Stories tagged "Military": 61
Stories
Mission to Sicily
"Then they came up with the mission to Sicily. And 36, well more than that, volunteered to fly as copilot with the British into Sicily, which we did. Out of the 36, 16 of us got back. And the reason for that is, the American tow pilots went into…
Flying Missions in Africa
"We went to Blida, Algeria, which is 60 kilometers outside of Algiers. And we flew copilot on C-47s while we were there. And we would fly flights from Blida to Casablanca, Blida to Gibraltar, Blida to Cairo. And they were long flights, boring.…
Egypt
"We landed in Fayid, Egypt 45 days, 43 days later. And Fayid, Egypt was where we were stationed. We had nothing to do. They had no gliders. They didn’t know what to do with us, but they wanted us overseas. So we were on a British base, and the…
Shipping Out
"We sailed out of Virginia on December the 1st, I believe it was. Norfolk, Virginia on the Mariposa. And that was a beautiful luxury liner. Very fast. 21 knots. And we went over without an escort ‘cause we had submarines all over the place, you…
Marriage Postponed
"There were 109 of us in the first class at Lubbock...We graduated on November the 10th, 1942...That was South Plains Air Force, they called it. And we were supposed to remain as instructors. Well, we get orders to transfer us to Austin,…
Advanced Glider Training
"Then we went into advanced, and they had some sail planes that we flew which were a lot of fun. And then towards the end of the training, they brought in the CG4A’s. And that was interesting. The people that brought them in were fighter pilots,…
Primary Glider Training
"I told the school officer I just had to fly. So I went back to my Link office. He called me that afternoon, and he said, 'Hey, Guy. How would you like to be a glider pilot?' I said, 'What is that?' He said, 'You fly…
Link Instructor School
"So I went to Chanute Field...I had enough college so they would let me go to Link instructor school, which was a school for training pilots to fly instruments. And we learned to fly the Link instructor, which was a container like a box. And…
Basic Training
"I was fortunate enough to get in the Air Force...That was in Texas, the worst part of Texas. Sheppard Field...It would rain on your head, sand was blowing in your face, and you were standing in water up to your knees. It was a horrible…
Pearl Harbor
"I was at Tenasin’s drive-in with a bunch of buddies. And I had a bunch of half bottles of whiskey in the trunk of the car. And we all got pretty well soused...
We thought the world’s coming to an end. We didn’t know what to think. We knew…