the President made by air during these 16 years.

Were you able to keep your job going on course while you were flying on these?

Yes, I had a good assistant that took charge. We had to have in those days, because we never knew when something else would happen.

What was your actual position during these years?

I was vice president in charge of all TWA war contracts, which was this airline I'm telling you about and two modification centers—Kansas City—some secret test work and so forth, other little odds and ends. That all came under my jurisdiction. I had my office in Washington, DC.

This secret test work, was this related to military affairs?

Air Force, yes. Special things they were testing. We did most of it right here at Kansas City. They had some stuff like something new for an aircraft, so we'd put it on aircraft and test it to make sure. That was the kind of work we had done. They were pretty busy getting these combat crews together. They didn't have much research and development in the military force at that time. There wasn't too much of it, but there was, a place we had several planes, some pilots, and-it was pretty self-containing.

PAGE 34 ... TARPA TOPICS

I didn't realize that the airlines had actually gotten involved in secret work for-the military. I thought it was primarily the aircraft manufacturing firms like Boeing, Lockheed, and so forth. You say that TWA was--

Let me give you an example. I probably should have told this in talking about airplanes. This Boeing 307- the Stratoliner that we've discussed—after I flew it awhile, I was asked to run the 100-hour proving test for the airline before we carried paying passengers. On a trip from Kansas City to Albuquerque, over Wichita I ran into some heavy thunderstorms and turned west. You were supposed to be able to fly off the airline and get around them. When I got over the southeast corner of Colorado, I couldn't get on top. The clouds had built up over there, so I headed straight for the radio terminal east of Albuquerque at Moriarty. They had changed the heating system on the carburetors on these engines. Before, we'd always had, when you put the carburetor heat on, 100° temperature rise. The carburetor temperature would say- 20°. We'd pull the heat full on, it'd go up to 120°, air going into the carburetor. The engineering department decided that the pilots were using too much heat, detonating the engines at times. Which we were. After all, when you start picking up a load of ice, you don't give a damn about a little detonation, you just put the heat on, open the throttles, and go on. So they said that instead of taking the heat from around the exhaust pipes, they'd just take it from underneath the cowling, to the carburetor. They tested and that gave a 40° rise—a 40° heat rise. So on this flight, the outside temperature was 20°. I pulled the heat on, all the carburetors, and the temperature went up to 6o°. We turned into these clouds and I wasn't in the clouds more than a minute or so—until my number one engine quit. I thought with the new aircraft, I'd turn around and get back out and see what's wrong with that engine. Before I got turned around, all the other three quit. That left me up there at 22,000 feet with four dead engines, and some passengers in the back, over pretty rough terrain—snow and ice. Snow mainly at that altitude. So we came on down. I had an engineer on board and he couldn't get them started. I tried my best to get them started and couldn't. So when I got about halfway down, I called a senior hostess forward and told her to wrap herself in blankets, quilts, back by the passenger door, and when we stopped, the first thing to do was to get that passengerdoor open. You're always afraid of fire after something like that. So she did that. When I got down to about 2,000 feet above the ground on instruments, I saw a spot over one of those big canyons through a hole in the clouds. I deer hunted out there several years before, and usually where you've got a big canyon here, over here someplace you've got a mesa. I turned to the left and just as I turned, I broke out in a heavy rain with a ceiling of 500 feet visibility, 1 mile. There was a slight clearing ahead, but I had heavy rain and less than a mile visibility. So we didn't have time to get the gear down. When we hit, we scooped up dirt in the baggage compartment. The doors came open. The baggage compartment was underneath— and came to a stop about 200 feet from that canyon. When we stopped, it wasn't a hard landing. We saved the ship. I came out there with some angle iron and mechanics.

PAGE 35 ... TARPA TOPICS

We fixed the landing gear up and I flew it out of there about a week later. I flew it into Kansas City for an overhaul and it wasn't terribly damaged—you know, landing with the gear up. Just as we landed, we had one casualty. The bottom of the passenger door was about 4 or 5 feet high off the ground the way the plane was sitting, and the girl got the door open. We had about eight or ten TWA pilots on board. Just as she got the door open, one of those brave pilots pushed her out, jumped out and stepped on her shoulder, and hurt her shoulder. That was the casualty that we had. (laughter) H:

What caused the engines to stall?

It was again, once more, a very simple thing. No one had thought it through to conclusion. The carburetor of any internal combustion gasoline engine; it's one of the best constant refrigerators you could have. When that gasoline comes out, it comes out in a stream, under pressure, it vaporizes when mixed with the air, and it has—in these carburetors—About a 40° drop in temperature. When the air went through—it was 60° here. Remember I told you 60°? When it went through, this carburetor, it dropped 40° and where it goes into the cylinders—the, fuel goes into the cylinders—it was, again down to 20°. So this air that was supposed to be warm, dry air under the cowlings, wasn't warm, dry air at all. It was warm, moist air, and when this air came in there, we kicked it up to 60° and then when it went down 40° to 20° again, and where it spread out through these pipes to each cylinder; it froze solid ice and couldn't get fuel to the cylinders. There wasn't enough temperature there; it wasn't hot enough. It was down around 20° and that's just the right place for it to freeze. Within 2 minutes, it shut the fuel off from all the engines.

And you couldn't get it restarted when you got way down low?

No, where we landed it was still almost freezing. By that time, the props had stopped, and there was no way in the world we could get them started because we had solid ice blocking fuel to each cylinder.

Were engineering changes made as a result of that?

Oh yes. We went back to a 100° heat rise, and then we put alcohol in those lines so if we ever got them partially clogged or anything, we could dump alcohol in there and that would clean them out—any fuel or ice.

If you hadn't gotten that plane down, you would have wiped out half of TWA pilots, wouldn't you?

A good bunch of them. People up at Link, they have a good artist up there. Here he made a sketch of this—from my description; he took a picture of the airplane. That was his sketch of my landing. He gave me this picture—this painted picture he made. [Shows Dr. Hasdorff picture.]

And that's very accurate?

Yes. See the gear up and the props are stopped, and how rough it is down here. PAGE 36 ... TARPA TOPICS

You were lucky to get it in at all.

Yes. (laughter)

This morning, I'd like to recap a little bit of what you talked about yesterday. You mentioned Charles Lindbergh earlier. Was he as right-wing and pro-Nazi as he was painted in some circles?

Not in my opinion at all. "Slim," as we all called him, he was with TAT when they organized it and the airline started. He was more of a technical type of individual, but a forthright person who spoke exactly what he believed. When he went to Germany, he saw the Air Force they had, he flew their planes. They invited him to do so. He saw the tanks, running around the country. He saw the artillery and the infantry in training. He came back and his belief was that Germany will conquer the world if someone doesn't do something about it. Well that was horror to the United States' position at that time. It was confirmed by our vice- president of engineering, —as I mentioned yesterday— Tomlinson, when he went over. He came back and said the same thing. This is what got Lindbergh in trouble, because that was in 1937 or 1938—somewhere in that time frame— and this was what got him labeled as a right-wing pro-Nazi. Which was not true. He was no more a pro-Nazi than the average American citizen. He was just saying what he saw and what he believed.

It's been asserted that he was also a racist.

Well, many people were at that time. The country was—I spent quite a bit of time in the south. I 've seen this thing change. At that time, a greater percentage of the United States' citizens were racists.

It's just no longer fashionable.

That's right. You remember at that time when World War II was declared, up until that time, they would never let a colored man in the Marine Corps. They'd wash him out. They never let them in the Air Force-. It was only when the war was declared that this thing began to change. When you say a man was racist in 1936, he was just one of the big majority.

Also, in the notes that your son gave me, he noted that you flew Roosevelt at 8,000 feet or less through Iran because of heart problems. Was this the case? Was it heart problems?

Yes, this was the case. Admiral McIntire, President Roosevelt's physician, on the first flight, had a general talk with me. He had somebody call me over to the White House. He said, "We'd like, of course, to have the President fly as smooth as possible. Under no condition is he to fly above 8,000 feet. His heart is weak and I don't want him above 8,000 feet. If you ever face a situation where you have to go above 8,000 feet, you let me know. I'll be on the plane. You come back and talk to me and let me know, and then we can probably do something about it. Under no condition is he to go above 8,000 feet " because of a heart condition. PAGE 37 ... TARPA TOPICS

Specifically, on the flight to Tehran, at Cairo—we went from Oran to Carthage to Cairo. At this conference at Cairo with Chiang Kai-shek [Generalissimo] and Churchill, he said he wanted to go to Tehran to visit with Stalin. Then I talked to Admiral McIntire. I said, "Admiral McIntire, maybe we can get through the mountains on a smooth day up there at 8,000 feet. I simply don't know. The only thing for me to do is to take the plane, and go up there and see if I can't find a way through those mountains at 8,000 feet or below. Then come back and tell you. " He thought that was an excellent idea. I went off and found this map and traced out this pass on—it was quite a bit south of the course—where I could get through that range of mountains at 8,000 feet or a little below if I had to. It was wide enough. This pass was—the closest the hills ever got together was probably a mile or a mile and a half. It was usually 4 or 5 miles wide. The peaks went up on each side. I came back and reported to Admiral McIntire that it was good, so the flight was set up. That's why I took the President. It was a very smooth day. Usually it would be rough in there, but it was in the morning and it was smooth. When he got to Tehran, the President called me back and said, "That is the best flight I have ever had. That's the most interesting thing I've ever seen. To see the ground, to see the people, and terrain from the aircraft and look up and see those mountains. Otis, that's wonderful." So he enjoyed that. I stayed around—I never did quite get to 8,000 feet. I got to probably 7,800 feet. I stayed under the 8,000 feet in accordance with Admiral McIntire's directions. H:

How long were you in Tehran at that time?

Several days—I 'm not exactly sure. I would say about 4 or 5 days. Now there is an interesting story there if I might take a moment to tell it. The night before we approached— the night before we got into Tehran—the German lines were about 400 or 500 miles to the west. They had pushed east that far. They dropped about 700 parachutists in the mountains just west or Tehran the night before. The objective of those parachutists was to wipe out the Presidential party in Tehran, Churchill and Roosevelt. An Army division was stationed there and Russia had a large' number of troops there. The British had some troops there. They went out early the next morning and captured all of these Germans. Apparently the German troops were second-class troops that they just picked up and dumped in there. To do that, then they took Roosevelt's party— he most especially had a separate villa to stay in, he and his party. But they took him over to the Russian compound where they had troops enough to defend that—and Churchill—and they all stayed in the Russian compound for the stay. They never got out of there. Then we moved. Into the Army barracks from the villa we were in so that we could be protected. There was no problem whatever. The Army did an excellent job cleaning up those parachutists and getting them out of there. Of course that added a bit of excitement to it, to Roosevelt and them all. It was a nice day and much was accomplished between Roosevelt, Stalin, and Churchill at that meeting.

You mentioned, off the tape a while ago, that your men had some 10,000 flights overseas during the war. Aside from taking the President on these conference flights, what was the nature of all of the others? PAGE 38 ... TARPA TOPICS

The first flight was in the first part of February 1942 when we got the first airplanes ready to make the over-ocean flights. We had about 3 weeks to get them ready, put in extra fuel tanks, take out the pressurization, and increase the range of the aircraft to haul equipment over to Montgomery [Field Marshal Bernard L.] in the desert, out of Cairo. He was about 75 miles northwest of Cairo at El Alamein there facing Rommel [Field Marshal Erwin]. The main purpose of that rush act was that General Montgomery was out of antipersonnel fuses for his artillery shells. We had to take three planeloads of these-fuses over for him to use in his artillery. After he got these fuses—there were several thousand pounds in each load—then he prepared for battle and chased Rommel back up the coast towards Tunisia. That was the way it was started. Then we kept running supplies and personnel to Cairo. A little later on they asked us to start flying across the north Atlantic from Washington to Prestwick, Scotland, which we did. All—the flights during World War II—I made approximately 50 flights over myself as pilot during those 4 years. We made a total, during World War II, of more than 10,000 flights across the Atlantic, carrying supplies, personnel, and all of these things we've talked about. People like Eisenhower—I took him on his, first flight—Mark Clark, Averell Harriman, Secretary Lovett, General Marshall, General Arnold, and all of those people on various flights across in these five planes. Then that fall we began to get the C-54s. They were substituted and we got more of them. At one time we had about 35 C-54s, and a large number of personnel. We had a total of about 7,000 people in that division, on that airline alone, when the war ended.

Did you ever meet any enemy resistance on any of these flights?

Yes, we had a couple of planes—we had one plane we were sure that was shot down, and we had another one that we think was shot down by a submarine. Then a third one was shot at by our own Navy. They didn't knock it down, but they put a lot of holes in the tail surfaces. The one that was shot down—and this is what's necessary in war. When South Africa moved a large convoy from South Africa to England for the invasion, orders were given to their pilots—as we gave our- pilots when we had convoys going— if any airplane came within a certain distance of this convoy, regardless of what it was, it was to be shot down. Now we did the same thing. That's wartime procedure. We did the same thing on our convoys. If any airplane came within a certain range, regardless of who it was, then the fighters were to shoot it down. That was necessary because the Germans, at one time, had a large number of our bombers and fighters they had captured, rebuilt, repaired, and were flying them over " " with our insignia. So when you saw a B-17 flying out there that said, USA, and had a star on it, it didn't necessarily mean that was our plane. It might be a Nazi flying it. So you couldn't take the chances with all the troops involved. We lost one plane. That pilot didn't know the convoy was there and was on the way to Africa. He started to fly over it and they shot him down in the ocean. The subs, when they first started the German submarines, they would stay on surface at night to get oxygen and so forth. When they'd hear an airplane, they would dive and get underwater. Sometimes they'd stay on the surface in early morning hours and our planes would fly over and see them and they would dive and get underwater. A little PAGE 39 ... TARPA TOPICS

later on, they equipped all the submarines with deck guns. When the transports came over, they would use their deck guns. They had quite a few routes we had to be very careful of. One of the things they would do at night, they ' d be down there laying on top of the water with their deck gun, and they would start shooting red flares into the sky. That would be the signal that there-was a plane and they were in distress down there. A pilot's first consideration, or first thought then, would be to go down and help and see what's wrong, and radio in. He would go down there and about the time he would fly over it, "bang," they'd knock him out of the air. So we learned fast not to trust those flare signals at night. That happened to me one time. Before I took President Roosevelt to Casablanca, I took General Marshall and General Arnold over on the trip as mentioned yesterday. We were down flying over South America at about 2:00 in the morning and I saw this flare come up off of the surface of the water. General Arnold just happened to be awake, and directly another one came up. General Arnold didn't realize what it was. He came forward and he said, "What ' s that, lightning?" In the meantime, I had turned a sharp turn to get out of there. He was upset. He didn't know what it was about. So I explained to him what we were up against. With what we normally expected, we didn't bother those things, because that was a German sub laying down there just waiting for us to come " over close. He laughed and said, "Well get the hell out of here. Stay out of their way. (laughter) He was a great guy. Those are the kinds of things you run into in wartime. Deception is great in wartime. Many battles are won on deception. Even the infantriesâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;you know, they'll throw in a brigade up here to attack on the end, when they 're really going across down here. The greatest deception of World War II was the invasion of Normandy. The Germans really believed that whenever the invasion took place, it was going to be across the shortest part of the channel, over there east of England. They had most of their defense prepared there and kept it there for 3 or 4 weeks after the official invasion was made in Normandy. By the time they got down to Normandy, Patton and his army, the Third Army and everything, was all pretty well anchored in there. They never got to have: â&#x20AC;&#x201D;they thought the only way to win it would be to push the troops back in the sea on the landing. That's the only chance they would have, because we had too many troops and too many supplies. Once we got in, and got positioned, they would just be overwhelmed. That was the German attitude. H:

Considering the bad weather that prevails in Europe so much of the time, were there many accidents bringing transports in with equipment and stuff?

Because of weather?

Yes.

No. The weather over there isn't near as bad as people think it is. It does get bad at times, no doubt about it. England has many types of weather. If Prestwick was closed in, which is in Scotland, we could move down to many fields. Fly another 50 miles, PAGE 40 ... TARPA TOPICS

and you always found an open place where you could land. It was more like California type weather. Los Angeles may be fogged in solid, but over the hill at Palm Springs is wide open. This is the kind of area. The weather in Europe—I was always surprised because I thought the weather in Europe was terrible. In Paris, for instance, it's the exception to have any snow there in the wintertime. The farther east you go, the colder it gets and the more snow you have. When you get in Munich or over in Germany, then you get the severe winters. All that is controlled by the Gulf Stream, going up the Atlantic Ocean and across. If you ever turn that Gulf Stream off, you'd have an Arctic condition in Europe. H:

They say that's `the only thing that keeps England in any way moderate.

The worst weather in the world, for flying, is in the United States, the northeastern ' part of the United States, primarily from Detroit to Boston to New York, from a pilot s viewpoint anyway. The worst weather, meaning the most clouds, and cloudy conditions. Sure we have tornados in this area, thunderstorms, and clouds, but when we have one ' here, Denver s open.

The aircraft didn't fly with any kind of aircraft lights, or you didn't have runway lights or anything else in most instances, did you?

No, you would just have a light on the airport, a beacon light to signal the airport, Of course whenever the radar would show enemy planes coming in, everything was turned off. Everything was turned off anyway. You had complete darkness. When you got ready to land, you'd get in position and they'd turn a couple of lights on, one, on either end of the runway so that you could see where the runway was. Then you used your landing lights. Everything we had to flyby, from a navigational viewpoint, was taboo in wartime. There were no lights, for instance. There was no directional radio. You couldn't have that because the enemy could use it as well as you. The only time you could use radio would be when you were in an emergency, when you were lost. Then you could come out in " ' the clear and say, " Give me a QTE. That was a course to the airport. They d take a direction finder and spot you. You'd give your number. They would take this direction finder and spot you. They couldn 't tell you how far out, but they could say, "If you'll fly at 43 degrees, that will take you over the airport." Then you'd fly 43 degrees and they'd listen for you. They'd hear you come over the airport—if you were upstairs above the clouds—and then they'd tell you when you were over the airport. Then you could come down through the clouds—say you had a 1,000 foot ceiling, you'd come down through and land. The only way you got from point A to point B on those long distances was by celestial navigation. That was all there was. Of course that had its limitation when you were flying on instruments. You couldn't take a shot. You'd have to fly by dead reckoning. You had to fly precisely. You had to know your wind, and could make compass corrections. It took precise flying on instruments so you wouldn't drift off one side or the other. When you broke out in the clear and you could see the North Star, you could take a shot in about 4 minutes,

PAGE 41 ... TARPA TOPICS

and you knew you were on this line. If that was north of the course, you'd change your course a little bit south. Or if you were south, you'd change course to fly a little bit north, depending on how far off you were. Then when you got the star directly ahead, or directly in back of you, you could take a shot on that and that would tell you how far along that line you were. It would give you approximately from within 5 to 10 miles of where you were. You could be that close. In the earliest stages of the war, did each transport carry its own navigator?

Yes.

You already had that many trained?

Yes. When I told you yesterday about the conversations with Curt LeMay. When I went back as TWA's chief pilot and the war began to get heated up, I had two classes of navigators trained. I took the course myself. I think I took it twice just to make sure I was as good as they were. I didn't take it fully twice. I took one full course and then I went back and took a review of it, and used it quite a bit. It's always interesting—I've always found in dealing with pilots, that they are like probably other classes of people. It's much better to lead them than it is to drive them. During World War II, if we had any kind of a mission that had any degree of danger with it, I always took the first one out myself. I would never ask a pilot to fly a mission that I wouldn't fly myself. When you get that way in celestial navigation, if you are a navigator, you know the pilot's up there. He's the one that's ultimately responsible. If a navigator isn't well trained, or something like that, and you really sense it, then you're in a position to help him out and get him back on course. Then when you get home, you get a new navigator.

It's been alleged by any number of navigators that I've talked to that they're secondclass citizens until war breaks out and then they're suddenly appreciated.

Very true. There was no use for them until the war broke out and you had to make long distance flights. Remember none of us had flown over long distances. As I said in that article there, when the chairman of the Civil Aeronautics board asked me if I'd ever been out of the United States, my only answer was a facetious one that I'd been one weekend in Mexicali, Mexico. Which was true. (laughter)

Was there any thought given to bringing you on full time with a commission during the war? Or did they feel you were more valuable in your position with TWA?

Yes. There were two or three times that I would be requested to be brought on active duty. Once was by a classmate of mine who was commanding officer of the area in China. He wanted me to come over and take charge of that Air Force area for him. The main important one was General Arnold, on my first time I flew him-back from England—which was in the summer of 1942—he asked me to come back as he wanted to talk to me. He said that they had a terrific problem of getting airports and an airline setup in Russia. The Japs came into Alaska, the Aleutian Islands, and they had quite a

PAGE 42 ... TARPA TOPICS

little bit of fighting there, that cleaned them out. They wanted to set up an airline from Alaska, through southern Russia, over as far as they could go, to the southern part of Russia B:

I suppose he meant-from the Aleutian Islands across to Siberia, and then, on to southern Siberia, down towards Afghanistan, Iran, and out to the Persian Gulf. That was the line that he wanted to operate because that was much shorter than going around the other way across the central Pacific to that area. Of course they really couldn't get down in that area because the Japs had all of those places down there at that time when MacArthur was trying to come up from Australia. So they wanted to have somebody circle them on the-north. However, we talked about that for an hour, or an hour and a half. Then it finally ended by him, saying, "Well, I don't know. I'll let you know Otis. I just doubt if I will ask you to do this because if I did, Jack Frye would get all over me." That was the President of TWA. He said, "You're doing an important job where you are, and you keep that going." He was very laudatory about the work we were doing and being able to take people around, and how we were increasing the war effort and so forth. Those two things were about the only times I was ever really asked. Several people said, "Well why don't you come in and join us." Several of my friends in the service—but those were the only two areas where someone directly, as far as I know, asked for me to come into the service on a permanent basis.

From your own personal viewpoint, do you feel that your contribution was as great being in the position you were in, or how did you view that at the time?

I never thought too much about it, but these people did. When they wanted to go, they called me personally and asked me to fly them. They didn't call anybody else. They wanted me. They had maybe 25 or 30 pilots there, but they always wanted me to do it. They must have had some kind of confidence in my ability in this area. General Arnold said several times to Jack Frye, in my presence, what good work we were doing. He saw the letter from the President. To answer your question, it never occurred to me whether I could or could not. I just did what I was told to do, and accepted these things. The fact that I was deferred and was not called to active duty on a permanent basis was because of the request the President of the company had—official request—to run this operation.

You mentioned, off the tape, about having some role in bringing the "Doolittle Raiders" [Lt Gen-James H. Doolittle] out of China after their mission. Would you discuss that a little bit?

Yes. I don't know how many we brought. I know that we brought Doolittle and several of his pilots. We sent a special plane over to K ' un-ming, in China. We went across Africa, India, and then up over the pass to Chungking and K'un-ming. I think we picked them up at Chungking, and flew them from there back to Washington, DC. I forget who was the pilot, but the pilot was quite impressed with these pilots that made that raid, and I had quite a conversation with him, and so forth. Doolittle was quite unhappy. He was dejected, because starting out with the raid, I think what they had was somewhere in the neighborhood of 25 planes. PAGE 43 ... TARPA TOPICS

Sixteen, I think, actually went on the raid.

Yes, 16, and out of the 16, as far as he was concerned, they lost every one of them. They crash landed in China. The weather was bad. The one that went to Russia, he counted that lost. He thought that—he said so—when he arrived home, he would probably be court-martialed. But he arrived home and General Arnold made him commander of the Eighth Air Force. Was it the Eighth Air Force in Europe that he was in charge of?

I can' t remember.

I can't remember numbers too well; there's too many of those things. He was commanding officer of one of the Air Forces in Europe. I talked to him several times in London. He was based in London.

What were your impressions of Doolittle?

Doolittle was basically sort of a wild type of an engineer. He was a good pilot, a good engineer; he was aggressive, he was always on the go. He is an intelligent man. I believe he graduated from MIT [Massachusetts Institute of Technology] in engineering. He was popular and liked by the pilots. He was a pilot's pilot; let's put it that way. He was about as wild as they were that came down the pike.

Was there anything else you'd like to discuss about World War II before we move you into the post-war era?

No, I think I've covered the equipment, the pilots, and some of the incidents that happened. There was one thing, again, that I might take just enough time to mention. It illustrates how a little simple change can affect, or make a serious error someplace else. For instance, on the mail planes that we flew back in the early 1930s, this plane had two flares that you would drop when you would land on an emergency field or you needed to see some lights, or see the ground. It was just a magnesium flare you would drop with a parachute and the magnesium flare would light and light up a mile or so around the airport when it was dark. They had one stationed at each side of your foot. To release them, we had cables running around on a big chain, and you would pull the cable, out hard and that would pull the flare out. As the flare went out, the case—which was about 4 inches in diameter and about 4 feet long standing beside you—would ignite the flare and the parachute would open and float down and you'd come around and land underneath it. Well this time, they thought that cable and everything—the pulleys were heavy, and they could save a few pounds by taking that off and putting gunpowder in the top of the flare and an electric circuit to it so that you-could ignite the gunpowder and it would blow the flare out. You wouldn't have all, that extra weight. They practiced a few of these and it worked fine, but no one took into consideration what would happen if the gunpowder became damp.

PAGE 44 ... TARPA TOPICS

So I was trying to get into Saint Louis one night with a load of mail and I couldn't. I went back to the emergency field at New Florence, Missouri, to land and they had about a 400-foot ceiling. I got under the ceiling and turned the electric thing on to ignite the gunpowder. The gunpowder was damp and blew the flare down, not out of the case, but just far enough for it to ignite it. That magnesium flare—you can imagine how hot it was—started burning at my foot. My flying suit caught on fire. The snow was about 6 inches deep on the ground, and I got down and the good Lord landed the plane for me. I set the brakes. I jumped out in the snow and got the fire put out. The airplane stopped. The fire, by that time, had burned out. We got the mail sacks put out and so forth. There was a case where someone just didn't think it through. They thought they could save a few pounds by putting this gunpowder in, but they didn't realize what would happen in rainy weather when it became damp. Those were the kinds of things we had to learn. That's the way we learned in those days. So that was another example of that. I think the rest of it, the main thing during that period of time, was the foresight of Jack Frye mainly, and then later joined by Howard Hughes. They were the leaders in the airline industry, mainly from the technical, development, and operational viewpoint. And followed by United, which was run by a banker. You mentioned off the tape that you felt that in some instances that Howard Hughes was depicted wrongly by the media and others. Would you like to discuss that a bit? Yes. I think the media treated Howard Hughes very unfairly. In fact, I've described their actions as "technological inexactitudes." (laughter) They seemed to take a man of Howard's standing and they always wanted to try to write or try to make the—not the good side of the story, but the poor side of the story, a tribute to Howard. Howard was a very friendly person to those people he trusted. He was shy; he didn't trust many people. The reason he didn't trust many people was that he had been taken by many people, and it had cost him a lot of money over the years. So he just would not associate with people unless he knew them well. He came to Washington—I flew with him in the Constellation, and I spent about a week taking care of him there in Washington; out with him, and associated with him. I took him around to places to see what he wanted to do there in Washington. He met General Arnold. He was decorated by the President for the work he had done. He told me one time that when he inherited Hughes Tool Company, that it was valued at $300,000. He said that he had taken that $300,000 and made it into the big, huge company of millions that it was at that time. He said that he had problems along the way, many of them. He said one of his major problems then was in PAGE 45 ... TARPA TOPICS

Hollywood. When he wanted to talk to me, he would call me on the phone between 1:00, 2:00, or 3:00 in the morning. I asked him why he worked at night. He said, "Well, if I were to go out to the plant in the daytime, I'm pestered by all kinds of people. They want to talk to me. I can't get anything done. I can go out there at 8:00, 9:00, or 10:00 at night and work until daylight and no one bothers me. I can get something done. That's why I do it." He was a very sensitive type of person. If he were here at the table, you would enjoy talking to him. He'd chat just like we would, once you had his confidence. He had all these other problems. He had Hughes Tool Company that he was building and he was buying many areas around Los Angeles for TV [television] towers. TV was just coming on stream. He purchased much land around Tucson; he had a big area there also at Las Vegas. He was directing things himself besides the TWA thing, which he spent a lot of time on—he and Jack Frye building the Constellation, which I covered yesterday. To answer your question, I think he was treated very unfairly by the media. They didn't give him credit for all the fine things he did for aviation and the chances he took. You take the main incident, the Spruce Goose. This is worthy of note, if I may take a few moments to tell you this. I happened to be in Washington when some of this took place. I was involved in part of it. In the fall of 1942, and early 1943, we flew on the Cairo trip down to Miami, Miami to Trinidad, Trinidad to Belem, Belem to Natal, Natal to Ascension, then to Bathurst, then over to Lagos, and then over to Cairo. When we got over to the Nile, we had stopped at Khartoum. From Washington, after you got south, I saw ship after ship of the US that were hit by German subs on the east coast of the US. I think few people realize how close the subs brought the war to the United States. Down in the harbor at Trinidad, there were three or four hulks there where they were hit in the harbor by subs. I mention that because that was the basic reason for building the Spruce Goose. General Arnold called Howard Hughes and said, "We want to build a large flying boat made out of wood. We want to build it rapidly. We want it to carry a large number of troops, because now, at this point," late 1942, early 1943, "we don't believe we will be able to get our troops over to Europe by surface vessel. We think we ' re going to have to fly them. The subs are just sinking everything we have out there. We want somebody who can move rapidly to do this, to build a prototype, four-engine or six-engine, whatever, but we want it to carry 200 or 300 troops. We don't care how slow it is, but we want it to be built quickly, and get a large number in the air to get these troops over there." Howard said, "Fine." I'm not sure how it came about, but the other fellow, Kaiser [Henry J.], was made part of it. So then in the spring of 1944, or somewhere thereabouts, with our aircraft and our Navy, we had cleaned out most of the subs and we were able to establish the convoys and we were shipping stuff with reasonable safety to Europe by convoy. So the Air Force—I don't know whether it was General Marshall and his staff—called Howard in and said they would have no further use for the Spruce Goose, because things had changed and they were able to take the troops across by surface convoy now. They were taking them across with no problem, so they wouldn't have any further use for the plane.

PAGE 46 ... TARPA TOPICS

Howard asked, "That being the case, we're fairly well along building it, would you object if I spent my own money and completed the Spruce Goose? We think it'll take between $10 and $15 million." And he said, "No." So Howard took his own money and completed the Spruce Goose, and he was vain enough that he wanted to fly it. He flew it on that short flight. The press and the media you're speaking of got all over him about the Spruce Goose, the money he wasted on the Spruce Goose and so forth. He spent $10 or $15 million of his own finishing that plane because that was his pride, building it just in order to fly it. He stopped immediately when the government said to stop. He did what the government said to do and asked him to do. He did it in a short space of time, but at no time was he ever given credit. He was criticized severely for the Spruce Goose. That was not justified. Other cases of a similar nature. It seemed to be that the media just wanted to make him out wrong each time rather than give him any credit for the good things he had done. H: B:

Do you have any idea why that was the case? ' Yes, I think it was because Howard wouldn't talk to the press. He wouldn t talk to the media. They would always want interviews and he wouldn't talk to them. He had a fellow named Bill Gay, at 7000 Romain Avenue in Los Angeles. You never could call Howard on the phone. You would call Bill Gay and then standby, and if Howard wanted to talk to you, he would return your call. He did that in Washington. He'd always have an operator. You could never call him. You'd call and tell who you were, what you wanted to talk about, and give them a little information. Then you'd hang up and they'd take the number, and then if Howard wanted to talk to you he'd call you back. I think that— you've had experience with the press. You know, if you don't talk to them and cooperate with them, then they try to start making the news instead of reporting it. (laughter)

What do they call that, "advocacy journalism?"

Something of that nature.

According to the articles you showed me, yesterday, you stayed with TWA until

Yes.

What was the reason you decided to leave them at that particular time?

We were having difficulties—the airline. The other people, Jack Frye, President, Paul Richter, and then Vince Conroy, Lee Tallman, and all other officers resigned in 1946. They were my friends and Jack Frye was the one that gave me all the opportunities in TWA and made me an officer of the company. He had given me the opportunity that I had. In the meantime, during World War II, that war took quite a strain. It took quite a bit out of you. That 4 years and the way we had to go practically 7 days a week and so forth. The company physician, Randy Lovelace at that time, told me that I'd better ease up or I was headed for some real trouble. That was one phase.

948 .

The other phase was—getting back— my friends were gone and they had a new man in there that was not the easiest fellow in the world to get along with. He knew nothing PAGE 47 ... TARPA TOPICS

about the airline, but he was in a deciding position where he made the decisions. Sometimes they were good, but most of the time they were not. In the meantime, Colonel Andres Soriano, who was an internationalist and had quite a few holdings in the Pacific area, had come to Washington in about 1944. He came in Mr. Frye ' s office, and my office was right next to his. He told Mr. Frye what he wanted to do, after the warâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;he said previously he had a small airline in the Philippines, and as soon as the war was over, he wanted to reactivate this airline and he needed some personnel to do it. So Jack talked to him for a little while and then as it was his habit, he brought him in and said, "Well Otis will handle the details of this and talk to you and discuss it with you and tell you what he thinks you need and so forth." So he started talking and telling me about his airline, where he would start to run it and how many fields, what size held like to have and so forth. He said that he would need personnel. He wanted maintenance personnel, sales people, hostesses, chief hostess, and chief pilots. He could get pilots out there, but he'd need some supervisory pilots, mechanics, inspectors, and all you'd need to run an airline. So I made him up a list and he came back in a day or two. I told him that he would need about 32 supervisory people. I didn't give him a name, just a title and what they would do, very briefly. He agreed and he thought that would be about right. He said, "How long would it take you to get them out there after I gave you the notice? " I said, " Well, I think we can get them out there right away because we'll have an excess of people coming back from the service and so forth. " This was in 1944. So in 1945 when the war was over, he sent me a cable. He was a Colonel on MacArthur's staff down in Australia. He sent me a cable that he was going back to the Philippines, he was ready for these people, and he would need them as soon as he got up there, and he'd send me another cable when he arrived. He said, " In the meantime, start doing the necessary. " So I got him the 32 people and had them ready to go when he called me back, or when he sent me a cable back. Then we shipped them out there. They were good people; they were select people. People who had to stay at home during World War II, they saw this as an opportunity to go someplace after the war. That greatly impressed him. He was very much impressed, Soriano was, that I could get this number of people, get them on the way put there in practically no time at all when he gave the signal. He was a Spaniard; he was raised in Spain and he graduated from the London School of Economics. He had great holdings in that area. In the meantime we were having problems in TWA. Jack Frye, as I mentioned, and the other officers resigned. When they resigned, Howard called me and asked me to stay on for a year. He asked me if I would. Things got more difficult as they went along, so in the meantime Colonel Soriano had been writing me personal notes asking me if I wouldn't come out to the Philippines. The TWA doctor, Randy Lovelace, had quite a hospital at Albuquerque. He was the TWA physician and a good friend of mine. He said, "You ' d better slow up. You're going to have a breakdown if you're not careful." We were nervous about the 4 years work in the war effort. In summary, those were the reasons I left. There was Colonel Soriano that had offered me this position, simply more money than I was making with TWA. I was having PAGE 48 ... TARPA TOPICS

problems internally with TWA management. These other things that attributed to it, so I decided to go. H:

Did you get any retirement out of TWA?

B: H:

No, 15 years, and never got a retirement. That was kind of rough, wasn't it?

Well, it would have been nice, but aviation has been kind to many of us.

Where did Jack Frye and these other officers go when they left TWA?

Jack Frye and Paul Richter went with the Grace Company down near your place somewhere. Where is Grace located, Atlanta? Grace shipping company, big, huge shipping company. They went with them for a few months. Excuse me, I 'm in error. Jack Frye became the President of General Analine and Film Corporation in New York. He went from TWA to General Analine and Film Corporation. Paul Richter went with the Grace Company, stayed there a few months, and then passed away. Jack Frye was with the General Analine Film Corporation several years. Then he went into other business, small manufacturing. In early 1959, he was killed in an automobile accident in Tucson, Arizona. Vince Conroy, who was the Vice- President of traffic, became Vice-President of the Avis Corporation. Lee Tallman, who was the Senior Executive Vice-President, became Executive Vice-President of part of Coca-Cola someplace—a big position at Coca-cola in New York.

You were involved with any number of things when you went to work for Andres Soriano. You helped form the Philippine airlines in the Philippines and then you wound up head of a brewery back here later on. Would you discuss that some?

When I went out to the Philippines, I was the vice president of Soriano and Company, " Soriano, y CIA, " which is Spanish for Soriano and Company. Soriano and Company had a management contract with me, he owned the biggest part of it—Philippine Airlines for management. My position, as an officer of Soriano and Company, was that of an Executive Vice-President of the airline—as a Vice-President of Soriano and Company. I' m not making this too clear, but it was an unusual situation. This worked out very well. Every day I would met with Colonel Soriano and have a discussion with him about the airline operation. Then I was a Director of the brewery. He had breweries out there, a Coca-Cola franchise, lumber concessions, goldmines—and tried to develop an oil field and many things. He had holdings in South Africa. So we stayed out there for 2 years and I helped in some of these other areas besides the airline. It was a little broader than just that. Then he asked me to come back here and take over some of these things in this country--

Including the Muehlbach Brewery, and then he had interests in oil in Canada. He had a trading company in New York. I was a part of the management, of these other things as well as the brewery here. My main thing was getting the brewery going again. He had had problems with it in Kansas City. So I spent about 7 years with him in that area. PAGE 49 ... TARPA TOPICS

Then the brewery was sold to Schlitz. Later on I went up and joined Singer, General Precision at that time. H:

Did you become an accomplished brewmaster during that period?

No. I had a very good brewmaster. My problem was more in getting the finances, sales, and marketing end of it up in this area. We came from fifth place to first place in Kansas City in about 3 years, so we were successful.

What brand of beer was it?

Muehlbach

I've vaguely heard of the name. Was it just mainly marketed in the Kansas City area?

No, it was marketed in Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas. We had a big market in Texas.

I don't remember that. I'm from Texas, and I've never heard of it, down where I was anyway.

Where were you located?

San Antonio and vicinity.

No, we didn't get to San Antonio until later. This was in the Dallas, Fort Worth, and Waco areas that we had substantial sales. In Houston and that area northeast, Longview. Do you know where Longview is?

Oh yes.

We had a distributor there. There was just one county that you could sell beer in that area. That was the only county. There were 100 outlets in there, and we had our beer in 99 of them.

Didn't this seem a little peculiar that you had such a long history of being in the executive business with airlines and suddenly find yourself handling beer sales?

I'm not sure that the word peculiar would describe it. When I was in the Philippines, I began to see, under Soriano, some of his objectives and policies of handling business. His theory was that if you studied things very carefully, and used good commonsense, that you would make a good decision. But if you didn't study carefully, you weren't practical; there was no way in the world you were going to make a good decision. He had confidence. That's what we did in the airline, and that's what I did in the lumber business down there he had. In the gold minesâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;we had certain changes we had to make. Most of my work was with the airlines. For example, when I went there they had Army surplus equipment. They had about 6o C-47s out of the surplusâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;Air Force. They had three DC-6s, and some C-54s. The PAGE 50 ... TARPA TOPICS

maintenance area was very poor, very substandard. The airplanes were having difficulty. They'd go out and get something wrong with them and come back. Sometimes they'd go out two or three times before they would make their flight to the first stop. So after I saw what was happening, I made up a plan that we would get a surplus hangar—buy it from the military—set it up, and build us an area where, we could give good maintenance. Get a few good mechanics from the States over there, to train these Filipinos. We had plenty of Filipino maintenance men out of the Air Force, but they didn't have supervision. At that time, the total cost of that was around $100,000. So when I took that plan into him and told him that I thought that was what to do to eliminate this problem, he asked many questions. Then he approved it. He said, "Go ahead and handle it. "We did and we got everything done under $100,000 . We got the airlines going right on schedule. We got the maintenance—instead of having 6o airplanes, I cut it down I think to 24 or 25, but made those good airplanes. We had them in good shape - maintenance and otherwise. They were good and reliable. Things went just on clockwork and we had quite a name for ourselves with operating on schedule out there in that area. So with that experience in the airline, I began to do some things like that in his other divisions. That's when he asked me—he was having trouble with the brewery here and he wanted me to come back and take it over and see what we could do about it. H:

He had a diversified interest in investing, didn't be?

Yes. So to answer your question, I didn ' t go directly from the airline to the brewery. I had these other things, in the background that I had the confidence of Soriano to do, and that made it much easier.

Did you work on a straight salary or did you work on a commission basis while you worked for him?

A straight salary, and expenses and other things. Out there, everything was furnished. We had a house, a car and chauffeur. Everything was furnished by the company. It didn't cost you anything to live out there.

How did your family like living in the Philippines?

They got along fairly good. Lee didn't like it; she got a little homesick a time or two. The kids loved it. They were, about 10 or 12 years old, Skippy and Sis. They were born 1 935 and 1937, and we were out there in 1948, to 1950; they were 10 and 12 years old.

Did you have any regrets going with Soriano, or did you find it rewarding?

I found it very rewarding. I don't think I could have ever done some of the other things that I did if I hadn't had the experience with Soriano. He graduated from the London School of Economics, and the vast success in business he had—I got some quite different ideas on how to run a business directly from him.

What became of Soriano? PAGE 51 ... TARPA TOPICS

He was a chain smoker, and he developed cancer and died in 1967.

That's too bad.

He was 66 years old.

What was the occasion for your next move over to the Singer Corporation?

When we sold out to Schlitz —sold the brewery—of course they took over and I didn't want to stay in the brewery any longer, so I was looking around for some other connections. These people up at Binghamton [NY], General Precision at that time, owned the Link Simulators—they were having trouble with the airlines. I had a friend up there and he asked me to come up. I first went up there to stay only a year or so, and I stayed almost 15. My position there was Vice-President, assistant to the President. My main job there were these large contracts we had in various countries, in Europe, Australia, Japan, and South Africa. I represented the president. Whenever the sales department would get a big contract up so far, then I would move in and make the final decisions and conclude the contract with the French Air Force, the Australian Air Force, or with Mitsubishi in Tokyo. I did an extreme amount of traveling to England.

How did you like the cold winters of Binghamton, New York?

Not very well. It does get cold there.

You say that you spent 15 years there?

Fourteen years and something, almost fifteen.

Besides Link trainers, what else were you involved in?

We were involved in the space program down at Houston. We had 600 engineers down there to do the maintenance for the space program at Houston. We did a lot of work in this area, particularly in the computer field. Simulators were getting large there, $2 or ' $3 million. They are now $6 or $7 million pieces of equipment, a good simulator. It s very advanced. They used large computers and we did much work training people in the space program and for the computers used in the space program. We also took care of all the space program ' s equipment at Houston.

Johnson Space Center?

Yes. We had 600 engineers there. We still do, as far as I know.

Did you get to witness any of the space flights?

Yes, I saw one out of Florida. I remember one I saw. The takeoff you mean?

H :

Yes. PAGE 52 ... TARPA TOPICS

It's quite interesting to see the speed in which it gets out of there.

It was at this time that you decided to go into a full retirement. Is that correct?

Yes, when I reached 65. They had a mandatory retirement age of 65. So that's when I came out here. We bought this place in 1964. I had my man here—Lee was down here most of the summers. She liked it down here. Then I retired in 1973.

Why did you, in particular, decide on this area?

Well I owned a place up near Kansas City, at a little town near Stilwell. I had cattle on it and so forth. The Kansas City Power and Light Company wanted it to build a huge substation there on that property. I did not want to sell, but they had the threat of condemnation, which the utilities have, if I didn't sell to them. They wanted 40 acres right out of the middle of my place. To make a long story short, they sent me a letter, threatened condemnation on the whole thing. I sold the whole thing to them. We agreed on a price. When I sold that, I had time to invest that money; it was a substantial amount of profit from which I paid for it, without paying the income tax on it. So I saw this place advertised. I came down here first and it was—I like the area and I like the place, but the buildings and everything were fairly crummy. The fields had gone, fences, and stuff like that. Anyway, I bought this place in the summer of 1964. It took us quite a while to get the deed and everything straightened out, and get full control. In 1965, I moved some cattle in here and started work on it to fix it up. I had this house—this house was built in 1857 by Maj. Gen Blount. He was quite a Civil War general.

Union?

Yes. It was a fairly large house, as you can see, and had 10 rooms. They were cut up, fairly small rooms. So we had to remodel the whole house. We added two rooms, and we wound up with six rooms. The basement—he built this in the late 1850s . Missouri was a slave state, and Kansas was a free state. They would get the slaves out of Missouri at night, bring them over here, and keep them in the basement here during the day, and then run them on out towards western Kansas the next night. They had quite a few clashes around here where the people would come over from Missouri trying to get their slaves. John Brown—this was his area. His lookout was the mountain right over here called "John Brown lookout." They had a lot of skirmishes, a lot of massacres, in this general area where the free people in Kansas were fighting the pro-slavery people in Missouri.

There was quite a bloodbath here for sometime.

Yes. So we fixed the house up; we have six rooms. We made it modern, put in a furnace and 3 1/2 baths. We did a lot of insulation and rebuilding and so forth.

You acquired more land too, as time went on, didn't you?

Yes, we have now 1,120 acres of land we own. We lease about 2,000 acres for our cattle.

PAGE 53 ... TARPA TOPICS

How many head of cattle do you have now?

We have about 290 cows, maybe 300.

Have you always had a yearning to be in the farming and ranching business?

I always wanted to raise cattle, but actually I just simply didn't have time to do it until I retired.

Is this from your youth?

Yes, I was born and raised on a farm back in southern Indiana.

That's quite a diverse interest, —aircraft to ranching.

I think in your declining years that you ought to do what you like to do, regardless of what it is. Some people like to raise cattle. Some people like to go skiing. Some people like to fish. Some people like to play golf. Some people like to sit around.

According to one of the articles, you made an address before the Sertoma Club of Kansas City in 1952. What kind of club is this?

That's a national organization—at that time was—that's quite an important club. It was the equivalent of the Chamber of Commerce or advertising club.

Lion's Club.

Lion' s Club—of that nature, 400 or 500 people.

How did they receive your talk that you gave that time?

At that time there was a substantial interest still in the World War II picture, of the people of Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin. They all wanted to have sort of a personal description of these people that I had met and talked to. So I think the one that you're referring to, I gave a talk there on Churchill, Stalin, and Roosevelt as I knew them, or something to that effect, and described the trips and what kind of people they were, what they said, and what they did. They were very, very interested. They received it very well. I had had previous training in public speaking; 3 years at the Advertising and Sales Club in Kansas City. I was President of the Advertising and Sales Club for 2 years in Kansas City. Of course we had weekly luncheon meetings in which I presided for the two years. I had quite a bit of experience in this area.

Do you still give talks before any groups?

Well, less and less all the time. I do yes. I gave one at aviation day in Saint Louis. I gave one for the Lion's Club in Kansas City. I gave one for the Retired Pilots' Association, 600 or 700 people. Probably one or two every year; I get trapped into giving them. It's always easy to say—they ask you to speak and they say, "Well this won't be until PAGE 54 ... TARPA TOPICS

next summer." You think, "Well, by next summer they'll forget it." But the rascals, they never forget it. (laughter) H:

That's about all the questions I have. Are there any areas or topics that I haven't discussed that you'd like to bring out?

My most cherished thing, and the thing that I brought out during my experience in World War II, were these five individuals in these pictures here I've shown you. I cherish them. I cherish the letter I received from President Roosevelt on the work that I was doing. There are several letters in the scrapbook from Eisenhower, from Mark Clark, Secretary of War Lovett—along the same order. Those are the kind of things that mean much to me now. When I received them, I didn't think too much of them. I thought, "Well it's just another letter." But as time goes on, they assume a much greater importance. This period that I've been in aviation from 1927 until now—I'm still a consultant with the Singer Company—has been, I think, the greatest era in history in which to live. If you read your history, there is no other time where you had as much advancement as we've had in this time frame. Take the aircraft the airlines have developed, from a Trimotor Ford traveling 100 miles an hour and carrying 10 passengers to the Concorde traveling at supersonic speeds carrying 200 or 300 passengers. We've also seen the development of the jet engine by Mr. Whipple in England. This is added to the development of the jet aircraft. We've seen the airlines develop into a huge, terrific business. We've seen the spaceships. As sure as time goes by, there will be big developments in that area. It may not be too soon, but it's just a question of time. All of these things—the other developments that have occurred. You take in the medical field—you're hearing on television this morning about Mr. Clark up in Utah that has a mechanical heart and is still living. He's in critical condition but he's still living. Take the development of penicillin. All the other developments. So aviation has not only been kind to many of us, although there were many that didn't come through. In the early days of TWA pilots, we lost 5 percent of our pilots every year by crashes. But aviation has been extremely kind to us. In addition, we've been living in one of the greatest eras the world has ever known. You look back at the other things, and the major thing is World War II, where the whole world was at war, and yet we lived through that. We're having our lumps now on the economic conditions, but they will be solved. In summary, I think the world has been very kind to us. To us in aviation, extremely kind, over this period. I'm happy to have been a part of it.

As one final aside there, you mentioned Mr. Lovett a couple of times. What was your appreciation for this gentleman?

Mr. Lovett was Secretary of War for Air during World War II. He liked to travel. He was a very friendly person, quite modest and polite. A dignified type, educated individual. PAGE 55 ... TARPA TOPICS

I enjoyed him. I enjoyed talking to him. I flew him on two or three of his trips overseas. He asked me to personally fly him, which I did. Most of those people at that time, once I got to flying the President, they I all wanted me to fly them if I possibly could. And I tried to oblige them if there was any way I could. Particularly those people like Mr. Lovett and the generals and admirals at the top there with President Roosevelt. He was a wonderful guy in my opinion. H:

Most people that I've talked to had a very high appreciation of Mr. Lovett.

He was probably one of the best educated and most intelligent overall of people that I've met. One of the best. There are several of them, but he was one of the best.

If you don't have anything further, that concludes my questions. I'd like to thank you on behalf of the Air Force Oral History Program and the Office of Air Force History.

Thank you very much, and may I thank you for coming up here this long way from Alabama, the time you spent here in getting this, and your patience in listening to all this stuff. I want to thank you and the Air Force for doing so.

Thank you. (End Oral History Interview #K2 39 . 0512-1361)

PAGE 56 ... TARPA TOPICS

A conscience is what hurts when all your other parts feel so good.

The Power of the Ballot Sometime in the late `60s John Gratz began leaning on me to give a little back to my fellow pilots. John was chairman of Council 69 and I was a lump with a smile on my face just happy to be an ever-so-junior captain. John lured me with the promise of the chairmanship of a yet-to-be-named committee that would put me in a place of honor and dignity. I agreed and donned an even bigger smile.

Boston bound pilots to list the hotels they thought best for a layover.

The committee he had in mind turned out to be the `Housing Committee' with all it's power and glory. You will recall that at that time pilots were responsible to find their own quarters on layovers. This could be quite challenging for West Coast pilots flying to large cities in the east like Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Washington where hotel rooms were quite often very tight.

About halfway through the next month I got a call from the manager of MG who said, "Your pilots are not showing up and you owe me a lot of money." Indeed we owed a bunch, which I paid, and then I started pounding on the pilots to pony up. There were screams of anguish, howls of indignation, and threats to have me impeached. (Wow, that one hurt.) Obviously the Millwood Guesthouse was not a popular place with the group. It was not downtown and guess what?! The cabin attendants were staying downtown.

We had an ongoing system whereas the Housing Chairman made arrangements with hotels and the pilots used the rooms so reserved. If a pilot failed to cancel or use the room the Council 69 slush fund would pay for the room and I would dun the pilot to pay up. Great fun and I made a lot of friends. Actually it worked quite well and I had few problems. A few months after I had settled into a routine we lost our downtown layover hotel in Boston and had to make a change. Being junior I seldom had the opportunity to fly the good flights to Boston and did not know where a good hotel might be. So I did the obvious and put a sheet on the bulletin board asking the

In due time I took the notice down and saw that the most popular hotel was the Millwood Guesthouse. I was not familiar with MG but a quick call to their reservations desk and everything was arranged for the following month.

At the upcoming council meeting I anticipated that the Millwood Guesthouse would be a hot topic. I was a better record keeper in those days than I am now and I had all the papers in order. When the subject finally came up the first question was, "Why did you put us in the Millwood Guesthouse?" Answer: "Because the majority of the voters wanted to go there." Next question, "How many people voted? " I held up the paper from the bulletin board. Answer:

PAGE 57 ... TARPA TOPICS

One. "

Junk is something you keep for years and throw away three weeks before you need it.

Dear Gene, A recent sad aviation event will surely be of interest to TWA old-timers. The last Boeing 307 Stratoliner was ditched in Elliott Lake, near Seattle, by a Boeing test crew. The venerable old airplane - formerly operated by Pan-Am - had been rescued from the boneyard and lovingly restored to flying condition, only to be dunked into the drink after the engines sputtered and lost power. The reason for the power failure is being investigated. The first Stratoliner flew on December 31, 1938, as a proposed airliner developed along with the B-17 Flying Fortress. The exploratory high-altitude flights by TWA's "Tommy" Tomlinson were behind the design of the pressurized Stratoliner airliner. Boeing built ten of them - the prototype crashed, TWA got five, Howard Hughes bought one for $250,000, and Pan-Am got three. The five TWA Strats served as military transports during WWII, as C-75s. After the war the airplanes returned to TWA service and I was privileged to fly them as copilot for several months. When I left active service with the USAAF in 1945 I had about 1,000 hours of B-17 time and - along with other former B-17 guys - I was assigned to TWA Stratoliner training, which consisted of a few hours of ground school in the old Goebel hangar at the south end of Kansas City Municipal Airport, and three night landings. The Strats flew much like their sister B-17s, except that the pilot seats were installed at a slight angle to conform to the shape of the nose.

The airplanes were sold by TWA when we began to receive DC-4s and Connies. Around 1 95 1 the original Strat engines were upgraded from 900 to 120o-HP Wright Cyclones and the planes were retrofitted with B-17G wings The last Stratoliner I ever saw was at Athens, just before we became involved in Viet-Nam. The airplane had different paint and was being flown by Aigle Azur in support of the French efforts in Indo-China. I still remember with pleasure my first flight as a TWA Stratoliner copilot. I deadheaded from Kansas City to Los Angeles to work a flight back through Albuquerque to Kansas City. I flew with Captain Evan Lewis - a true gentleman of the skies - and, ever after, strove to be as good a pilot and captain as he was. I never succeeded, of course. Barney Rawlings How many more out there who actually flew the Strat? Let's hear from you. Gene Gene, "You're doing a wonderful job continuing the " Grapevine " section in Tarpa Topics, keep it up. I just finished reading the November 2001 issue and recognized with much sadness the names of 3 I knew or knew of in the Flown West section. The 1st was Capt. Sal Fallucco, one of the small group of TWA Pilots that flew the Pope at one time or another. I saw Sal one time several years ago here at Capt. Larry Earhart's retirement party. Sadly I wasn't able to talk with him. The 2nd name I recognized was Capt. Charles Kratovil. I'd never met him but almost felt like I knew him. I'd read about him way back when I was in Jr. High School

PAGE 58 ... TARPA TOPICS

If you must choose between two evils, pick the one you've never tried before. and read the book "Jet Flight 8o8". This was the story of an airline flight from JFK-FCO and everything that was involved in it. The story centered on Capt. Kratovil flying a TWA 707-331B nicknamed the "MATS MULE" for its use in the MATS operation several years before that. It's interesting that one of my fellow co-workers here at US Airways read the same book a number of years ago and we began talking about it a few months ago. One statement in the book stands out in my memory & it was when someone asks Capt. Kratovil what was the largest airplane he ever flew. He replied that the Ford Tri-Motor was the largest aircraft he'd ever flown compared to what he had flown up until that time the Ford was a huge aircraft. After that, nothing else was near as large by comparison. The 3rd person I knew personally and that was A.T. Humbles. I'd met A.T. on a TWA Seniors tour of the Holy Lands way back in the early 1980 's. I'd gone along with my parents on the trip and was able to meet many other TWA Retiree ' s. A.T. seemed to keep everyone laughing most of the time with many stories & just his wonderful personality. When we took off from Amman, Jordan on the return home, the El Al 747 had used up most of the runway. A.T. looked out the window & calmly said, "We didn't leave much runway left over." One story he told comes to mind about one of his training flights on the old Martin 404. He had flown it around and made a pretty good landing but happened to bounce it once or twice. The instructor told him to take off again and he'd show him just how a good landing was made with the 404. So off they went again and this time with the instructor doing the

landing. A.T. said, "We came in & touched down and bounced, and bounced and bounced down that runway about 5 times." "When we finally stopped I looked over at the instructor and said if I'd have known you wanted me to land like that I'd have gladly done that." He said the instructor was so mad he never said another word other than to taxi to the hangar and shut her down. I remember sitting there laughing like crazy at hearing that story. " I just thought I'd pass along these thoughts and memories of the 3 names I recognized. I ' m sad to see them fly west. Jim " JET " Thompson "

P.S. I was sure sorry to see the old Boeing 307 Stratoliner ditch in Puget Sound yesterday. I'd seen it at OSH last summer and it looked beautiful even if it was in PAA livery."

A Paddlewheel Adventure by John Thomas Happy II While enjoying the rainy weather in Central Florida this winter, I came across a "Lum" Edwards tour on the American Queen from New Orleans to Memphis. A seven day cruise. My bride Bette and I took Southwest Air from MCO to MSY on Sunday and were very lucky to get in as the weather was nasty. Low ceilings, rain and wind blowing like mad. The SW crew did a great job and greased it on. The trip from the A/P in a van was much more scary. We arrived at the Robin Street Wharf about three, to the accompaniment of a great Dixieland band in the check-in lounge. My! What a way to start a Dixieland jazz cruise. The American Queens the newest Delta

PAGE 59 ... TARPA TOPICS

It is easier to get forgiveness than permission.

Queen Steamboat Company's paddle wheeler. So big, it can only do the lower Mississippi River. Not above STL because of the locks. (29 to Minneapolis-St Paul). Carries close to 500 folks and 18o crew. But built in the theme of the late `80's. There were 14 of us brave seafarers ( never out of sight of land), aboard, from the TWA Seniors group. After getting settled in our staterooms with a fruit and champagne snack, we checked the ship/boat out, finding all the bars first. Once you are on the boat/ship, you put your clams away. They run a tab on you, but only for gift shop, side tours and the drinks, everything else comes with the tour package as usual on a cruise. We were supposed to sail at 19:00 but due to the lousy weather they waited for a lot of people that didn't get into MSY until later. We left at 22:00 but at 20:00 we were treated to a terrific show by the Dukes of Dixieland. Without a doubt the best jazz group in the business. After the show we had dinner (late sitting). Stuffed catfish and scallops, I don't even want to mention the dessert. Next morning was one of 7 breakfasts either buffet or sit down that were out of this world. Then if we didn't have enough of food we were entertained by Chef Joe Cahn who talked about Marti Gras, tailgate parties, fat Tuesday, Justin Wilson, jambalaya, pralines, New Orleans and Louisiana politics (a riot) and the fact that he did not believe in "weight watchers". He believed in "tall watchers". Weight v/s height. If you worked on getting your height taller you would fall in the right weight bracket. ! ! ! It took him three beers to get through the demonstration ! ! ! ! In the evening we had a Captains champagne

party ( black tie) followed by a fantastic show with Pete Fountain and his Dixieland all stars. SUPER. After, dinner was, suffer through this, lobster, Greek salad, and gumbo soup. With jambalaya on the side. The next day after the usual, bkfst and lunch, Connie Jones (ex Fireside Five and Dukes alumni), did a history, illustrated with some of the best Dixie music, on jazz, in new Orleans. We spent a lot of time in the engine room bar ( above the engine), eating the largest shrimp snacks I have ever seen. Music by David Post. Old favorites. In the evening another show and another dinner. After which dancing until ? You must know that my bride Bette, dubbed Ford and Janie Blainey "Fred and Ginger. They danced every night the whole cruise and Beautifully. We stopped at St Fredericksburg, Natchez and Vicksburg. At Vicksburg, Bette threw some of the filthy stuff into the Harrah's Hotel and Casino, docked right behind the American Queen. I don't gamble myself `cause I know where the clams are going. There were four Broadway type floor shows between the Dixieland music. One was a World War II USO Canteen show. Brought back many, many memories. Another show was one of all B'way show tunes....great! Ibis was one of the best cruises I have had the pleasure of doing. The TWA group was just super. Everyone had a very good time, even flying kites from the fantail. There was never a lack of something to do. Or not do.

PAGE 60 ... TARPA TOPICS

No husband has been shot while doing the dishes.

The food was the best, bar none. Including the soft-shell crabs my bride Bette put away. The shows were as good or better than any, including the Alaska cruise on Princess, the Caribbean on Royal Caribbean and the Atlantic cruise out of Lisbon. This boat/ship just does not roll or sway. And you can swim to shore, of course all the ex-swabbies in TWA may not agree with me, but then I like to kick over a pile, just to get some conversation going. The end of this adventure ended on a bit of a sour note, however. For folks that think they can ride on the TWA (co-share) Express out of Memphis. Forget it. Not like out of STL or NY. They DO NOT honor TWA passes. We had to rent a car from Budget ( The ONLY ONE in Memphis that would rent one way) and drive to STL.4+ hours. Fortunately we shared the car with Gene and Joy Corcoran and the conversation was lively and the time went really fast. There is an awful lot I have left out to meet space requirements but if you have a week or a couple of days, take a river boat (ship) trip. The Delta Queen, the Mississippi Queen or the new American Queen. Try the Great Steamboat (ship) race out of Cincinnati some time. Or the Tall Stacks, out of the same town. Have a "Happy " Sue and I enjoyed this trip a couple of years ago. Had a great time and I recommend it highly. Gene

From Dorothee Miller Daytona Beach, Fla., Jan. 19, 2000 â&#x20AC;&#x201D; At the request of Mrs. Dorothee Miller a private dedication ceremony was held Jan. 17 to memorialize her husband, Capt. Willie Miller, at the Daytona Beach, Fla., campus of Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University. During the ceremony, Embry-Riddle's Instructional Center was named in Capt Miller's honor as recognition of a substantial gift to the university from Mrs. Miller. The gift will be used to create additional classroom space. The Instructional Center, which was built in 1 995, is a state-of-the-art lecture auditorium and classroom complex. Longtime friends gave testimonials in remembrance of Capt. Miller during the ceremony. Other speakers included Dr. George Ebbs, Embry-Riddle president, and Dr. Steven Sliva, former EmbryRiddle president. At the conclusion of the ceremony, the signage of the new name of the building was unveiled. Miller was a pilot with TWA for many years. During World War II, he was assigned to Air Transport Command, the intercontinental division of TWA, flying hospital ships carrying cargo and personnel for the U.S. military. The Chinese Air Force awarded Miller the Chinese Air Medal for courage in flying the dangerous China-Burma-India run, known as the "hump" route because it

PAGE 61 ... TARPA TOPICS

Experience is a wonderful thing. It enables you to recognize a mistake when you make it again. passed over the Himalaya Mountains. Miller went on to establish successful aircraft brokerage companies, including Aero International Associates in New York. Miller was a member of several aviation organizations, including Aviation/Space Writers Association, Hump Pilots Association, International Order of Characters, Long Island Early Fliers, National Business Aviation Association, OX-5 Aviation Pioneers, Quiet Birdmen, TWA Active Retired Pilots Association, TWA Seniors Club, and the Wings Club. Hello Everyone. We would like to wish everyone a Happy New Year 2002. It hardly seems possible that John has been retired from TWA for ten years. We are really enjoying retirement and with each passing year we seem to find more to do. After leaving TWA in December 1991, we moved to Taiwan for almost two years where John flew the B-767 for EVA Air. We made some wonderful friends and enjoyed traveling on the EVA route system. We returned to our home in Stonington, CT in 1 994 . We decided to renew old friendships and at the invitation of Jim and Kathy Tabb we visited their home in Tryon, NC. Jim had founded the Blue Ridge Music and BBQ Festival and we had such a great time we decided to become BBQ judges. We went to Kansas City and took the course offered by the KCBS and have been traveling around the south in the summer to BBQ contest and state fairs. What fun! In 1998, we went on a cruise to Antarctica and we met a retired Coast Guard Captain. He had served aboard an icebreaker, the Glacier, which is in California and in the process of being restored. The Glacier Society hopes

to operate the ship as a functioning museum ship, both in port and underway. Once complete, the volunteers will bring the ship over the North Pole to Connecticut-John is really looking forward to this trip. Our grandson Joe (age 17) also volunteered during the summer months and they had a great time hanging out together. In 1996, we became Fellows at a botanical garden in Coconut Grove, FL., my hometown. The Kampong, a Malay word for village, is a ten acre garden which emphases the preservation and uses of tropical plants for medical uses. The Kampong was the former home of Dr. David Fairchild, one of America's most distinguished explorers and horticulturist, and his wife Marian, a daughter of Alexander Graham Bell. The Kampong is the site of a wide range of activities including graduate level programs and courses. There is an annual Physicians course as well as programs for student from Harvard to University of Florida. In April, a new education building will be dedicated. This building will accommodate 16 students, an outdoor classroom and storage. We are very proud to say this building will be called Scarborough House. The Kampong is located five miles south of MIA, so if you are in the area you might want to call for a tour, 2 (3 0 5) 44 -7 1690. On January 30, we will pick up our new boat in Ft Lauderdale, FL, and we will live aboard until spring when we will start back to CT on the ICU. If any of you are in Miami this winter we would love to hear from you. FAIRSOUTH@AOL.com Best regards, Kathy Scarborough It all sounds great except the part about over the pole in an icebreaker. I get chilled in Modesto in August after sundown. I do want to see the Kampong. Tropical gardens are high on my list. Gene

PAGE 62 ... TARPA TOPICS

Going to church doesn't make you a Christian any more than going to a garage makes you a mechanic.

Notes to Rufus enclosed with dues From Mary Karlson I feel I know you after hearing so many nice things about you from Marvin. He was so happy to get your phone number and be able to call and talk to you of the good old times with the airline. He was a very devoted employee with TWA and after retiring in 1979, all he talked about was all those wonderful times with TWA and working with so many nice people. He got along with everyone and did nice things for them. He was a wonderful husband and a great father for our four children. We all miss him so much. It was so nice of the Connie crew at TWA to fly the Connie over his funeral and come back the second time, tip their wings and fly west. (Note from Rufus: Gene â&#x20AC;&#x201C; this letter has a lot of nice things about Mary Karlson in it, hope you can use it. Marv and I thought we were dead one night on a 707 flight from Bombay to Tel Aviv, but that's another story. ) (Note from Gene: OK, Rufus, drop the other shoe. All who want to read that story say Aye!) From Bill Clegg Sad but true that TWA is now history. We were fortunate to have enjoyed the best years. From Veronica Higgins I enjoyed seeing the picture of the hostess class. Did I miss the information regarding the month and year somewhere in the magizine? It was a great picture of history. (Can anyone help Veronica with this?) From Dodie Fredrickson Fontes (widow of Paul) Being an Eagle Member and an Honorary Member, maybe I don't owe dues â&#x20AC;&#x201C; but I read every page of TARPA and love it! Of course, all the old-timers of our (Paul Frederickson) era have mostly " Gone West." Take care and keep TARPA going!! From Fay Widholm It is my pleasure to pay the regular membership dues. I enjoy the TARPA TOPICS. It keeps me in touch.

PAGE 63 ... TARPA TOPICS

If you look like your passport picture you probably need the trip.

From Denny O ' Connell Got bored with retirement and am now working for Flight Safety at Teterboro as Director of Standards. Also working there with me are Bob Forsyth, Bob Fischer and Dave Cowell. Give my best to Bob Dedman. Tell him I am still in search of "Cabers." He'll know. From Dick Stone Keep up the good work. I read the magazine cover to cover and I go the NJ TWA retired club. From Martin Sobel Going back to your roots after California culture shock or what? I am keeping busy working at Flight Safety Int'l in Columbus teaching mostly EJA pilots. Am teaching and checking on the Citation V Ultra 56o and will go to Falcon 2000 school in the late spring. Hope to begin building an RV-8 by the end of 2002. From Dorothee Miller Yes, I hope TARPA continues. Yes, I will sign up for the convention early! ! How about another cruise? From Dorothy Schmidt Remembering the many exciting and wonderful years Dick and I had with the "Old TWA!" TARPA issues are great! From Markt Meyer Only change for me is the phone number. When Pat didn't run for Congress again we had some problems with calls. Public life can be a real problem at times. Soon to be retired 14 years â&#x20AC;&#x201C; seems such a short time. From Larry O ' Day Nice to see you have a job with TARPA and are making yourself useful for the 1 st time in your life! Hope the new year goes well for us all! From Bill Merrigan I certainly appreciate all the work that you fellows do for us. My hat is off to you, Dedman, Gratz, et al. All the best for the new year. From Tom Vogel Seems a long time since Saudia. Hope TARPA keeps going. I have a Stearman, fly out of Livermore and do a few air shows. PAGE 64 ... TARPA TOPICS

Age is a very high price to pay for maturity.

From Jack Moser Can't wait for the next issue of the Dixon Chronicles. From Tom Murphy Completed my last flight Aug 31, '01. Had a long and very enjoyable career and enjoyed every minute of being able to fly for the now historic TWA. Can't think of a finer group of airmen to have worked with. From Chet Denning In January I had some heart surgery â&#x20AC;&#x201D; valve re-worked and two bypasses. Touch and go for a while but going pretty good now. Also got a pace maker installed.

From Jack Wooden I have always enjoyed my association with TWA crew members and your most welcome TARPA magazine. Thanks so much for your efforts on our behalf. From Roger Moom I just retired on 11 Nov. '01. I flew Flt 1 for my final flight with five stripes and an Aloha shirt. It just seemed like the right thing to do. Hope to see everyone in Chicago in September. From Bob Dalin Had a pleasant flight on American SAN-DFW-MCI but did take 3 days to get out of Dallas on return. The agents were very helpful. Tracy and I are in our 80's but as lively as ever. The weather here at Lake San Marcos is very mild and easy to be outside. Thank all the staff for keeping us up on TWA news. From Hank Stoffel Today is the second anniversary of my retirement from TWA. Here is a thought I have: Firstly, I would like to thank you fellows for doing such a great job of trying to grow some connective tissue between us retired old timers and our younger generation pilots at TWA. Now that TWA has ceased to exist as such, I expect the younger pilots will perhaps drift away from our proud cadre of elder pilots. To help forestall this possibility, I would like to request a favor of Captain Bill Compton. Would he consider writing a piece for TARPA publication summarizing the struggles we've endured for the last fifteen years with PAGE 65 ... TARPA TOPICS

Middle age is when broadness of the mind and narrowness of the waist change places.

Carl Icahn? We were asked to help save the company with many of our sacrifices. It would be interesting to learn how a great international airline like TWA could succumb to the maddening frenzy of capitalist corporate raiders and the insatiable appetites of the media to drive the last nail into the coffin of TWA by incessantly hammering away at the mishap of TWA flight 800. Together, they (Icahn and the media) have sealed the fate of a great proud airline! Perhaps the piece he would write could in some way give us pilots closure. I've always admired Captain Compton and hope that he has joined TARPA. Please keep up the spirit and the good work. From Len Crose I read TARPA TOPICS through when it arrives and enjoy it so very much. Two things of importance happened in 2001 and so far in 2002. We lost our great airline and in Feb. of this year I lost my wife, Shirley, after almost 54 years of a wonderful marriage. I miss them both so very much. They were both so good for me and the two children. From Bob Waggoner ' Do you know if their is anyway I could get a copy of a seniority list from the mid 1970 s? I would like to find out how many of my co-pilot class of Jan `46 made it to retirement. bobwaggp38@ aol.com . Can anybody help? From Gil Fisher You guys do a great job in helping to perpetuate the memory of TWA and we all grieve ` of it's passing. A lot of us like to think it's still Up, Up and Away with TWA,' always. From Jack Mateer I read the latest TARPA cover to cover when it arrived; really miss the flying, but most of all, the TWA people. From Nancy Cole (Widow of Rob) When Rob became an Eagle he continued to pay his dues. In his memory, I too, shall continue.

PAGE 66 ... TARPA TOPICS

My idea of housework is to sweep the room with a glance.

From Virginia Halliday Bill had a fall on New Year's Eveâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;right after dinner. He needed hip surgery and has been in re-hab since Jan.7th. Bill's faithful offspring are showering him with get will wishes and visits form those in Calif., Utah, Mass, NY, etc. We're sure he'll be up on his feet shortly. From Loretta Hammers 816 741-4032 and Neal Kurz 816 436-1663 First TWA family reunion. July 6, 2002, Embassy Suites Hotel, I-29 and Tiffany Springs Parkway, K.C. MO (Near MCI) Call for reservations.

So there you have it. I teach a computer course to seniors with an organization called SeniorNet. It's great fun, the course is very elementary, and all I have to do is stay one page ahead of the students. Lesson One says, "Back up everythingâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;often." Well you guessed it. I had a crash last week and lost some e-mail and other files. If you sent me an e-mail and you don't find it here maybe it's in cyber heaven. Try me again and I'll promise to do better. There are some great stories out there just waiting to get out. A couple of them are on my desk but just too long for this issue. Let me hear from you, we need to know what you are doing, have done, and may do in the future. I will be busy for awhile. We're moving just a block but from a two story townhouse to a one story. It's farther from the street and closer to the pool and my knees will be ever so grateful. Phone and e-mail will not change, new address when all is done. We hope to be in Chicago. We hope you will be too. Gene

PAGE 67 ... TARPA TOPICS

North Star Over My Shoulder (Cover Notes) It is rare to find one person whose life embodies the history of an industry the way Bob Buck's life encompasses the history of commercial aviation in America. Buck first flew in the 1920's, inspired by the exploits of Charles Lindbergh. In 1930, at age sixteen, he flew solo from coast to coast, breaking the junior transcontinental speed record. In 1936 he flew nonstop from Burbank, California, to Columbus, Ohio, in a 9o-horsepower Monocoupe to establish a world distance record 1 for light airplanes. He joined Transcontinental and Western Air (T&WA) as a copilot in 937; when he retired thirty-seven years later, he had made more than 2,000 Atlantic crossings— and his role had progressed from such tasks as retracting a DC-2's landing gear with a cockpitbased hand pump to command of a wide-body 747 . Buck's experiences go back to a time when flying was something glamorous. He flew with and learned from some true pioneers of aviation— the courageous pilots who created the airmail service during flying's infancy. At the behest of his employer Howard Hughes, Buck spent three months flying with Tyrone Power on a trip to South America, Africa, and Europe. He flew the New York—Paris—Cairo route in the days when flight plans called for lengthy stopovers, and enjoyed all that those romantic places had to offer. He took part in a flight that circled the globe sideways (from pole to pole). He advised TWA's president on the shift to jet planes; a world expert on weather and flight, Buck used a B-17G to chase thunderstorms worldwide as part of a TWA—Air Force research project during World War II, for which he was awarded the Air Medal (as a civilian) by President Truman. In North Star over My Shoulder, Bob Buck tells of a life spent up and over the clouds, and of the wonderful places and marvelous people who have been a part of that life. He captures the feel, taste, and smell of flying's greatest era—how the people lived, what they did and felt, and what it was really like to be a part of the world as it grew smaller and smaller. He relates stories from his innumerable visits to Paris, the city he loves more than any other—echoing Gertrude Stein's view that "America is my country, and Paris is my home town"—and from his trips to the Middle East, including flights to Israel before and after it became a state. A terrific storyteller and a fascinating man, Bob Buck has turned his well-lived life into a delightful memoir for anyone who remembers when there really was something special in the air.

PAGE 68 ... TARPA TOPICS

IN ALPHONSE

MEMORY

RAYMOND

OF GRANDSAERT

NOVEMBER 25, 1919 - JANUARY 19, 2002 Al was born in Rochester, New York . His father was from Belgium and his mother from the Netherlands. The family moved to California while Al was a child and it was decided by the family that he should get his High School education in Belgium, so there he attended a boarding school until he graduated. Upon graduation he returned to California and attended Cal. Poly college. Al, as a child, was fascinated by airplanes and wanted to go to work in the field of aviation. He soon was hired by Pan American Airlines as a flight engineer in which he flew out of San Francisco on the Pan Am Clipper, then later went to work with United Airlines for a short time, before finding his real love, Trans World Airlines in 1947 . Al married his wife Jeannette in 1941 and after living in Wyoming and then Lima, Peru for a while decided to move to Redwood City, California in 1948 where he has made his home ever since. His wife Jeannette, of 52 years passed away in 1993 . PAGE 69 ... TARPA TOPICS

Al was very active in his church work. He was a member of the Mount Carmel Church for 16 years and a founding father of the St Matthias Church in Redwood City. Al served his church in many capacities and was awarded numerous awards for his dedication to the poor . Al in addition to Tarpa was a member of the Pacific Northwest TWA Seniors Club. Al leaves behind three sons Bud, Jack, Tom and a daughter Peggy, along with his sister who is Sister Mary Sylvia of the Sisters of Mercy in Burlingame, California. He also has eleven grandchildren. The memories of Al's kindness and friendly makeup will be missed by all his fellow workers and friends and to his family to which he dearly treasured. by Claude Thomas

MEMORY

WILLIAM

DUNCAN

STEWART

DECEMBER 22, 1922 - JANUARY 12, 2002 William D. (Bill) Stewart died suddenly January 31 of natural causes in Grass Valley, California, where he had lived since retiring from Trans World Airlines in 1 984 . Bill was the youngest of four children of James A. and Christia Stewart. He was born December 22, 1922, in Seattle. His father was a pre-Klondike veteran of the Yukon, while his mother came to Dawson in 1906. Bill graduated from Fairbanks Alaska High in 1940 and spent two years as an engineering student at the University of Alaska. He worked as an aircraft mechanic and flight mechanic for Pacific Alaska Airways (Pan Am) and Alaska Airlines. During World War II he was a flight engineer with Consairways on Pacific routes under Navy supervision, followed by USAF service. After the war he participated in the Berlin airlift (Alaska Airlines) before joining Trans World Airlines in 1949. There he rose to become a supervisory flight engineer. He married a TWA flight attendant, Marguerite Thomas, on September 20, 1953, in Greenwich, Connecticut. They had three children, Christina Lee, Jeffrey Thomas, and Sharon Lynn and three grandchildren, Lisa Marie Decker, Jennifer Lee Stewart, and William Lee Stewart. by the Stewart family PAGE 70 ... TARPA TOPICS

MEMORY

GLENN

SPERRY

OCTOBER 15,1917 - JANUARY 20, 2002 Glenn's love of flying began when he had his first airplane ride with Charles A. Lindbergh, at Mason City, Iowa when he was 12 years old. At the age of 14, Glenn soloed and at 16 he received his pilot's license. Glenn worked for Northrup Aircraft until he joined the TWA Intercontinental Division in 1942 as a Flight Engineer. In later years, he was based in New York and San Francisco. His family said that to know Glenn was to like and to love him. We did both. by Joy L. Sperry

IN ELMER

MEMORY

(SLIM)

MEYER

JUNE 20, 1919 - JANUARY 14, 2002 Slim Meyer was born in Minnesota in 1919. He served in the Air Force in World War II. He joined TWA after the war as a Flight Engineer and worked for 41 years. Slim lived in Los Altos, California for 50 years using it as a base for his favorite activities skiing and traveling. He also enjoyed working on various projects with his sons in Auburn, California. Slim is survived by his wife of Mariel after 51 years of marriage, sons Dennis and Ronald, grandchildren, Haley and Blair and a sister Ruth.

IN MEMORY OF CAPTAIN KENNETH MARKS APRIL 28, 1920 - DECEMBER 28, 2001

PAGE 71 ... TARPA TOPICS

IN MEMORY OF OMER "BILL" ELSNER SEPTEMBER 13, 1922 â&#x20AC;&#x201C; SEPTEMBER 7. 2001 Bill was hired by TWA as a Flight Radio Operator ii days after the Pearl Harbor attack and remained in that capacity until TWA discontinued the use of radio operators in 1956. He then went on to work in flight operations at JFK airport and became Manager Flight Crew Administration. In that position he not only served the company that he loved but came to be known for the assistance that he lent many of pilots in administrative manners. In 1974 he and his family were sent to Jedda in Saudi Arabia for three years where he worked for TWA under contract to Saudia Airlines, an assignment he really enjoyed. After returning to JFK in 1977, his office moved "down the hall" to the operations section from which he retired in 1986 as General Manager Operational Planning. His forty-five year career spanned the glory years of TWA and Bill seemed to enjoy every minute of it. Bill is survived by Bertha, his wife of fifty-four years and their three children, Pat, Bill and Nancy. They had seven grandchildren. Bill was a TARPA Eagle at the time of his death. by Dick Niklas

IN CAPTAIN

MEMORY

KENNETH

"JAMIE"

JAMIESON

APRIL 2, 1936 - FEBRUARY 15, 2002

IN CAPTAIN

MEMORY ROBERT

BABSON

NOVEMBER 5, 1913 - DECEMBER 31, 2001

IN CAPTAIN

MEMORY JIM

OF SMILEY

NOVEMBER 11,1939 - MARCH 3,2002

IN CAPTAIN

MEMORY

DONALD

WALLACE

SEPTEMBER 25, 1924 - APRIL 7, 2002

PAGE 72 ... TARPA TOPICS

MEMORY

CAPTAIN

CHARLES

RICE

MAY 24, 1919 - MARCH 18, 2002

IN CAPTAIN

MEMORY

NORMAN

FAUSETT

JANUARY 5, 1935 - APRIL 3, 2002

MEMORY

STANLEY PYTEL JULY 27, 1923 - JANUARY 28, 2002

IN ALBERT

MEMORY W.

WOLLENBERG

MAY 29, 1917 - APRIL 20, 2002

A VANISHED FRIEND

THE PILOTS

Around the corner I have a friend, In this great city that has no end. Yet days go by, and weeks rush on, And before I know it, a year is gone. And I never see my old friend's face, For life is a swift and terrible race. He knows I like him just as well, As in the days when I rang his bell, And he rang mine. We were younger then,---And now we are busy, tired men; Tired with playing a foolish game, Tired with trying to make a name. "Tomorrow," I say, "I will call on Jim, Just to show that I'm thinking of him" But tomorrow comes and tomorrow goes, And the distance between us grows and grows.

Have you ever thought about where old pilots go When their flying days are over and they've joined the status quo?

Around the corner - yet miles away .. . "Here's a telegram, sir ... Jim died today."

Have you ever wondered how they cope and do they really mind Having left their quest of flight; their love of flight behind? The answer is that they've never left the far and distant skies, They' re up there now in every craft with everyone who flies. They' re in the hearts of every child who ever wished for wings, They're everywhere in the world of flight; a world where challenge sings! by Barry Craig

PAGE 73 ... TARPA TOPICS

April 25, 2002 5 Castaway Drive Danbury CT 06811

Rufus,

Great idea to open up membership in TARPA to the remaining TWA pilots. I've enclosed $120.00 to cover '02 dues for myself and to join my daughter Cindy and son Andrew. I believe you know both of them. They were both flying on 9/11; Andrew on domestic, and Cindy was on your favorite Flight 888 â&#x20AC;&#x201D; she got the news over Greece. The story is long, and perhaps she will have an opportunity to tell you about it one day. I hope there are copies of the March edition of `TARPA Topics' available, as I am sure they would be interested in receiving one. My wife insisted that I enclose a TWA family picture for the files. An interesting story would be to research all the TWA pilot families through the years. I am sure there have been many. I am also sending along a collage that may have some meaning to you. Thanks again for the new eligibility.

Best regards,

Phil Mandel

PAGE 74 ... TARPA TOPICS

A THREE SIXTY by John Zachem He came from eastern Kentucky to the University of Kentucky in 1955. Told he had to go to college, but not knowing what he wanted to get out of it. Frustration was addressed by the United States Air Force ROTC Program as they bet him that they could teach him to fly. One whose only experience with aviation was Saturday matinees and watching the mail plane fly over twice a week, throw a canvas bag out, drop the hook, and snag the cable for outgoing US Airmail. He always wondered where the plane had come from and where it was going. Having been well fed by a loving mother, father, grandparents, uncles and aunts the USAF medical staff determined that if he would shed 3 8 pounds by the end of his sophomore year (four months away) they would admit him into the advanced ROTC program. He did, and they did. His senior year, age 22, after soloing a C- 140 thru the Flight Instruction Program at Blue Grass Field in Lexington, he began to think that maybe The Program was right. He could fly. The Program was truly correct - they taught him to fly in remote locations in Georgia and Texas - in recips then jets. They sent him to the other side of the world (California), encouraged by his young Kentucky bride. Then they REALLY sent him to the other side of the world in 1963 to "stem the tide of Communist aggression." All different experiences, airplanes, rewards and disappointments. After an interesting assignment with Medical Air Evacuation in New Jersey he was convinced that flying was what he needed to do for the foreseeable future and the USAF could not promise this. Offered a class date of December 13, 1965 by American Airlines and Trans World Airlines the decision was a minor bump in the road. TWA's domestic route structure matched AAL's, and its international routes made it a no brainer for rapid advancement (Interviewers for both airlines indicated left seat in three years). You know the rest of the airline story - never furloughed, just stagnated. Blessed by finally reaching the pinnacle of B-767 International Captain, he thought - "it will not get any better than this". Then along came Carl with eyes on the retirement plan. Age 52 brought both children out of college, concerns for the future of TWA, and a non-flying job opportunity at his Alma Mater. A very tough decision made by the entire family - early retirement. There were good experiences at UK, but it wasn ' t flying. To paraphrase an Italian aviation pioneer, once you have flown, you will always walk the earth with your eyes skyward, for there you have been and there you will always long to return. Managed to stay involved with aviation a little by arranging charters for administration, athletic and alumni folks and tagging along in the right seat. Also, was appointed to the Airport Board by the Mayor. But, after eleven years decided to leave UK to travel and play golf. Fourteen months later he was approached by an acquaintance who owns an aerial photogrametry company with six airplanes. Seems Comair had hired three of his pilots and he

PAGE 75 ... TARPA TOPICS

needed help for a couple of months -jumped on it. Two months led to another, etc. - enjoyed the precision flying required in the C-2o6 and C-2 1o. Its not flying over the North Atlantic or Alps but spending seven days at 2100 ' AGL over TX, CO, WY, UT shooting gas line compression stations was an enjoyable challenge. Now folks, this is not holding a Brownie out of the window. We use pretty sophisticated cameras mounted in the airplane operated by a technician with a laptop talking to America's wonderful satellite system. Then, the pilot on the companies Rockwell 690B Turbo Commander left - wanna do it? - Briar Rabbit said, "please don't throw me in the briar patch! " Once again setting 29.92 passing thru seventeen five. Its been nearly a year, will turn 65 later this year, now Chairman of the Airport Board, and loving doing what I started 43 years ago - flying at Blue Grass Airport! (I wish we could change it back to Field). Hanging around hangars, kicking rocks, talking to nice young men who hope to do what some of us have done. And, still encouraged by his Kentucky bride. A cynic may say that he is just back where he started - he would say that he has flown a perfect three-sixty.

The Fellowship The engines have been shut

The Pilot has gone home, just

down;

there beyond that cloud,

the checklist has been read, The final flight is over, nothing

Where await his airborne comrades, their heads in

more need be said.

welcome bowed. by Barry Craig

PAGE 76 ... TARPA TOPICS

The Rest of the Story by Ona Gieschen I was doing a little research when I ran across an article in the STARLINER describing those advertising shots of the Connie in `47. I noticed that Ray Craft was the co-pilot on the DC-3. I've known Ray since we both wore split red I.D. badges allowing us access to the experimental test cells where the Pratt Whitney R-2800C flung itself apart or passed it's new test that those aircraft engineers dreamed up. Ray worked upstairs in the suit and tie atmosphere where theories found their way to blueprints and eventually to the test cells and the foremen and their operators. I was the foreman's secretary, wore the standard female war plant style overalls and spent a great deal of time riding the three wheeled bike picking up and delivering messages and orders between the engineering group and the test area. Later Ray and I both ended up with TWA. I sent Ray the clippings from the STARLINER, (the Starliner was the name of the company newspaper during the mid 40's) and ask him to tell us the 'rest of the story' Here it is and a fascinating story it is. Thanks Ray. May 23, 1947 I got a call from crew schedule to report for a two hour local photo flight. When I got to the field, I found that Capt Russell Dick and I would be flying a DC3 in formation with one of our early 049 Connies for some publicity pictures. Captains Paul Fredrickson and Frank Busch, with F.E. Bob Keller would be flying Connie #515. Captain Dick and I would be flying DC3 # 399, with a couple of passenger window units removed on both sides of the cabin to give the photographers a clear air shot for their cameras. They were Rex Werner, art director TWA; and George Enell, former TWA who had branched out into a shop of his own. We hadn't been in flight long when we discovered that it was severe clear throughout the Kansas City area, and that completely frustrated the artistic souls of our photo boys; they wanted beautiful puffy clouds in the background. A short conference with our own Met people convinced us to head west. We did without even landing. When we got into the ABQ area, it looked good; but the light was beginning to dim for PAGE 77 ... TARPA TOPICS

good color work, so it was decided to spend the night in ABQ. Since none of us had luggage for this "two hour local" flight, the Connie hostess; Barbara Chase, raided the passenger service kit to get razors and toothbrushes for us. Next day, about mid-day we were airborne looking for some beautiful fair weather cumulus. They were there, but we had a problem. In order to get the right cloud perspective, we had to get to about 20,000 foot altitude. Our DC3s were not high altitude jobs with two speed engine superchargers like the Connie. I remember we had everything full bore; props, throttles, and even needed electric fuel boost pumps to keep our engines alive. We were poking along at about 110 mph, and the Connie had to use takeoff flaps in order to fly slow enough to hold formation on us. I don't know if he was being facetious, but Bob Keller told me long after that he was having a hard time keeping his engines warm. I think we had spent at least an hour in this mode, when the Connie pilots told us they were going to fall back, so they could clean up the flaps; and slowly pass up over our wingtip to get some shots from that perspective. When I went back into the cabin to brief our photogs, I found Rex Werner having a breathing problem. With his face in the plane of that open window, his little black moustache was so full of ice chrystals that it was apparently causing his oronasal mask to malfunction. In those good old low tech days our cockpit oxygen procedure was a wooden nipple in the hose gripped between our teeth and mouth breathing; with rather successful results. So I fixed Rex up in that mode and we finished another half hour or so in good shape. So we landed at ABQ to get fueled for return home; but Lovelace clinic was so convenient, we sent Werner and Enell over there to have their state of anoxia checked out. You know they had been a lot more physically active charging around that cabin than we, sitting in the cockpit; except for my one venture into the cabin to confer with them. I believe we left them to return home in the greater luxury of the Connie, while Russ and I ferried the DC3 back to MKC at (minimum enroute altitudes)! According to my logbook, that two hour local photo hop involved 6:20 and 10:30 hours in the two days. I still have a beautiful framed enlargement of old #515 hanging in my library/computer room as a souvenir from Rex Werner.

Historic Midway Airport PAGE 78 ... TARPA TOPICS

TARPA Tiptoes Through the Tulips (a colorful tale) On April 11 eight folks headed for Brussels toured The Hague briefly and spent the from various points in the US. Included in the afternoon in Keukenhof Gardens. The tulips group were Howard and Catherine Hall from and other bulb flowers were so colorful. You California, Gene and Berenice Klumb from can color that day with a rainbow. Florida and Minnesota, Joan Tarbox and her The next days were filled with interesting friend Neal Johnson from Minnesota and experiencesâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;a lecture on Dutch art, a lace Texas and Jean Thompson from South maker, a wooden shoe maker, a cheese maker, Carolina and her friend Betty Glotzbach from a concert by "The Captains Choir", folk Georgia. dancers. On Tuesday and Wednesday an odd the We arrived in Brussels on a cool, cloudy day malady began sweeping through and our sojourn in Belgium continued gloomy. passen We were embarking on a Vantage tour and, gers. after an orientation session and dinner in our At least hotel (Hilton), half we learned of had a Vantage's plans flu-like for us. The next bug day we went to Bruges and were that laid them low for 24 hours. A doctor in and out of rain came aboard to see some of the sickest. His as we saw some diagnosis was, "It's something going around of the charming on shore as well as aboard ship." So, color us old city, a center green. of lace and chocolate making. The following One very interesting evening was spent day was spent in Brussels, again in and out of listening to a college professor talk about the rain. Color Belgium gray. Battle for Arnhem in World War II and the On Monday, April 15 we headed for Dutch Resistance. His wife ended the evening Amsterdam and the Vantage MS River with her personal recollection of the battle as Explorer which was to be our home for the seen by a 13 year old living in Arnhem in next 7 nights. En route we had lunch at 1944. We stopped at Arnhem to see the museum Scheveningen in a beachfront hotel/casino the We and where it was cold and trying to rain. military cemetery. Aboard ship they showed "A Bridge Too Far". Color us red, white and blue. Then we ventured into the province of Friesland and the IJsselmeer, formerly the

PAGE 79 ... TARPA TOPICS

TARPA Tiptoes Through the Tulips (a colorful tale) Zuider Zee. The north end of our trip was the best to stimulate the Dutch economy. town of Franeker where we saw a planetarium (Shopping is so much easier for US citizens in conceived and built in the 1770's by Eise the age of the euro dollar.) Eisenga. His creation is still keeping accurate On our next to last full day we discovered ti me, showing the correct phases of the moon, another TARPA member aboard, Lew etc. We drove along the dike that separates the Whitaker and his friend Joan Poultney. North Sea from the IJsselmeer. Construction Somehow Vantage goofed and we plan to find began in 1932 and ended in 1992. Color us out why that happened. impressed! Our last day in the Netherlands was full of We were in another area of bulb production. beauty. It included a diamond factory, the We even taught our sweet, pretty Dutch guide, Rijksmuseum and the Tessa, that `boobs' was not the correct Floriade. None of you has to She can now, with some pronunciation. be told about the first two but concentration, say `boolbs'. We visited a lot the last is an experience that of pretty, tidy, colorful Dutch towns and it happens once every ten years Holland. It's an in horticultural international exhibit that covers 160 acres and includes expanses of tulips, hyacinths, daffodils, frittelaria and flowers I can't identify as well as a vineyard, lakes, waterfalls, and buildings. It defies description. Color us awe-struck. We all enjoyed the trip and were pleased with our accommodations on the MS River Explorer and the food (despite a maitre d' named Attila) was excellent. Most of the Dutch are so adept at speaking English that we had no communications problem. We're all glad to be sleeping in our own beds but it was a great trip with interesting activities, beautiful sights, delicious food and good company. Color us tired but happy!

Jean E. Thompson (Touring Thompson) drawings by Neal Johnson shouldn't surprise any of you that we did our

PAGE 80 ... TARPA TOPICS

The Connie Sets a Record by Betty Harvey Slegman It was late at night, February 2, 1946. I was part of a press junket that started from New York the day before and was now returning from Los Angeles aboard the brand new Lockheed Constellation airplane piloted by Jack Frye, then president of Trans World Airlines. We were flying over uncharted airways on this transcontinental trip that would last seven hours and twenty-seven minutes. It was a flight that would set a record in aviation history. It was an exciting two days. I was included in the press entourage because of a column I was writing for United Press in New York called "The World of Tomorrow." I was part of the "radio" division of the news department. Our staff rewrote the news as it came off the teletype machines for the radio broadcasters (no TV in those days). My features, however, were "made from scratch." I arrived at United Press during the summer of 1 944, having just graduated from the University of Michigan where I was the women's editor of "The Michigan Daily," the only morning paper in Ann Arbor. I had been a member of Mortar Board, majored in economics and had a good scholastic average. Employees with writing experience were at a premium in those days so I reluctantly hired on as a copy girl, but still was in the first small group of women to enter UP's hallowed newsroom. Copy girls took orders for coffee and sandwiches, ran out to buy them, calculated the money exchange and sometimes typed for the writers. We also worked at the baseball desk. This was almost my undoing, as I knew just a smattering about baseball. Batting- averages were over my head. UP started to get complaints from around the world that put my job in danger. My boss, Phil Newsome, called me to his desk and said he either would have to fire or promote me as things were at a crisis at the baseball desk. I said, "Phil, please promote me and I'll try hard to do well. " He agreed and I was up and running, typing in a new position as a UP writer. UP went day and night so my hours varied. Overnight shifts were hard on my stomach. I never knew whether to eat breakfast, lunch or dinner. But as I grew in the job, made friends with the staff and learned to meet deadlines every fifteen minutes, life took exciting turns. I handled news from Europe, the Pacific and the home front-whatever I was assigned. My most exciting story came the day the Atom bomb dropped on Hiroshima. My father, a noted scientist and engineer, told me once that the country that developed the Atom bomb PAGE 81 ... TARPA TOPICS

would rule the world. I was covering the Pacific roundup when the story arrived over the teletype machines unheralded (a big story was usually a "flash" in the newsroom when all but one machine stopped and everyone stood at attention). I told my editor, Arnold Dibble, what my father said and Dibble told me to "write it big!" I did the best I could to cover the Atom bomb story that day and the next as the secrets concerning the Bomb were released. This was a defining moment in my career because the big stories usually went to men. Perhaps as a reward for my intense and prolonged Atom bomb coverage and my recognition of the importance of the Atom bomb, I was promoted to the feature desk. It was a wonderful promotion because I actually had a desk plus a phone and regular nineâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;to-five hours. One of my features was "The World of Tomorrow." My boss, Phil Newsome, recommended me to Trans World Airlines when their invitation arrived to go aboard the Constellation airplane for a two-day junket. That's how I happened to be on that record-setting flight. We boarded the airplane early on February I, 1946, for an uneventful ride to Los Angeles with a stopover in Kansas City, Missouri. We had a lovely dinner in Los Angeles, toured MGM and met Joan Crawford, had another lunch and dinner, then climbed back on the Constellation late on February 2nd. In those days, no one told us to buckle our seat belts. About 1:00 am on February 3rd most people were sleeping. We were over the Sangre de Christo mountains in New Mexico when I felt a little tremor. I grabbed my seat arms. Suddenly, the plane dropped. It seemed to fall forever. Many of the news people on board went up headfirst into the brand new luggage racks, registering big holes in them. Some were tossed into the aisles along with their baggage and typewriters. Many suffered broken ribs and head wounds. Thankfully, there were no severe casualties. Jack Frye, the pilot, fortunately stabilized the airplane. He got us back to New York. We deplaned a rather sorry looking group of reporters but grateful to be alive. We decided among ourselves that our stories would only briefly mention the mishap. After all, the big story was that Frye flew the Constellation coast to coast in seven hours and twenty-seven minutes setting a new transcontinental record. I did not learn until later that during the mishap the co-pilot was knocked unconscious. He had been standing when the airplane plummeted and his head hit the ceiling of the cockpit. I read this in a news article written by Justin D. Bowersock of the Kansas City Star newspaper. It was serendipity that TWA was then based in Kansas City where I had relatives. They met me at the airport on the first leg of that memorable flight. They were my aunt and uncle Leon and Hortense Bloch, whose two sons would later start H&R Block. My aunt begged me to return to Kansas City for a "proper" visit, which I did on my vacation and there met my husband-to-be, Robert Slegman. PAGE 82 ... TARPA TOPICS

Love conquered all and softened the departure from my family in New York and my career at United Press. Once in Kansas City, I didn 't have much time for regrets, rearing my three childrenâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;John, Dorothy, and Ann. I am now a grandmother of Kate and David Isenberg and Sain Brewer, a mother-in-law to Holly Franking Slegman, Tom Isenberg, and Jim Brewer, and a step-grandmother to Jim ' s two children, Bronwyn and Casey. Writing remained an important part of my life. It expressed itself in my nineteenâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;year career as a partner in a small PR agency, Slegman/Laner. Now at age 76, I have many wonderful memories. Yet, that flight of the Connie back in 1946, always will be a highlight. After all, it was my very first airplane trip.

PAGE 83 ... TARPA TOPICS

PAGE 84 ... TARPA TOPICS