here's bob. "neighbor bob." he's 3mo shy of 95. he was 78 years old when monty and i moved to The Compound. monty is my next door neighbor, and bob's property abuts both of our parcels.
bob was drafted at 18 years old, in 1942. his high school, in dodge city, kansas, graduated out about a dozen boys who got drafted (most of the class). bob was drafted into the army but was asked, after basic training, if he wanted to go into the army air force. here's bob below. i took him out to lunch as is my habit and monty's (the day before monty took him to breakfast).
bob began as a flight instructor, flying the T-6. i asked him how many pilots he taught to fly. "25" (bob's sharp as a tack, and remembers WWII exactly).
then he was put into the cockpit of the B-29, and flew those over the pacific. i asked him all the usual questions. "did you know tibbets?" "no. he was before me. by the time i was in the B29 the war had just ended."
just because they weren't shooting at him, it's not as if bob's service wasn't perilous. the B29 had a nasty habit of losing engines during flight, which happened to him, inconvenient when flying from hawaii to guam and similar long runs over open ocean.
half of the dozen who got drafted out of bob's HS class was lost in the war. his best HS friend died aboard the USS liscome bay, a transport carrier, when it was sunk off the gilbert islands.
of the 16 million WWII veterans in the US, about 1 million were alive in 2014. half that number are alive today.
i asked bob yesterday if he thinks he could still fly a T-6 if he was plopped into the cockpit today. bob's quite a humble guy about his abilities, probably overly so. he thought about it for a minute and said, "yes." and then took another bite of his sandwich.
Dan Empfield
aka Slowman
bob was drafted at 18 years old, in 1942. his high school, in dodge city, kansas, graduated out about a dozen boys who got drafted (most of the class). bob was drafted into the army but was asked, after basic training, if he wanted to go into the army air force. here's bob below. i took him out to lunch as is my habit and monty's (the day before monty took him to breakfast).
bob began as a flight instructor, flying the T-6. i asked him how many pilots he taught to fly. "25" (bob's sharp as a tack, and remembers WWII exactly).
then he was put into the cockpit of the B-29, and flew those over the pacific. i asked him all the usual questions. "did you know tibbets?" "no. he was before me. by the time i was in the B29 the war had just ended."
just because they weren't shooting at him, it's not as if bob's service wasn't perilous. the B29 had a nasty habit of losing engines during flight, which happened to him, inconvenient when flying from hawaii to guam and similar long runs over open ocean.
half of the dozen who got drafted out of bob's HS class was lost in the war. his best HS friend died aboard the USS liscome bay, a transport carrier, when it was sunk off the gilbert islands.
of the 16 million WWII veterans in the US, about 1 million were alive in 2014. half that number are alive today.
i asked bob yesterday if he thinks he could still fly a T-6 if he was plopped into the cockpit today. bob's quite a humble guy about his abilities, probably overly so. he thought about it for a minute and said, "yes." and then took another bite of his sandwich.
Dan Empfield
aka Slowman