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Show ,SCo!. Robert L.Scotf W.NJU. RELEA&E l5L ( liANy tms far: Yoons Robert Scott, : c"rreat ambition is to fly, makei fllitt at Macon Ga., pulls off DPT 'ool, and crashea 67 feet to the :A Cberokee rose bash probably !j7 4 UJe. Be now eoes In for build-m.del build-m.del Plane, and win. . Boy i mno baon merit badce. At an auc- fSw y n" arst pl:ine ,or J75- STON to Ft. McPherson and enlists In ' r army a. a private. Wtnnlns Point competitive exam he 1. Rep, and In the summer of 1932 after idoated and commissioned as a :h'. rcnentenant of Infantry he goes to RnsuJwhlcn he tours on a motorcycle, .ak. .ly arrives at Randolph Field, Ihls 1. it ments had come. As he leaned over my cockpit and reached inside the ship for the Form One, the time-book time-book always carried in Army ships, I saw only his hand and thought he was offering to shake hands with me. So I grabbed the hand and shook it He just grinned and growled: "With landings like those- I can do you very little good, and I'll be damned il I'm going to let you kill me. Do you think you can take this thing around the field all by yourself your-self and get it back down?" "Yes, Sir," I yelled. "Then take it around and make a landing as close to me as you can." I had never felt so good. Taxying out I could see the world only in a rosy light. My head was really whirling. Pointing the ship into the wind, I over-controlled into a normal nor-mal student takeoff and was in the air. Honestly, the living of this life was wonderful here I was an actual Army Pilot with my own ship, and up here free from the shackles of the earth. I envied no one. Circling Cir-cling in traffic I'd "get my head in the clouds" and gain or lose altitude but that didn't matter. I was soloing. solo-ing. Then, at the fourth leg of my traffic pattern, I began my. glide in towards Lieutenant Landon. By the gods he had said, "Land as close to me as you can," and I was surely going to make that ship stop right by him I wouldn't have my instructor in-structor being ashamed of his student. stu-dent. Even before I got to the moment mo-ment to level off, I could see that I would land right on top of him. But the Monday morning flying period. I always had to delay my start until after Saturday morning inspection. inspec-tion. That meant that I had to average av-erage just about fifty-four miles an hour, even counting the time I saw the girl, in the forty-seven hours that I had from after inspection on Saturday to flying time at eight o'clock Monday mornings! Week-end after week-end I drove madly across the South from the middle of Texas to the middle of Georgia. On one of these cross-country dashes, I weakened and was fool enough to ask the Commandant of Student Officers if I could go to Atlanta. I can still see and hear Capt. Aubrey Strickland saying, "Atlanta "At-lanta what?" And me meekly replying, re-plying, "Atlanta, Georgia, Sir." He just said, "Hell, no," and I turned and walked from his office with the good intention of obeying the order. But within the hour I had weakened. weak-ened. I filled my rumble-stot tank, which held fifty-five gp.iloiis of fuel, and was off to see h-?r for the short time available. (Yes, she was, and still is some On the return trip I burner? out two bearings near Patterson, Louisiana. Jimmy We-dell, We-dell, one of the well-known speed flyers, helped me to get it fixed after I explained the predicament I was in. But even with five of us working work-ing on the number one and number six bearings of the Chevy, I was twelve hours late getting back to Randolph Field. As I walked into the bachelor officers' offi-cers' quarters that I shared with Bob Terrill, I expected any minute to hear the sad news. But I was too afraid to ask for details, so I just waited for Bob to say, "You are to report to the General tomorrow for court martial for A.W.O.L. in violation of specific instructions." Finally he put down his letter writing, writ-ing, looked at me almost in disgust, dis-gust, and broke out: "Scott, you are the damned luckiest luck-iest man that ever lived! You didn't get reported today. No! This is the first time in the history of Randolph Field that it's been too cold to fly. And it wasn't only too cold to fly, it was too cold to have ground school, because the heating system had failed. We haven't flown today, we haven't been to ground school. So they don't even know that you've been over there to see that girl." In all of these trips to see my girl over in Georgia, I drove 84,000 miles. I wore out two cars and you'll probably agree that her father fa-ther had full right to say to her: "Why don't you go on and marry him? It'll be far cheaper than his driving over here every week-end." When I had finished Primary and Basic training at Randolph, I almost al-most let down my hair and wept, though, on the day that Commandant Comman-dant of Student Officers called over and said that now I could have permission to go to Georgia, to see my girl. I thanked him and went. ... Well, when graduation came at Kelly and I had those wings pinned on my chest, I had the wonderful feeling that I had gone a little way towards the goal I wanted. I was at last an Army pilot. Never did the world seem so good. And then out of a clear sky came orders for me to go to duty in Hawaii. That was pretty bad because I wanted to get married before I went out of the country, and as yet the girl hadn't gotten her degree from college. Probably if I had gone to Hawaii, if i I I " n , CHAPTER HI Lollei Write th I had flown before in the ia" LSrie crates of the past, this " d nothing to do with wheth-ailersot wheth-ailersot I would get through the On the side against me ny fact that durins mv ti led flying I had doubtless de-j7Tmany de-j7Tmany faults that were not tyyft Army pilot to be proud of. oHMase like mine, some pilots TaThey know it all; therefore ffejs nothing to learn. Others SM;uch aD effort to please their -tors that this very eagerness lump against them as their own irenemy the result of tense-sate tense-sate Cooksjcase was more of this last rom 1 knew 1 could flv e shiP here, n'tried to carry out my instruc-'hiVaV; instruc-'hiVaV; orders even before he gave I listened almost spellbound igh our oral communications SEm in that primary trainer that lung-tube which we called a dFBport" and which at best was ' Afti' to understand over the rattle "that Wright Whirlwind engine. ied to try to read his mind, exe- his every little whim. I even tori,) jo outguess Lieutenant Lan- i and have the stick and rudder liniving to the right direction be-w;i be-w;i lie could get the orders out of mt: mouth. otlow thereby hangs a tale. I was nun, only trying to look in his rear-an rear-an mirror and actually read his ton when I couldn't hear through gosport, but was diligently look-pi look-pi about the sky for other hare-s hare-s .Iced student pilots. He must have ncejized my eagerness, for he gave jirr.every break and for the many era I pulled I needed lots of aks. ne day, at a bare four-hundred altitude, I thought I heard the tractor say, "Okay, Scott, put it dive." I peered around first and fh at the nearby ground, for it "ted very low to be going into a k. Then like a flash I thought I !erstood: Why, he's trying to see ,? m ground-shy I'll show him I'm tuifith my teeth clenched and prob-'"y prob-'"y with my eyes closed, I pushed ,'Jl.t PT-3 into a vertical dive at ,nt-blank altitude. Just as the ton fields down below seemed iput to come right into my lap I -H Ted Landon grab the controls .Ji saw him hastily point to his 'id with the sign that he was "tak- i over." We came out just over ! mesquite trees, and he roughly pped the ship into a bumpy land-jfr land-jfr in a cotton field. Then, while Unas trying to add things up and Ijalizing already that I had tied it again, I saw Ted very methodi- ..Uy raise his goggles and with oeat deliberation climb out of the ,jnt cockpit. He glared at me but id sweetly enough: "Scott, what in the g d hell e you trying to do what was that aneuver? I said glide G-L-I-D-E. )n't you at least know what a jrmal glide is in all this time? ,Weakly I said, "Sir, I thought you ;id a dive." I could see Ted fight .r control; then he told me the Jxt time I had him at an altitude low, not to attempt to think but 'St try to keep the ship straight ;id level. On another day, after about two es of instruction, we had been taking only take-offs and landings, d I knew the time was approach's approach-'s when I would solo. As usual, 'at realization made me more and lore tense as the end of the period wed. On the take-offs I'd tense P and forget all about holding the ose straight, and on the landings d jerk back on the stick instead of as"ig it slowly back into the ap-roart) ap-roart) to landing stall. All I could 1 was day-dream about: Here we ". Scott, just about to take over no prove to the world that we can 0 all of this by ourselves, ground the field in traffic I couldn't old the correct altitude, and my inductor in-ductor was cussing a blue streak, 'cdyel about my having graduat-d graduat-d from West Point and say that he ncw I was supposed to have some rains but he hadn't been able to ni them. After each bumpy land-Z land-Z he'd look around at me and hold is nose that was symbolic enough hie. 1 finally bounced into an-landing an-landing that nearly jarred his out. Then, as usual, he owcS what a prince of a fellow he 'as, nd showed me that an instruc-'r instruc-'r had to become accustomed to 'odenta' making mistakes knowl-which knowl-which stood me in good stead ears later when I became an in-trictor. in-trictor. Lieutenant Landon got out of the 't seat, taking his parachute with 'od I knew the moment of mo- i Gen. C. L. Chennanlt, who was Colonel Scott's superior in Burma and China. the Lieutenant was running, throwing throw-ing his parachute away just to get clear of a student who had really taken him literally. Anyway, I missed him and plunked the ship into the ground after aft-er levelling off too high. Well, I held it straight and there was no ground - loop. As it stopped I breathed again, and I could feel the smile that cracked my face. A pilot! I had landed the ship and it was actually in one piece! Looking back over my shoulder I saw Lieutenant Landon. He was just standing there about half a mile away. Then I made another mistake. He raised his hands and I thought he waved me in I didn't know until the next day that he had been shaking his fist at me for trying .to land right on him. So I taxied in, never giving a thought to how my instructor was going to get in with his chute you see, Randolph is a big field and I had left him more than a mile from our hangar. I had parked the plane and was in and beginning to dress when I began to realize what I had done. Looking out the window win-dow I could see him trudging across the hot soil of Texas, in the sun, with ships landing all around him. My Lord, I had tied it up again! I tried to get my feet back into my flying-suit, tripped and fell, got up and ran out of the hangar door. I guess I was going to take the ship and taxy out and pick him up. But I had lost again the ship was being taken from the line by the next student. stu-dent. I just stood there With sinking sink-ing heart as he came up. But he didn't even look my way, except to say, "It's kinda hot out there." Then he just glared and threw his chute in his locker. Well, I nearly worried myself to death that night. I knew he'd more than likely tell me after the next day's ride that 1 was the damnedest student he'd ever seen, and that I didn't have a prayer of making a pilot. Eut next day he didn't say a word. AU day I started to go over and tell him how sorry I was, but I guess I didn't have the nerve. During my flying training, I had girl trouble, too. You would no doubt call it "trouble," but I knew it was the real thing. I had a Chevrolet Chevro-let then, and every week-end I just had to see my girl, even if she did live over thirteen hundred miles away in Georgia. To get to see her, I would drive that thirtccn-hundred-odd miles to her college or her home in Fort Valley, spend anywhere any-where from ten minutes to two hours with her. then jump back in the car and drive madly for Texas and I would have figured out some way to have flown a P-12 back over every ev-ery week but I didn't have to do it after all. The Chief of the Air Corps came down a few days later and I waited until he had had lunch in the Officers' Offi-cers' Mess. Then I walked over and said, "General, can I ask you a question?" "Sure, sit down," he said, and I told him the whole story and I made it like this: "General, I know that I'm supposed to go where I'm sent because I'm In the Army, but I've got a girl over in Georgia, and I think I can do a lot better job wherever you send me if you can give me time to talk her into marrying me." He didn't appear ap-pear to be very impressed at first, but he took my name and ierial number, and two or three day later, lat-er, when he got back to Washington, I was ordered to Mitchel Field, N. Y. As I drove my car towards my first tactical assignment I kept reaching up to feel my silver wings on my chest I wanted to prove that it wasn't a dream. This was what I had been working for since 1920. Now I was actually riding towards the glory of tactical Army aviation. I recall that I had just about completed the trip to Long Island, when something happened that will keep me remembering the fall of 1933. Just before I reached the Holland Tunnel, I was suddenly forced to the curb by three cars all bristling with sawed-off shotguns and Tommy-guns. Tommy-guns. I jumped out pretty mad, but saw that many guns were covering me and that it was the police. They looked at my papers, but said anyone could have mimeographed orders. They searched the car and me, took down the Texas license number, and even copied the engine number. All the time I tried to talk with the flashlights in my eye. ITO BE CONTINUED' |