Page Ten

  In June 1950, the Korean War brought an end to my civilian status. Having agreed to stay in the Reserves. I ended up as a member of a Volunteer Air Reserve Training Unit (VARTU) at O'Hare Field in Chicago. Two weeks after the Korean War started nearly all navigators from the O'Hare VARTU were called back to active duty. Needless to say, we were no longer the free-spirited, somewhat arrogant, flyboys of WWII. Now we were mostly husbands and fathers, and had a different outlook on life. Something else had changed; the Army Air Corps had become the U.S. Air Force. Out with pink and green uniforms and brown shoes, in with the blue uniforms and black shoes.

First Assignment

Our first assignment was to Ellington Field in Houston, Texas. A crash course of seventeen training days seemed rather short considering the fact we had not picked up an E6B computer, or been in a military aircraft, in over four and one half years. It all came back pretty' quickly with ground classes and flight training in T19 and B25 aircraft.  

Let me stray from the story theme here to say something about Madeleine. Joyce and Bill. We had now come to be a military family, albeit Joyce and Bill were at first too young to understand. Five years of actual military time. Which I will continue to write about, and five years as a civilian field engineer attached to the Air Force, resulted in many moves. Three months of the civilian time put me in North Africa while they stayed in Orlando. Florida, Many miles on the road, with no air conditioning, no cruise control, and no freeways, brought up the question many times "are we about there?" Madeleine did an excellent job with Joyce and Bill during their formative years and they coped very well.

Next Assignment

The next assignment was to the Fairfield Suisun AFB in California. The first item on the agenda was to pick up Madeleine. Joyce and Bill in Chicago and fly to California.

We learned very quickly that there was very little housing available. We spent the first thirty days in a Quonset hut on the Mare Island Naval Base in Vallejo. A former WWII housing development was made somewhat livable, so we moved there. The developments official name was Chabot Terrace, but was better known as Shabby Terrace. Not a good way to start out as a military family.

The plane assigned to the Fairfield Suisun AFB was the ten-engine (6 conventional & 4 jets) B36. One later crashed on takeoff, killing the complete crew, plus Colonel Travis, the wing commander. The base was renamed Travis AFB.

It was assumed that we would be assigned to a B36 crew.  However, it was soon apparent that we, as reservists, were considered expendable. We would form B29 crews in preparation for combat over Korea. We were sent to the McDill AFB in Tampa, Florida for about a month of B29 crew training. (During WWII, McDill was a training base for the twin-engine B26 crews who said the plane had the glide angle of a rock. Thus, the term "One a day in Tampa Bay".)

The tour at McDill was pretty routine, mainly involved in learning the plane and jelling as a crew. There was one incident that indicates how difficult it is to get an order changed in the military once it is given. A hurricane watch was issued and orders were given to get all B29 's out of McDill. We were scheduled to take off about 8 p.m. but engine problems held us back. About 4 a.m., even though the weather conditions had changed, we took off into a clear sky and landed in a raging storm about three hours later at the Barksdale AFB in Louisiana. The hurricane never came close to McDill.

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