Nomad News-Vol.4-No.87

BOYHOOD HEROES: Recently, I received an e-mail titled "The Old Man With a Bucket of Shrimp". It narrated how Eddie Rickenbacker's life was saved by a seagull and how he repaid the debt in latter years. Eddie Rickenbacker was a Wold War I flying pioneer and later on, the founder of Eastern Airlines. He was also, one of my boyhood heroes. I made a "scooter" by nailing a wooden box on a piece of wood. Under the wood was two sets of roller skate wheels. On the top of the box was a smaller piece of wood that served as a steering arm and did double-duty as the airplane's wing. A nearby neighbor had a long concrete driveway on a slope. As Eddie Rickenbacker, I would wait at the top of the slope for Manfred von Richthofen (the Red Baron) to come by and then swoop in behind him in my Spad and "shoot him down". The next day I might reverse the players. I would be the Red Baron in my Fokker D-7 "shooting down" Eddie Rickenbacker. Another WWI German hero was Hans Imelmann, perfector of the "Imelmann" maneuver, rolling an airplane out into level flight at the top of a loop. Later in life, after I had received my pilot's ticket, I was tempted to try an Imelmann but was afraid the 09 didn't have enough power to pull herself around in that attitude and would fall into an inverted spin, from which there is no way to recover. A normal spin is OK. Next to looping, the 09 was happiest when spinning. Back to earth and my heroes. Next was Buck Rogers, a comic strip heroe who flew through space with his Space Belt. I was in space before Alan Shepherd. I wrote about my experience with a "space belt in Nomad News No.58 CLOSE ENCOUNTERS. Then came Charles Lindbergh, "Lucky Lindy" and his solo flight to Paris in "The Spirit of St. Louis". One of my prized possessions was a leather Lindy helmet Finally there was G-8 and His Battle Aces, a comic strip aviator-spy who was always in hot pursuit of Doktor Kreuger, I believe it was. I was never able to fulfil by desire to be a military pilot but perhaps just as well. Maybe my sheltering angel was looking after me then, too. While on airplanes, I might as well relate a couple of incidents involving paper airplanes. When in high school, I would make paper airplanes and while waiting for the teacher to appear, would make a paper airplane and from the back of the room, attempt to land it in the waste basket by the teacher's desk. One day I was near the door and had my arm cocked to launch the airplane when Miss Zimmerman came in behind me and took the craft from my hand. This was an offense that normally would send the student to Bull Reynolds office; Mr. Reynolds being the superintendent. Fortunately, Miss Zimmerman liked me because I was a good student, scholastically speaking, and she just said: "Donald, take your seat". Fast forward to 1942. I'm at Fort Devans Air Base, MA. We would take the train home some weekends, from Boston to Philadelphia. On the Sunday evening return, George Morphesis, whose family owned a Greek restaurant, would come back with a big bag of Texas Tommys, hot dogs wrapped in a slice of bacon with a strip of pickle and cheese on a roll. Upon entering the train, we would proceed to the Club Car and commence washing the dogs down with cold beer. On one trip, one of the guys made a paper airplane from a menu and it took a nose dive on takeoff. I said something to the affect that "I'll show you how to make one that will fly", which I did. I gave it a toss down the aisle and it flew beautifully. Now, in our group there was the First Sergeant, two Tech Sergeants, and three Staff Sergeants of which I was one. About the middle of the car there was a table of four or five officers having dinner, one being a Lt. Colonel. The Colonel came to our table with my paper airplane in his hand. It had landed in his beer glass. He came directly to me, handed me my work of art, and said: "Sergeant, you better keep your men under control". Why me? I said: "Yes, Sir", and gave him an Air Corps salute. An Air Corps salute was a casual two fingers to the forehead and casual retraction. Nothing stiff or formal with us. Things are different today. They, meaning the oppressive government, has either litigated or legislated the fun out of flying. Kids today aren't allowed to dream and without dreams, there is no imagination. The government takes control of them shortly after they learn to walk. They never learn to bond by enjoying such things as "pick Up" sports where they make their own rules, for example Then their self-gratifying parents push them into Little League baseball or Pop Warner football, regaled in big league uniforms. They never learn to have a fun life. Everything is regimented. (copyright 2014 Andrew M. Dolan)