Those of us chosen for the event went to work right away on our aircraft. I wanted to reduce weight and get as much thrust out of my jet as possible. With the connivance of the maintenance and armament people, we tweaked the engine, giving me more fuel flow, higher tailpipe temps, and a little more speed. Then we started working on reducing weight. Out went the four .50 caliber guns and the ammo boxes. We were working on the armor plate behind the pilot seats when we were told that any tampering with the birds would disqualify us. Apparently, this message was sent by the Pentagon but originated at AMC headquarters. It seemed strange that Air Material Command should worry about it, but since the Material Command was entering three birds in the race, most of us in the fighter group were damned suspicious.
We arrived in Cleveland before the Labor Day weekend races to squeeze in as much practice as we could. After I landed from a practice and taxied in, a fellow walked toward my bird. It was Tony LeVier, already a famous air race pilot from previous Cleveland events, but also currently the chief test pilot for Lockheed and the ultimate expert on the flight characteristics of the P-80.
After I climbed out of my cockpit and we introduced ourselves, Tony walked around my bird, scrutinizing it from every angle. He took one look at the wrinkles running diagonally down both sides of my P-80’s fuselage and whistled. “Just how many g’s did you pull, Robin?”
“Hell, Tony”—I shrugged—“I don’t know. The g meter pegged out. I’ve been trying different ways to cut time around those pylons. Guess I overdid it.”
“Yeah, I guess you did!” Tony shook his head and laughed. “Back at Lockheed we figured around eleven g’s might do that to the 80, but no one up to now ever did it. I wouldn’t stress that particular bird any more if I were you. Matter of fact, you might consider not even flying it again.” Tony obviously knew what he was talking about, and I took him very seriously. In fact, all of us had him up on a pretty high pedestal in the pilots’ world.
So I asked him, “What do you suggest, Tony?”
“Well, what has worked for the prop racers should work for jets, too. Aerodynamics are aerodynamics. Pull all those g-forces and you’ve increased your angle of attack drastically. Do that and you’ve loaded up enough drag to stop a train. And that will sure as hell slow you down. Since this is the first time anyone has ever raced jets around a closed course we have a lot to learn. But basic aerodynamics still apply. What I’d do is take those turns as smoothly as you can. Don’t dive at the base of the pylons and jerk the bird around. Get enough spacing on your approach to each turn, rack up about 70 or 80 degrees of bank, dive a little bit, and cut around each pylon as closely as you can. I’m sure you’ll find the speed you keep will more than offset the small extra distance you’ve taken. What do you have, two more practice sessions? OK, try it next time.”
I did, and Tony was right. I gained precious seconds on each of the 18-mile legs of the racecourse. But there was something else to overcome.
We had been at Cleveland for several days before the participating aircraft from the AMC headquarters at Wright-Patterson showed up. Naturally curious, and disguising my previously formed suspicions, I ambled over to have a look at them. To my astonishment and growing rage, I was barred from getting any closer than 50 yards from those competitors. Even at that distance some peculiarities could be seen: The air scoops on one of the P-80s were bigger than normal, there were no gun ports in the nose, and the armor plate that stuck up behind the seat was very obviously not steel. It was more than likely made out of cardboard.
Once refueled, the Wright-Pat jets were trundled into a hangar and the doors were rolled shut. I was incensed but couldn’t seem to find anyone who gave a damn. OK, we’ll see. It occurred to me I might load a hundred or so rounds in the guns I would be carrying, but that might have been considered unsportsmanlike conduct. Besides, there was no place in Cleveland where I could get my hands on such ammunition.
Since we were fuel-limited, the jet division of the Thompson Trophy Race was cut to ten laps, as opposed to the twenty the propeller racers would fly. Even ten laps was cutting it close. I had other problems, too. Since my wrinkled bird was no longer usable, I had to borrow someone else’s for practice and for the race itself. No time to fiddle or twiddle, just polish the leading edge and hope the borrowed bird was a good one. Fortunately, it turned out to be just that.
The morning of our race, we military pilots were called into a briefing room and given a stern lecture by some colonel we didn’t know. We were told that we were there to represent the Army Air Forces, that the public and the press wanted to see our new jets, that we were expected to put on a polished and professional demonstration, that this wasn’t a competition for our self-glorification, and that winning was not the object of the exercise. By the expressions on the other faces, I knew the rest of the pilots listening to the colonel wondered where in hell he was coming from. Not compete? Just whom did he think he was talking to—a group from the seminary? What BS.
Time dragged, but we were finally towed out to the parallel runways. There we were positioned into two groups, line abreast, wingtip to wingtip. I thought to myself, This ought to make that first turn around the pylon just off the southwest end of the runway pretty interesting, if not downright hairy.
Someone standing on the hood of a jeep waved a flag as the signal to start engines. For some reason it had been decided we would all make battery starts, not a good thing under any circumstance. My jet took forever to spool up. Glancing away from the tailpipe temperature and rpm gauges, I saw the rest of the guys signaling they were ready. I couldn’t catch the starter’s attention. Down went the flag.
My engine was only up to 96 percent rpm when away they all went! I felt like the tortoise in Aesop’s fable. The other six jets left me fighting their exhaust turbulence and I was last off the ground. Actually, this turned out to be a good thing. As a matter of self-preservation the other six pilots had scattered out for that first turn. By the time I got airborne, my engine was really humming. I was pulling about 104 percent and the tailpipe temperature was just below the red line. OK. Good. Now, if the thing would just last for the next twenty-odd minutes, I’d be all right. I kept my bird down on the deck, about 20 feet off the ground, and sailed around the first pylon underneath several of the other jets.
When we completed a lap and a half I was right behind the leading jet. It was that special bird from Wright-Pat. The way things turned out, and thanks to Tony LeVier, I managed to gain on each of the turns, then had to watch in frustration as the lead guy pulled away on the straightaways. So it went: gain a little, lose a little, around and around. When I pulled the ninth piece of tape off my instrument panel showing I was on our last lap, I tried my best to smooth out each turn. It helped a bit, but even with the throttle practically bent over the quadrant and the temp stuck on the red line, I still went around the last pylon and crossed the finish line a scant second in trail.
At this point, my fuel counter, which I’d been trying to ignore, was showing fourteen gallons remaining. I yanked my throttle to idle and pulled up sharply, trading speed for altitude, setting myself up for a flameout landing just in case. Before I could request priority in the landing pattern, the Wright-Pat guy called a fuel emergency himself. OK, maybe he was pulling excess power the whole time … and maybe not.
My engine didn’t quit and I landed behind him and then followed onto the taxiway and back to the ramp, unbuckling myself as I went. He was led to the winner’s parking spot in front of the grandstands. I ignored my flagman and parked right next to him. On the pretext of offering my congratulations, I jumped out and hustled over to his bird just as the ground crew put up his ladder. Climbing up, I leaned into his cockpit and gave him a congratulatory handshake.
One glance at his fuel counter and I felt like hitting the son of a bitch. Mine had rolled down past zero. His read eighty gallons.
On one particular night in December, coming back from an air show in the Midwest, I thought, How luc
ky I am to be here in this moment, to be doing this and feeling for the umpteenth time that this is where I belong. My P-80 almost purred as we sped along at 38,000 feet toward California. It was a moonless night with millions of stars glistening over my canopy, so clear and close I felt I could reach out and touch them. Off to my right, several thunderstorms were putting on a magnificent display, lightning flashing from cloud to cloud and striking the earth below. With each flash the clouds nearby gleamed pure white for an instant, and before they returned to dull gray, another flash started the process somewhere else along the front. Of course, the spectacle was silent to me. The sound of thunder and ferocity of action within and beneath the clouds could only be imagined. At my altitude the air was calm, and with practically no headwind, each checkpoint ticked off within seconds of my planned estimates.
Ahead, the Rockies lay under a blanket of snow as they stretched north and south from horizon to horizon. Soon they were behind me, and only the scattered lights of lonely ranches and tiny towns told of people sleeping below. Grand Junction passed underneath. I could see the glow of the city lights of Phoenix off on the horizon to the southwest. The San Francisco Peaks of Arizona lay dead ahead, covered with their white winter’s blanket. The small scattering of town lights along the south flanks of the mountain told me I was looking at Flagstaff.
As always, when passing this way, either flying or driving, I thought of the day back in April 1943 when I stood on the flight line at Davis-Monthan and watched the B-17 as it departed, carrying Dad’s ashes to be scattered over those same peaks. It seemed very long ago, yet scarcely five years had passed—five years filled with enough action and experience to last a lifetime: a war, jets, the loss of friends, and in another month, marriage. It was all happening so quickly.
When I crossed the Colorado River, gleaming like a silver ribbon, I knew I was back in California with the home runway only minutes ahead. A call to the last radio range station, instrument flight plan canceled, power back, and nose down started the long, gliding descent toward Riverside and March Field. A sleepy tower operator gave me landing information, and with an overhead pattern, flaps and gear down, a turn to final, and a slight bump, I was down.
I parked and rolled back the canopy. I sat for a few moments filling the forms for an OK flight, jotted down the takeoff and landing times, logged my night time, and listened to the metallic pinging as the engine cooled and the jet settled down until needed again.
On the way to squadron operations to stash my flight gear and change clothes, I thought of just getting into my car and continuing on to Beverly Hills and Ella. It was early Saturday morning and the weekend beckoned. Good judgment prevailed. I needed to get a few hours of sleep right here on base. The rest of the two days ahead could be taken care of with fresh energy … and I mean ENERGY!
Our wedding on February 6 in Beverly Hills was wonderful. My dad would have loved it. I missed him terribly that day. The crowd of photographers and people outside the church was really something. Ella and I headed off to ski at Sugar Bowl in Lake Tahoe for a quick honeymoon. It was my first time skiing and I terrorized that mountain. Ella was an old hand at it, having grown up in the mountains of Snoqualmie, Washington. I must say she was very patient with me. That honeymoon gave me a gift I’d enjoy the rest of my life. Skiing became a passion, not only for the sport and physical thrill of it, but because it was a great way to spend times with old friends and meet new ones. The après-ski appealed to me almost as much as the time on the mountain. It was also a grand thing to share with my wife.
We settled into Ella’s house and I continued to drive back and forth to March Field. I was made operations officer of the 12th Recon Squadron. I enjoyed it, but, unfortunately, the experience didn’t last long.
Not long after the wedding, Colonel Leon Gray was leading eight of us in a pass over the airfield. This wasn’t showing off. It was being done for the benefit of the ground crews, who worked so hard to keep our jets in top shape. Leon had his flight in echelon to his right, with me and my flight in echelon on his left. That made a nice big V and looked good from the ground. After passing the north boundary, he started a gradual turn to the left. I eased the nose down, and as my three followed, I gave them the signal to go to right echelon. I never liked turning into an echelon. It was difficult for Three and Four, and seldom necessary. I wanted Leon to pass overhead as I kept going straight during the initial part of the changeover. When I knew my three guys were in trail, I started a gentle turn to the left to rejoin the colonel.
Something went horribly wrong. I couldn’t see what happened, but while underneath me, number Four collided with Three and they both went down. Neither managed to bail. It was a bad day. Though I tried my best to give an accurate description in front of the accident board later, their findings made it look as though my actions caused the collision. I was finished as operations officer of the squadron, transferred to 12th Air Force headquarters, then made a personnel director, a task and position for which I had neither affinity nor training. I soon realized I was the one who selected who would go where as people arrived in the command. Moreover, requests for bodies to fulfill vacancies and to fill requisitions from other commands were also under my purview. It was interesting and made me realize how someone in that position might gain an exaggerated sense of importance in the overall scheme of things. I floated along with my new job and flew as often as I liked, which of course was most of the time.
Then one day a request came in for personnel to fill a quota for a new school just organized in Florida. It was called the Air Corps Tactical School. I was the one who would pick the attendees, and my name went on the top of the list. Sometimes even a bad assignment can have good results.
Ella and I laughed and sang as we drove east in my 1939 Buick sedan at the end of April. We were bound for Tyndall Field, located on the beaches of the Florida Panhandle near Panama City. We were excited and happy to be spending the next three months basically alone in a new spot, away from the bustle of Southern California. A new adventure lay ahead and my first headquarters job lay behind.
I returned to March from the tactical school at the end of September, but this time I was assigned to an operations job far more suitable to my experience. I confess those staff jobs didn’t hurt me a bit. Whoever had me transferred out of the squadron in the first place really did me a favor. I’m not sure it was his original intent, but that’s the way it worked out. It was during this last job at March that I was picked to be one of the escort officers for a flight of RAF fighters doing a tour of the East Coast. Those pilots had Vampire jets and put on shows at various fields, including Washington. They were marvelous fellows, with great skill as pilots and a delightful sense of humor about everything. I thoroughly enjoyed the month I spent with them. Later, when a request came through for someone from March to go on an exchange tour with the RAF for a year, I jumped at the assignment!
In October I was off to England again. Ella was finishing up her latest film assignment, so she’d be joining me in November. I was headed back to what had felt like home, despite the war just two years before, and I was happy!
12
Exchange with the RAF 1948
Tangmere was, as the RAF would say, pissing with rain on that late October day in 1948. Ragged gray clouds caught in the trees and blurred nearby buildings. And it was damp, thoroughly damp. Not your normal kind of rain-wet damp, but raw damp right through your clothes, down in your shoes, between your shoulder blades. It was the sort of damp that made mockery of a trench coat and made me wish for a fireplace and a hot glass of something. On top of that, it was cold, the kind of penetrating cold that drove the damp into your bones and made your nose water.
I trudged on toward the flight line and tried to work up some enthusiasm for the situation. It wasn’t easy with wet pant legs flapping against my shins and a trickle of cold water trying to get inside my collar. Nor did it help my mood thinking of the night before, when I had spent hours trying to light a c
oal fire in my room in the officers’ mess. I had given up and huddled for the rest of the night under soggy sheets and blankets. Most of all, it hadn’t helped this morning facing a limp piece of toast upon which rested twelve evil-looking beans. That, together with a shot of canned grapefruit juice and a small cup of bitter black liquid meant to be coffee, had been breakfast, not just my own breakfast, but breakfast for everyone in the Tangmere mess. The hot sun of Southern California seemed remote and far, far away.
I had known it would be different when I finessed this assignment. I had wriggled my way out of a lousy desk job at March Field and back to a flying slot, a very special flying slot. I was assigned as an exchange officer with No. 1 Squadron of the Royal Air Force. The warriors of the RAF had been my inspiration and envy when I was a cadet at West Point. I grinned remembering how most of us back in 1940 worried the war would be over before we could get into it. The smile brought me back to the challenge of the present, and suddenly I didn’t mind the water inside my shoes and dripping off the visor of my garrison cap.
How would No. 1 Squadron feel about having a Yank in their midst, especially a twenty-six-year-old major? Maybe my two Johnny-come-lately combat tours in the last year of the war in Europe and my British Distinguished Flying Cross would help. Time to prove myself would help most of all. I had been told I would find the boss in squadron ops, and the small, nondescript building just ahead had to be the place. Feeling every bit the new kid on the block, I squared my hat, gave a tug to my trench coat, opened the door, and entered the ops office. The room was full of men already. Even without his pips, anyone would have known the man over by a small table was Squadron Leader Tommy Burne, RAF, DFC, etc. A bit stiffly, and quite self-consciously, I snapped a salute, immediately wondering if the RAF saluted when inside. The CO seemed somewhat taken aback and returned the salute with a casual wave of the right hand. Lesson number one: Don’t salute in the ops, at least not here in No. 1 Squadron. Lesson number two: Get here earlier in the future.
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