Great pilots

I read this morning, just a few minutes ago that Clarence C.E. "Bud" Anderson has flown south at the age of 102. A great pilot indeed.

 

And a great American. He and his old friend Gen. Yeager together again.

 

I remember watching Bud Anderson and Chuck Yeager piloting Mustangs in formation at Oshkosh when I was a kid. I knew that I was witnessing something special then but you don't really see the 'big picture' when you are a kid. WWII vets are almost all gone and very soon there will be none left at all. Nobody beats Father Time.

 

I think he may have been the last of the "well-known" WWII pilots. In a few years there'll be no WWII veterans left!

 

The last of the Doolittle Raiders passed 5 years ago. Anyone in uniform prior to VJ Day is close to 100.

In my lifetime there were still Civil War Vets.

 

If you entered the service in 1945 at age 17, you were born in 1928. The youngest of them are around 96, definitely pushing 100. My father, a P-47D pilot in the war, was born in 1921. Jan's oldest brother was an officer on a destroyer during the war. Both gone.

 

I was 06-19-1926. Signed up in 1943, got booted out in 1945. Didn't do anything special.

 

Bob- You surely got to fly lots of interesting stuff during those 2 years. Plus, there were a lot more support folks during the war than those in theater. Could not have won without them.

Looking forward to your 100th birthday.

 

Thank you, Taz. I have been wondering about that number with the two 00's lately. A lot of things going wrong. Stamina fading, eyes fading, balance gone, heart having a few stumbels,and I sleep a lot during the day. But, I am writing a lot. and my mind seems to be working okay still, I think. Okay, so I forget to unzip some times when I pee, no big deal. Actually, I try to get the most out of every day to keep the machinery working and i pay little attention to worrying about the future. Nothing I can do about it except to stay quiet so the devil doesn't know where I am.

 

Flown west? Maybe a nav would fly south…

 

Ahh......yes. Sorry about that. It was early and I hadn't had my coffee yet! Flown west is what I meant to say.

 

Just teasin’

 

Will- I usually know which way is west and always did in an airplane.

 

There are some of us that have a built-in Tates. It's a quirk that when the afflicted faces north, the Tates indicates south. When the afflicted faces east, the Tates indicates west. It goes to show that HE WHO HAS A TATES IS LOST.

 

I had to google "Tate's Compass" and I found a couple of different stories about the origin of that... I had never heard it before.

This sounded plausible:

https://ultimatecampresource.com/campfire-stories/funny-campfire-stories/john-tates-compass/

"This all reminds me of the unfortunate story of the British entrepreneur John Tate and his compasses. Sometime back in the mid-1800s a small-time British manufacturer named John Tate decided to go into the business of making compasses. He set up a factory, installed the machinery, hired some workers, and began turning out his first compasses. He had just completed his first batch of 500 compasses when someone finally pointed out that he had forgotten to mark which end of the compass was north. The compasses worked fine; you just didn’t know which way was north and which was south. Needless to say poor Mr. Tate’s compasses didn’t sell; Tate went bankrupt, the factory closed, and the workers were laid off. But his memory lives on, since that time any compass where you’re not sure which end is north and which is south has been known as a ‘Tate’s compass’."

This one also sounded plausible:

https://theseniorpaper.com/online/2017/03/a-chuckle-in-the-right-direction/

"There was once a couple, Mr. and Mrs. Tate, and it was their life’s dream to have a compass company. They finally saved enough money and started the Tate’s Compass Company. Luck was with them, for the first contract they acquired was to manufacture 750,000 compasses for the Boy Scouts.

They worked feverishly day and night to meet their deadline, and finished just before the Boy Scout Jamboree was to begin. On the day of the Boy Scout Wilderness hike, each Boy Scout was given a Tate’s Compass to help them find their way. Unfortunately, it was discovered a little too late that every single compass was made with the colored point of the needle facing the wrong way, so when one was facing North, the needle pointed to the South.

Needless to say, all of the Boy Scouts got lost and it was the biggest fiasco known in Boy Scout history. The Tate’s compass company went out of business, but from this experience came the familiar adage, “He who has a Tate’s is lost.”

 

It's fair to say you have given all of us on this forum much more than 98 years worth of knowledge, insight, constructive critique, and just plain fun. We are so fortunate to have the pleasure of your company (virtually). Please don't ever stay quiet!

 

Holy Mackerel! If I knew that I did all that stuff I would have written it down. I have to say thanks and I'm glad that i did something worthwhile force. As far as the fun stuff, that has been a constant source of trouble since I was a kid. Things pop out of my mouth before I'm close to the trigger and I've always got something cooking in my head. Always in trouble when I was in the service. I had a couple of close calls at Boeing when, unknowingly, I answered an executive's phone with,
"Urology Department. Can you hold?" Then I answered the phone next to a draftsman's desk, thinking that it was his, "B-17 Spares." It was the military rep's line to the Air Force and that one caused a bit of a stir. I could go on but I won't.You guys are keep me awake, thanks again.

 

Bob- If you are not almost in trouble frequently, you are not trying hard enough.

 

i suppose that i am over-doing it but I had some fun at our big pharmacy to which we have been using for many years. i was in the middle of the rows of stock and I asked the clerk who was standing near by "Where's anti- fungal?" Answer, "Next aisle over." Without even thinking, "Where's Uncle Fungal?" After a long cold look, she said," They have to stop letting you in this store." An older lady one aisle over got a long loud laugh out of it. I had dealt with the clerk for a long time and she was an "old hand" at dealing with me.

 

I was at Edwards for the 40th anniversary of breaking the sound barrier. Gen Yeager did a fly by in an F4 at Mach 2. Pretty high. Even then it had been a long time since I had heard a sonic boom. All the windows I could get close enough to see in the place were lexan.

 

Bud Anderson, last surviving World War II triple ace pilot, dies at 102

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Anderson, who was born in California and learned to fly at 19, served two combat tours during World War II, according to his website. He escorted heavy bombers over Europe from November 1943 to January 1945, flying 116 combat missions and destroying over a dozen enemy aircraft in aerial combat as part of the 357th Fighter Group, nicknamed the "Yoxford Boys." He was the highest scoring ace in his squadron, according to his website.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/bud-anderson-last-surviving-world-war-ii-triple-ace-pilot-dies-at-102/

 

One of the breed that, from their integrity and character, tend to put you in your place. Men like him are few and far between and right now, we could use a lot more of his kind. I'm betting that they are out there somewhere.

 

Would I. Juutilainen or H. Wind be considered "Great Pilots" by FChat standards or just great WWII "Fighter Aces" ?

 

Great book. When the rest of the ETO converted to P-51s, the 56th refused and kept flying P-47s, including the relatively rare hot-rod P-47M, perfect for shooting down V-1s.