McGuire and Prestwick Terminals

In July 1965, I flew out of McGuire AFB, New Jersey, headed for Scotland, Mary could not join me right away, since I was going to help close down the base.  I had orders to report to the  6952nd Security Group at RAF Kirknewton, about 8 miles west of Edinburgh. The plane landed at Prestwick Airport in Glasgow where I was met and I took a staff car to RAF Kirknewton.

 

Base Headquarters – My Office was in building to right

My Roomate – Ray Nosko Gate Guard  

RAF Kirknewton Gate – Ray Nosko – My Roomate

Kirknewton Village

Kirknewton Village, Scotland

 Butch Garrard, Dee Watt and Me “The Gatekeepers” Hootenany Club, Galashiels, Scotland 1965

While I was in Scotland, I spent most of my leisure time playing the guitar and singing. I had purchased a 12-string EKO guitar from Italy. I joined up with Harold “Butch” Garrard from Miami, Florida who sang tenor and played a six-string guitar, and Dee Watt, a Scottish girl from Edinburgh, and we formed a folk trio named “The Gatekeepers.” We played a mixture of Celtic and American folk. We especially liked the music of the Clancy Brothers and learned most of their songs. We played every weekend in clubs around Scotland. We had gigs in Galashiels, Dunfermline, Berwick-upon-Tweed, and Glasgow, but our main club was the Stockpot just off Princes Street in Edinburgh. We were quite good and became very popular in the folk scene in Scotland. We met many entertainers. There was a private club just for musicians called the Singers’ Club. After gigs, musicians always drifted to the club and would jam until the wee hours. At the club we met Rolf Harris (who wrote Tie Me Kangaroo Down), Ewan MacColl, Peggy Seeger, and many others.

Edinburgh, Scotland “Arthur’s Seat” July 4, 1965

By January 1966, the base closing was completed and I transferred to the 6950th  Security Group at RAF Chicksands, England. Mary joined me shortly and we moved into a house on Castle Road in Bedford, England.

My assignment at both locations, Scotland and England, was top-secret control. My job was to collect classified intelligence documents and ship them back via courier to the United States for processing. I can’t really discuss where or how these documents were collected, but be assured that these documents were a very important part of the U.S. intelligence effort, and vital during the cold war.

Mary and Me in Bedford, England, 1966

Our base wasn’t particularly large. It was located on a hillside about seven miles south of Bedford in a farming area. To get to the base, you turned onto an unmarked road though woods and down a hill, through a farm and in the gate. There were two gates, a North and South gate on each side of the valley. The farm grew brussels sprouts, and after picking there were always some left in the fields that rotted. In the fall, the whole base smelled like rotten cabbage. At the bottom of the hill were the chapel, the hospital and Chicksands Priory. The priory had been a home for Priests and Nuns in Medieval times. It was said to be haunted by the ghost of a nun named Rosetta who had been sealed up alive in the walls for having an affair with a priest, who was beheaded and buried in the garden. Legend said that she roamed the grounds every Tuesday, but I don’t believe any of us ever saw her. The priory was the officers club and quarters. Going up the hill, you passed the enlisted barracks, the NCO Club, base library and the gym. Finally you came to the BX, Commissary and Post Office. This was as far as you could go up the hill without proper authorization. Further up the hill was the operations and communications building where I worked. On the crest of the hill was a huge antenna array that we called the Elephant Cage. When locals asked us about the antenna, we would tell them that it was the source of a tunnel to America to smuggle English girls, or that it was a giant magnet that would suck in Soviet missiles if they were fired at the United States. If a local asked our mission, we were instructed to tell them that we manufactured ping-pong balls. We were warned to be tight-lipped because Soviet spies were always a possibility.

Our house in Bedford was a block away from the embankment, along the River Ouse. Bedford was an exciting, historic town. Of course every town was historic in the British Isles. Our street ended near the main street at the old Castle grounds. Bedford Castle had long since disappeared and all that was left was the mound where the castle had stood.

Mary Ann Ouse River

Near the end of the street was the bridge over the Ouse. The river was wide at this point and in the 1500’s, a prison was on the bridge. John Bunyan, the Puritan preacher was imprisoned there and while incarcerated, wrote “Pilgrims Progress.” There was a lawn bowling pitch on the embankment, just up from our house and a three-hole golf putting green. Boat rides were available on the river, and we rode the boat from time to time. We had a movie theater. The movies were the same as what we had in the states, but there were some differences. We didn’t get popcorn, but we could get soda and candy. People smoked in the theaters. The movies started with previews and ads, just like in the states. I remember particularly the ads for orange crush, and Cadbury Fruit and Nut chocolate bars. Down near the bridge was a farmer’s market. Every Wednesday, we would stroll down. I enjoyed dishes of cockles in malt vinegar.

Scenes in and near the Bedford, England

There were several restaurants in Bedford. Mary and I especially like the mixed grill thatconsisted of a pork chop, a small (2 oz) piece of steak, a rasher of bacon, a fried egg, a roasted potato, and a half tomato. British breakfasts were different. We learned to eat breakfasts with fried toast, baked beans, streaky bacon (which had a bone in the bacon), smoked kippers, and curried rice. Oatmeal was a staple in Scotland, but not in England. Of course, I must mention fish and chips and sausage and chips. There were special fish shops that sold these wonderful treats. When we go to Long John Silvers in America which is a poor, poor substitute for fish and chips, we are not given a choice of the species of fish, and don’t even know whether it is cod, scrod, haddock, or whatever passes for fish. In a British fish and chip shop, you are given a choice, cod, haddock, plaice, etc. This was fish that came off the boat that day. The fish and chips were deep fat fried together in a big vat of lard, so that the chips had a taste of fish. You can’t get that taste in the States. The fish and chips were salted; then placed on a sheet of waxed paper, then onto a couple of sheets of newspaper and then rolled into a cone. You walked down the street munching this treat like eating popcorn. If the Israelites had been given fish and chips instead of manna, they would have refused to leave the wilderness. If there is anything about England that I really miss, it would have to be the fish and chips. I have searched in the U.S and Canada for fish and chips and have always been disappointed. The fish in Florida are the closest, but not quite the same. I also mentioned sausage. The British have a variety of sausages, many of them oatmeal based. Some are good, and others are best avoided such as a sausage called “black pudding,” which is a combination of oats and blood. You could buy sausage and chips at some shops.

There was some resentment against Americans in Britain. There were those who had lived through World War II that stood by the old English attitude toward American servicemen of “Over sexed, overpaid, and over here!” We got a taste of this one night in a restaurant in Wales. A family in an adjacent table finished their meal, stacked up their dirty dishes and set them on our table! I was shocked but thought that maybe this was something Welsh people did, however rude. I asked our waiter later, and he said that the Welsh would never do such a thing. He supposed that it was probably someone who either didn’t like Americans or who was just stupid and rude, probably English or French.

In Scotland, two incidents stood out. Near our base was a brick wall. Someone had sprayed painted “Yankee go home – and take me with you.” Another was at a New Year’s Eve party in Edinburgh. The Scottish celebrate Hogmanay. This is a three-day festival or rather a three-day party. During Hogmanay, the custom is to get a bottle of whiskey and a basket of coal and travel from home to home sharing the whiskey and giving the host a lump of coal. This is supposed to bring luck during the year. Well anyway, I was at a Hogmanay party, and a Scotsman was more than a little inebriated. He decided that it was time to insult Americans. He started with America, the land of the almighty dollar, and moved on to The Statue of Liberty, unloved and unwanted, etc. I held my peace as long as possible, and finally said, “Hey mate, you should not run down America, we have a lot in common with Scotland.” He replied, “Yeh, what?” I replied,  “We both fought the English, only difference was – we won!” Well, this started the brawl, and my friends I quickly found the front door. Hogmanay was certainly an interesting event.

Our house in Bedford was an old row house and every old home had a name carved in the stone lintel above the door. We lived at St Clovius. We lived on the bottom floor, and another family rented the second floor. They had a private entrance. Walking into our house, one encountered a long hallway, and the living room was to the right. The ceilings were about 10 feet high and heating was by fireplace or kerosene portable stoves. Our house was always cold and moldy. The kitchen was very tiny and our appliances were the size you buy for dormitories. Our hot water heater was coke powered. Coke is sort of like charcoal, but is made by cooking the sulfur and other irritants out of coal. It burns very hot and clean. Every morning, I got up early and started a fire under the hot water tank, and got the fires going in the fireplaces. The British call kerosene – paraffin. To Americans, paraffin is a wax that you melt and put on canning jars. We purchased a paraffin stove and when I asked where to buy the paraffin, I was directed to the market up the street. I went in and asked for paraffin, thinking it was a solid, and was asked if I brought a container. I told them to just put it in a bag. After some discussion, I was straightened out and asked for ten shillings worth of paraffin. The owner said, “I don’t sell it in teacups.” I didn’t understand. This was another difference between American and England I had to learn. We are used to going to service stations in America and purchasing by amount, not quantity. For us asking for $5 or $10 worth of gasoline is perfectly normal. The English pumps for petrol and paraffin did not work on price, but on quantity. You put the hose in the tank, and punched for 1 liter, or 2 liter, or whatever by liter, never by price. My request caused a breakdown in communications between the storeowner and me. I learned the British method and all was well.

 Our home on Castle Road, Bedford, England

There were many little differences to learn, many of them were differences in meanings of words. For instance, in England the first floor is what we would call the second. Our first floor is always the ground floor in England. Waking someone up in the morning is done by knocking on the door, thus you are knocked up. Cars (autos) have bonnets and boots, not hoods and trunks. The English have perambulators, not baby buggies. People do not weigh pounds – they weigh stones. A stone equals 14 pounds. Thus in England, I weigh 15 stone, which sounds much better than 210 pounds. An umbrella is a brellie. Now this was just England. Scotland and Wales were another matter entirely. In Scotland, a mixture of Gaelic and English was often spoken. So Hoot Man, it’s a braw, bricht moonlit nicht tonicht, meant, Hey man, it’s a bright, moonlit night tonight. In Wales, the English was spoken with a musical lilt complete with double negatives and reversed adjectives. A conversation between two Welshman might go like this. “Never, have I been here before in the Dragon Red Pub.” The reply, “Me too, neither.” In the old Brythonic Welsh, the adjectives always come after the nouns, not like in English. Thus a Red Dragon becomes a Dragon Red, or a Draig Goch in Welsh. A yellow dress is a dress yellow, etc. It takes a little getting used to, but the Welsh were easier to understand than the Scottish.

There were a couple of gaffs that we soon learned were particularly irksome depending on which country you were in. In Scotland, you never call a Scotsman “Scotch.” He is a Scot, not Scotch. Scotch is a whisky not a man. Celt can be pronounced Kelt or Selt. If it is pronounced Seltic, then it refers to sports teams. The people and the nations of Scotland, Wales and Ireland are Keltic.

We also learned that there are terms that if misused have sexual meanings. I don’t need to mention them, but it was embarrassing to use one of these terms out of context.

When we first arrived, there was a dock strike in progress and our furniture was held up on the dock for several months. Eventually, I had to retrieve it myself from the dock. For a bed, we shared an army cot, and our dining room table was an ironing board. If you walked out our bedroom door, you walked into an attached greenhouse and then into a walled back yard. We liked to barbecue in the back yard. One day, I was grilling a large round steak when a sales lady came knocking on the door. We called for her to come round back. I thought her eyes would pop out. She couldn’t take her eyes off the steak. The reason being that the typical steak served in England is a four-ounce strip and my steak was a two-pounder.

Each day, Mary would go up to the next block to buy food for the day. This meant trips to the greengrocer, the butcher, the fish mart, and the bakery. Milk was delivered to the door. Ours came from the Isle of Guernsey and was a rich yellow color with two inches of cream. I have never tasted better milk than that from Guernsey.

While we were there, we acquired two dogs that we named Sir Nigel Ruff, the Earl of St Clovius, and his Lordship, Sir Basil Rolf, the Duke of St Clovius. They answered to Ruff and Rolf. Next door to us lived a lady with a son named Nigel. She had a very high and grating voice. When she yelled, it was kind of like scraping your fingernails over a chalkboard. She would stand outside and yell for her son to come in. “Nigel, Nigel, time to come in!” So, I would also stand outside and whistle for my dogs, yelling, “Nigel, Nigel, Basil, Basil, time to come in.” That was a mean thing to do.

Cedar Road – Sister Goodrich and Mary Ann

In England, everyone has a “local.” This is the pub where the family gathers to chat with friends in the evening and enjoy a pint or whatever. Ours was “The Ship.” We went there for a reason other than the pint or the chats. I had a job playing the guitar and singing folk music at The Ship. In addition, I sang at the Bedford Folk Club and at other venues around town.

The Ship, Bedford, England

On one occasion, Mary and I were invited to a village fete to entertain. It was held at the squire’s manor house, and the committee had decided to have an American style barbeque, they had purchased 50 frying chickens and had made barbeque grills out of troughs and some type of metal grill. But instead of charcoal, they were going to use coal! We let them know that the chicken wouldn’t be edible if cooked over coal. Mary and I went back to the base and bought bags of charcoal and returned and saved the barbeque.

We took the time to travel around England as tourists, we visited Coventry, London, Ely, Northampton, Cambridge, Oxford, and of course Scotland and Wales. Gas was very expensive on the economy, but since I received ration coupons for tobacco and alcohol that I did not use, I was able to swap them with other Air Force personnel for gasoline coupons. This allowed me to fill up on the base at American prices saving over $1.00 per gallon. 

London, England

Scenes in the Midlands Area, England

Scenes – England

The Bedford Branch of the Northampton District, Central British Mission was a close-knit group. We had plenty of activities together. The branch would have picnics in Bedford Park, where we would barbeque and play softball. Ron Jones and I both played guitars and would always get a sing-along going. We had several single people, but most of the branch consisted of married couples, many with young children. The makeup of the membership was pretty evenly split between military families and the English. Mary and I were spent a lot of time with a family from the branch, George and Glenda Adams, and their four children, Mike, David, Keith, and Karen. The Adams lived in base housing, and it became the branch hangout for the missionaries, all the singles and us. We fit in with the singles because we were young and didn’t have children. We went to the temple almost every month, and served as veil workers from time to time. We started out with branch callings. I was the Sunday School Superintendent, and Mary taught Primary. However, we were soon called to the mission board to be in charge of genealogy and temple work for the mission. We were to publish a monthly mission genealogy newsletter, which we named Kith and Kin. In addition we traveled to district conferences as speakers.

We had many opportunities for church service in England. Besides our Mission callings, we helped build chapels, and attended Youth Conference at Keele University. I attended an Aaronic Priesthood Commemoration Campout at Benbow’s Farm where Wilford Woodruff baptized over 800 people in one day!

The people of England had customs and beliefs that often clashed with church doctrine or procedures. For instance, we in America totally shun Alcohol. The problem in England was that Alcohol was the preservative in soft drinks. In America the preservative is sodium benzoate. Since the alcohol content of the soft drinks was no more than that found naturally in an apple, we as Americans overlooked this and drank the soft drinks. However, the British didn’t consider anything under 7% alcohol as being alcoholic. Our seventies quorum ran a book and refreshment store at the District Chapel. Between conferences, you could purchase snacks and beverages. One of the beverages was 6% Ginger Wine. We had to put an end to that quickly. Occasionally, mission staff was sent to branches to do trouble-shooting. Two incidents in England while we were there come to mind. One branch wanted to split, because they were arguing over the Sacrament bread. One group wanted white, because they felt white symbolized purity. The other wanted brown, because they felt that brown bread symbolized the churches concept of nutrition; in other words, “The whiter the bread, the sooner your dead.” The solution was to have them switch to soda crackers and then lecture them on the meaning of symbolism. Another branch had a more serious problem. The Branch Presidency had adopted clerical robes and had pretty much changed the order of worship. That branch was dissolved.

We traveled monthly to the London Temple to do work. Mary and I were veil workers and took root beer to the workers. We also took root beer and Tootsie Rolls to the Mission Home in Sutton Coldfield.

 The one great disappointment amid all of the blessings we were enjoying, was that we did not have children.  We had been informed by physicians that we would never have children.  We decided that we should adopt.  We applied for adoption and were informed that we met all the qualifications.  We anxiously awaited the arrival of our child.  Then, the most cruel bomb was dropped unto our hopes.  The adoption agency said that they could not let us adopt, because we were Mormons!  This was so hard to accept.  We were living the gospel, we had the means to support  a child and we wanted one so badly.  Many a tear was shed and many questions were asked in our prayers.  But we remained true to the faith in spite of the adversity.  

Because of our desire to do family research, I gave up singing at the Ship, and we started traveling almost weekly to Wales. My Air Force job gave me three-day weekends every week, and every over week, I also was off at noon on Thursday. This was because our courier plane only came in once a week and that was Thursday afternoon. We shut down our operation on Friday, because we didn’t have that many documents to collect. By noon Thursday, we were finished for the week, and we took turns meeting the courier. So, as soon as I could get back to Bedford, we headed for Wales. We had purchased a new Ford Anglia for traveling. Gasoline was very expensive on the economy, and my gas rations were insufficient. However, I was also given tobacco and alcohol ration coupons, which I could always trade for more gas. Thus we had the gas needed for the research and church assignment. Since our callings were at the mission level, we also received a monthly stipend for gas from the Church.

The Welsh National Library had the entire Bishop’s Transcripts for Wales, and was the repository for wills and most Welsh legal documents. We would drive to Aberystwyth and find a bed and breakfast for the night. The next day was spent in the library. Mary and I did a great piece of genealogical detective work. I knew from Ohio historical records that my 4^th Great-grandfather, David Penry, was from Breconshire County, Wales, and his wife, Mary Pugh, was from Radnorshire County. We first looked at wills, and when we found a will with either of their surnames, we stuck colored pins in a map. A pattern of migration along the Wye River Valley soon appeared. We were also keeping track of will dates, and were able to pinpoint the probable location of the family at the time of emigration to America. We then started searching the Bishop’s Transcripts. Every year, the Bishop’s clerk would ride the parish circuit, copying the births, deaths, and marriages from the Parish registers into a Bishops Transcript Book. A separate book was kept for each Parish and supposedly duplicated the information from the Parish Register (assuming that the writing was legible.) The problem was that some Vicars were not good record keepers and the night before the Bishop’s clerk arrived, would be frantically trying to remember all of the past year’s events. We were methodically searching the many registers for the area, when Mary felt the spirit inspire her to skip over some of the names on the list and look at a particular transcript, that of Llandeilo Graban in Radnorshire. All of a sudden, she gave out a yell “I found it.” This of course, caused many heads to turn in a very quiet research library. But we did not care because we were both elated. Mary had found the marriage of my 4th Great-grandparents. We then traveled to that area of Wales and finished our research in the actual Parish Registers, finding many more of my ancestors. We would again stay at local bed and breakfast lodging in the area.

One night was interesting. We got a late start from Bedford and by the time we reached Aberystwyth, which incidentally was on the Welsh Coast, all of the hotels and B&B’s were closed for the night. We had to sleep in the car, so we drove to the top of the mountain overlooking the city and went to sleep. Above 4:00 in the morning, a light was shone in our window and it was a bobby (British policeman). He asked what we were doing and we explained. When he found out we were Americans, he told us he had a cousin in America and kept us up the rest of the night talking. We were really tired the next day doing research.

Longest town name in Wales

Thlan-Vair-Pullth-Gwin-Gilth-Go-Gerick-Wiern-drobilth-thlan-tie-sillio-go-go-gock. This is fairly close, but unless you are Welsh, you will not be able to say it perfectly!  Say it fast without taking a breath.

Beautiful Wales – The Land of My Fathers – Cymru am Byth 

We traveled into the Black Hills region of Central Wales and drove up a narrow road into the mountains until we came to Cefn Brith, a farmhouse built 1100 years ago! This farm was the birthplace of the Welsh Martyr – John Penry who was put to death in London in 1598 for treason.  But in reality, this was not the real reason.  He was a Puritan Minister who opposed the theology of the Church of England and Bishop Whitcomb wanted him stopped.  He had written a series of tracts under a pen name which were critical of the English Church and the Queen’s support.   In addition, he had lobbied to have the Bible printed in the Welsh language.  He was taken from the Clink Prison in London and hung and drawn and quartered.  He left a wife and four daughters.  His congregation escaped to Holland and sailed to America on the Mayflower!  I am sure he is a relative since our family came from that area, but I have not been able to make the connection.  

Cefn Brith was located in the Devynock Parish, who’s Vicar was also a Penry. Hugh Penry, Vicar, lived here in the year 1611 in a mansion in the village of Llangamarch Wells.  The Penry coat of arms is located above the door and indicates that our family are descendants of Elystan Glodrydd, who was ruler over this area in the ninth century.  At the time the area was known as Fferligs and he was the Prince of Fferligs – or Ferlix in Latin.

 Home of Hugh Penry, Vicar of Devynock 1611 with Penry Court of Arms Above Entrance

 We really lived Wales and the people. They were so friendly, especially when they found out that we were of Welsh descent. We visited the farm “Maesclyttwr” which means Farm on the Clyttwr creek (pronounced Mays Cletter). This was my ancestral home, the farm my ancestors had left to come to America. We introduced ourselves to the lady of the house, who showed us the house and insisted we stay for dinner. When her husband came in and she explained that our family had lived in the house nearly 200 years before, he asked, “Is this the first time you have been home?” He was serious. I was so touched that tears came to my eyes. What a wonderful greeting!

 

Gwenddwr, Maesclyttwr – Penry Farm  (Farm on Clyttwr Creek)

We decided to take a month-long trip to visit Scotland and Northern England. We checked out a tent and camping equipment from the base, and were joined by our friend from church, Ron Jones. We tied our luggage on top, Ron shared the back seat with our guitars, and away we went. Our first stop was Youth Conference at Keele University. We chaperoned the activities. From there we headed to Liverpool, and visited the place where the Beatle’s got their start. We took a ferry across the Mersey, and visited the docks of Liverpool. We then became victims of a local prank. Liverpool was named after a mythological bird, the Liver (pronounced Lyver) bird. The Liver building has big statues of liver birds on the roof.  An old man told us that these birds were mechanical and flapped their wings every hour. After sitting on a park bench for over two hours, we realized that we had been duped. I’m sure he had a good laugh at the expense of three gullible Yanks. We traveled north into Yorkshire and stayed one night in a farm field. The owner said he had campers from Denmark, Germany, and France, but we were the first @&*% Yanks. He charged us two shillings (about 24 cents for the night). We then headed to Scotland and visited Gretna Green, took the ferry to the Isle of Skye and camped at Portree, and stayed a night in the Vale of Glencoe which was nicknamed The Valley of the Shadow of Death, because of a clan massacre that had taken place there. We attended the Edinburgh Tattoo, which was a military presentation of pipe bands from all over the British Commonwealth, and demonstrations by military units. It was thrilling, especially the finale. After the mass bands had played, all of the lights went out. Then a single spotlight was shone on the top turret of the castle, and a Black Watch piper came out and played. Shivers still go up and down my spine at the recollection. We also went to Loch Lomond and viewed the highland cattle, and took the ski lift to the top of Ben Nevis. We went to Loch Ness and visited the ruins of Urquardt Castle. Unfortunately, we didn’t see “Nessie” but I think we had her for lunch at a local pub. We visited a number of castles and lochs. Edinburgh Castle was especially interesting. We looked out over the town, visited Margaret’s Chapel, and the room where Queen Mary slept. We learned all about the intrigue and life of Scotland’s early rulers. We visited the home of John Knox, who started the Presbyterian Church.

Beautiful Scotland

We then crossed the Firth of Forth to see Dunfermline Abbey, the burial place of Scottish kings. We also visited the cave where Robert the Bruce received his inspiration to continue fighting after watching a spider spin a web across the mouth of the cave. This was a fun but tiring vacation.

In 1968, we received the greatest news since we were married. Mary was pregnant! With her pregnancy came the usual morning sickness. She seemed to pick the most awkward times for the morning sickness to strike – at bus stops or on the bus. We were riding the bus, because I had already taken our car to Southampton for shipment to the States. We started packing up to return to America.

On January 23, 1968 The North Korean Navy captured an American ship, the U.S.S. Pueblo, commanded by Commander Butcher. I knew from my assignment in Security Service that this was a highly classified communications intelligence vessel. This was not a warship and its capture could prove to be disastrous to the intelligence community. This proved to be true after the crew was released. The boarding of the Pueblo was so fast, that the crew didn’t have time to destroy the classified documents. In the intelligence community, we were issued special magnesium grenades that we could drop into file drawers. These created a temperature hot enough to totally destroy the contents. The crew was taken by surprise and didn’t have time to react. Later on, North Korea made some of the documents public, which caused the military to have to change a number of special COMINT identifiers. In addition, North Korea published photographs of the crew supposedly “confessing.” What they didn’t realize that in the photo, Commander Butcher was giving the interrogator the bird.

Our three years in England came to an end in June 1968.

I received orders to report to Goodfellow AFB in San Angelo, Texas. We flew out of Mildenhall/Lackenheath AFB in June 1968.

 Leaving England and arriving at McGuire AFB Terminal

When we arrived in McGuire AFB, New Jersey, we were met by my Brother-in-Law Jim Gladden, who took us to Washington, D.C. As soon as I received word that my automobile had arrived in Brooklyn, New York, I took a bus and retrieved the car. It was sitting in a vast parking lot of vehicles that had been shipped from Europe. But there was a big problem. The car was a customized racing Anglia. The racing carburetor had been replaced with a stock carburetor; my racing bucket seats were gone, replaced by a couple of standard seats. The racing headlights had been stripped out, and there were just two vacant holes. The windshield wipers were gone. I filled out paperwork indicating the damage and theft. I had to get back to Washington D.C. before dark since I had no headlights, and it was pouring rain. I headed south with no wipers, and somewhere in Maryland, the rain got so heavy, I was forced to turn into a parking lot. Unfortunately there was a chain over the entrance that I could not see. I hit the chain and dented the front fender. I eventually got to Washington and got the car fixed so that we could proceed to our new assignment. We visited our families in Virginia and Ohio. It was now evident that Mary was pregnant!

Mary pregnant with our first child

But then came the day our vacation was over and we had to head to Texas.  We loaded up our little Ford Anglia and headed south.  We spent our wedding anniversary in Texarkana, Arkansas. The motel had a great outdoor swimming pool and we swam until nearly midnight. We then drove on to San Angelo. In San Angelo, we rented a small house just off the base.

We then acquired a little brown, long-haired dog of mixed breed. We named her M’lady. In England, we watched a TV show called “Thunderbirds.” The actors were puppets and it was a militaristic sci-fi and spy combination show. The show still airs sometimes on children’s channels, as “Thunderbirds are Go.” In this show, the head of the agency was called M’lady by her butler, thus the name.

 

M’Lady

M’Lady was a cute little dog. One of her games was catching horned toads and bringing them in the house. Since Mary was expecting our first child, we realized that I had no experience at all with infants. I didn’t know how to fasten a diaper, and this was in the days of pins – Pampers were a future invention. Poor M’Lady became our practice doll. The tail was a problem however. It’s hard to apply a triangular diaper to a baby with a long bushy, wagging tail!  We were beginning to get anxious awaiting the arrival of our first child.

Awaiting the new arrival – Summer of 1968

 

Front Gate, Goodfellow AFB, San Angelo, Texas

Goodfellow AFB Academic Library 

My job at Goodfellow AFB was to work at the Academic Library. Just outside of the library was the base flagpole that had a ship’s mast with an anchor at the base.  No one seemed to know where this came from and its significance, since the base was named for a World War I pilot who flew missions in France!

Goodfellow was a Security Service training site. At this base, men and women from all branches of service learned how to be radio operators and to interpret codes. We also had linguistic specialists. In the library, my job was to receive the newspapers and magazines from Communist countries and catalog them for use by interpreters. In order to do this, I had to learn to recognize the Chinese characters so I could catalog in English. I also learned to transliterate Russian. I had a special typewriter that had Cyrillic keys. I would type in Cyrillic, but the print was in Arabic letters. While working there, several things happened. My co-worker was bitten by a black-widow spider and I had to cover his work for a while.

There was a lot of wildlife around San Angelo including black-widow spiders, not just on the base, but also in our yards and around town.  Texas Coyotes are brown, not grey like those in the north.

Coyotes, Road-Runner, Horned (Toad) Lizard, Grey Fox, Tarantula

The tarantulas were especially creepy.  They would cross the road by the hundreds and you could hear them crunch as you ran over them.  They actually could make the road slick!

At the time, there were restrictions on trading with certain nations, such as Red China and Cuba. As intelligence operators, we needed access to publications from these countries, so we established third-party buyers in Hong Kong and Berlin. I would tell them what I needed. They would do the purchases, ship them to me, and bill the government. My Hong Kong buyer quit and my new buyer was unfamiliar with all the procedures. He made a mistake and sent one of my purchase orders directly to Peking. Imagine my horror when the Peking Daily News showed up on my desk addressed to Comrade TSgt Robert Penry. Once China had my name, it was like it had been sold to every Chinese periodical. I received photos of Chairman Mao, and magazines and invitations to visit. Thank goodness, we were in a top-secret facility and none of this leaked out at the time. One magazine called China Reconstructs was having a contest to commemorative the 50th anniversary of Chairman Mao’s famous march to Anyan Province where he reportedly gained the inspiration for his little red book of quotations. I submitted an entry into the contest as a gag, but the Chinese took it seriously and thanked me profusely for the wonderful suggestion of a painting entitled “Chairman Mao and His Close Comrade in Arms, Lin Pao, join with the Marxist-Leninists of Albania in Singing and Dancing the Mao Tse Dong Polka! They sent me an autographed picture of Chairman Mao and a calendar that I hung in the office.

Picture of Mao Tse Dong

We immediately became workers in the San Angelo Ward of the Church. I was called to be Scoutmaster. Our ward was unusual, being split between Anglos and Latinos. My home teaching district was in the Latino quarter. My companion was Brother Alvarez. I loved visiting the Spanish families. We were always given food. One sister made the best burritos that I have ever eaten. For Latino boys, cooking was not macho. We had to practically force them to work on the cooking skill awards and merit badges. Our Scout Camping trips on the Concho River were unique. Since other troops would be their, our boys were not going to be seen cooking. So their mother’s came too. All cooking at scout camp for Latino boys was done by their mothers.

  Hayride at Brother Taylor’s

During Sacrament Meeting, either the opening or closing prayer would be in Spanish. One Sacrament Prayer was Spanish and one talk was Spanish. Brother Alvarez and I loved to switch the prayers. He did the English and I did the Spanish. Being Texas, the dress for Sacrament Meeting included dress cowboy boots and Stetson hats. We had a wonderful time in the San Angelo Ward. The picnics out at Brother Odie Taylor’s ranch always included barbequed pecans, tubs full of cantaloupe and many, many gallons of ice cream. We also had a hayride as part of our activities. I don’t believe I have ever known someone who liked ice cream as much as Brother Taylor. Our Stake Center was in Midland, about 80 miles to the north. Stake meetings were on Saturday every month and Baskin and Robbins was an obligatory stop. Brother Taylor always started with a quart of mint chocolate chip and finished with a pint of mint chocolate chip for “dessert.”

Our bishop had been newly called when we arrived, and wanted to make an impression on the Latino members, so he asked Brother Hernandez how to say the word “Been” in Spanish. Brother Hernandez misunderstood and thought he had said, “Bean” and told him “frijoles.” Well, our bishop ended up asking one of our sisters in Spanish, either “Where are the beans, or How are the Beans.” She told him the beans were just fine and walked away with a puzzled look on her face. Those of us that knew some Spanish had a great laugh and the poor bishop was totally clueless.

San Angelo was an interesting city.  It was divided into two parts – the Anglo part on one side of the railroad, and the barrio or Latino section on the other.  When you crossed into the barrio, the streets weren’t paved.  It was almost like driving into Mexico.  I suppose there was a lot of prejudice, but we didn’t see it in the Church, and we did not harbor any such feelings ourselves.  We found the Latino members of the Ward to be especially friendly and gracious. 

One of our favorite locations was a steakhouse outside of town near the twin buttes.  When you came into the restaurant, you choose your steak out of a display case.  It was then cut into chunks, grilled and served with potatoes and Texas toast.  It was brought to the table in a big platter.  If the platter became empty, they brought another one.  No one ever left hungry!

A big event in San Angelo was the annual Rattlesnake Roundup.  There were lots of rattlesnakes in the area, and men would hunt them during the roundup, bring them to town, where they were killed, skinned, cut up, cooked and served for the public.  Pretty tasty!

 

Scenes in and around San Angelo, Texas

We had many friends, but special couples were Bob and Kathy Frome. Frank and Jackie Cowan, Paul and Becky Maxfield, and Mark and Marcine Evans. We were a group that hung out together. Eventually, all of us except Frank and Jackie had children in Texas. Unfortunately, after discharge from the Air Force, Paul and Becky moved back to Utah and they and their two children were killed in a head-on collision near Provo on Nov 10, 1970. Bob and Kathy and Mary and I went to San Antonio together for the World Fair called the Hemisfair in late 1968. The Church had a large pavilion and many of the General Authorities were there. We especially liked the boat ride on the San Antonio River, and the exhibition halls at the fair.  Do you recognize Gordon B Hinckley in the top left picture?

San Antonio, Texas – The River Walk and the Alamo

David Aaron Penry, born 23 November 1968, San Angelo, Texas 

Finally the big day arrived and Mary went into labor. I took her to Tom Green Hospital in San Angelo. The nursing staff said that it would be several hours before we could expect further development, so I headed off to the chapel to conduct my scout meeting. When I told the Bishop that Mary was in labor, he told me to get out and get to the hospital. I went back to the hospital and later that evening, Mary gave birth to a beautiful baby boy, our first child David Aaron Penry, named after ancestors on both sides of the family. I am not going to say much about my children in this chapter. I am putting stories of my children and grandchildren in their own chapter.

After the birth of our son, the Anglia seemed too small and just didn’t have the power needed in the U.S. We traded for a new 1969 blue Chevy Nova. This was a sharp looking and powerful car. At the end of my enlistment, I realized that I had been in the military for 10 years, and I didn’t feel that my career was going anywhere, so I decided to leave the Air Force. After my discharge we headed back to Ohio.

Next came the big question of what to do for work. I found out that the Carpenters’ Union local 785 in Marion was looking for a veteran in order to meet a quota. The union also needed a minority, so they took a young black man and me as apprentices. This apprenticeship also included a free education in carpentry techniques at Lima High School. Every week, we apprentices drove to the high school where we used its advanced shop facilities to learn how to saw, join, sand, polish and do cabinetry. Some skills such as carpentry measurement, use of tools, etc., would be on the job. I was sent out to a number of jobs that were interesting. These included installing siding on a high school in Marion, building a U.S. Department of Agriculture Laboratory in Delaware, Ohio, building salt sheds for the Ohio Highway Department, and laying floor tile in High Schools in Columbus.

We rented a farmhouse in Byhalia for $25 per month. The house was cold and drafty and the water was undrinkable. The water actually came out of the faucets containing crude oil and smelled of sulfur. We couldn’t bath in it. We would go to my parents to bathe. This picture is after it became abandoned.  But it didn’t look much better when we lived there!

Work was good and the pay was good at first, but it was during the Nixon administration and a major reduction in federal funds for construction was announced. I was laid off, and times got rough. I went to work for Harris and Jolliff Lumber Yard in Byhalia building pole barns for almost basic wages. My parents helped us, but I didn’t want to depend on either my parents or church welfare. There was another reason. Mary was pregnant with our second child, and I had no idea how we could afford the medical costs. I knew that something had to be done. So I contacted the Air Force recruiter and reenlisted in late September.

My Birthday Gift from my Mom – Martin D28 Dreadnought Guitar

 

 We received orders for Mountain Home AFB, Idaho. I would be retrained into the Personnel Career Field. This meant that I would need to go to school at Keesler AFB, Mississippi, reporting in October. Since we were leaving, my mother had bought a Martin D-28 guitar for my birthday, and since I would not be home for my birthday in January, she gave it to me on Mary’s birthday, September 28. Of all my earthly possessions, the Martin Guitar from my Mom is the most precious.  I can’t begin to tell how much pleasure it has given over the years.

Since I had to leave for Keesler AFB, I left Mary and David with her Mother in Tennessee and headed south.

 

Mary’s Aunt Rose’s house in Soddy, Tennessee –

 

Mary stayed with her Mom in a trailer behind the house

 

 

I was already a Staff Sergeant and the rest of the classes were just out of boot camp. The school asked if I would mind serving as a Training Instructor (TI) while there. This came with perks such as a private room in the TI barracks and lots of free time. My shift for school was the “C” shift, 6:00 p.m. until midnight. My duties as TI were to take charge of the class. I would pick them up at their barracks, march them in formation to the school and return them. Once a week, I also had to prepare them to pass in review. One night, a very scary thing happened. Our route back to the barracks was across an unused runway. There were barriers and signs warning vehicles to stay out. I had my squadron marching, when a car came barreling down the runway without lights and swerving from side to side, being hotly pursued by the police. I yelled at the troops to scatter and they took off in every direction. The car careened though the formation and fortunately missed everyone. We were shaking so bad, that I simply dismissed the troops and told them to go straight back to their quarters. The car was stopped about a half-mile down the runway and the driver arrested. I stayed and filled out reports. The driver was a drunken serviceman and I was told that I would have to testify at his courts-martial. The problem was that class was nearly over, and I did not want to have to stay. The prosecution decided that my written testimony would suffice. They said that they could always have me flown back if necessary.

Keesler AFB was in Biloxi, and had just been devastated by Hurricane Camille. Being a carpenter was great financial blessing. Since I didn’t have to be at work until 5:30 p.m., I was able to work in Biloxi. Since I was a union member, I was paid union wages and on Saturday’s I received double pay. I earned as much a week as a carpenter as I made in a whole month in the Air Force. Hundreds of carpenters were heading to the Gulf Coast, and had I known this, I could have done so myself. Work was available for years. But, in the end, every thing worked out for the best.

Rebecca Ann Penry, born 10 November 1969 Chattanooga, Tennessee

Mary gave birth to our second child, Rebecca Ann in Erlanger Hospital, Chattanooga, in the same hospital where Mary was born. This was on November 10, 1969, which was also the Marine Corps birthday. I received a phone call and the Squadron Commander gave me a three-day pass so I could head to Tennessee. Becky was a beautiful baby. She looked like a little doll.

On the way back to base, I was stopped by the sheriff in Mile Straight, Tennessee, just down the road from Soddy-Daisy. The whole scene was so surreal; it could have been an episode from a comedy. The speed limit was 60 mph. I was doing the speed limit and came up behind a teenager driving a Dodge Daytona with a California Tilt and big drag-racing tires doing about 45 mph. The driver had two heads (He and his girl friend). I pulled around him and he realized he had been passed and of course, this was not cool. So he gunned it and came screaming around me with smoking tires. A deputy pulled out of a side road and stopped me! He looked like Jackie Gleason in “Smoky and the Bandit.” He had a pearl-handled revolver, an all-white suit and Stetson, Polaroid reflective glasses and a swagger. He said, “What’s your hurry, boy? You Yankees think you kin come down here and burn up our highways.” I told him that I wasn’t speeding. He replied, “Don’t give me that. I clocked that sumbitch doing 90 and I see’d you pass him!” He saw my uniform cap in the back window and said, “You a G.I. Boy? This is gonna cost you!” I told him what really happened and he told me I could tell it to the judge. He made me follow him down to a local hole-in-the-wall service station. The service station attendant, complete with greasy rag in back pocket came in, got behind the counter, and announced, “Courts in session.” He was the Justice of the Peace. I told him my story and he said, “Well, maybe you jist might be telling the truth and I’m only going to fine you two dollars.” He told me to pay the young lady sitting at the desk (His 15 year-old daughter). I handed her the two dollars, and she said, “that will be $29.50.” I told her the judge said two dollars, and she told me that there was $27.50 court costs. I bid a fond farewell to ole Tennessee and headed back to Mississippi, poorer by almost $30.

I had no sooner gotten back to base, then we were hit by another hurricane. There were so many hurricanes and tropical storms that year, that I don’t even remember their names. My car was parked in front of the barracks, and stone from the roof peppered it, scouring off the paint and glazing the windshield. Because of the prior hurricane, insurance work was backed up for months. I found a piece of plexiglas the size of my windshield and taped it on instead and headed for Tennessee to pick up Mary, David and Rebecca.  

We headed on to Idaho. As soon as we arrived in Mountain Home, I stopped at the State Farm Insurance Office and related the situation. They sent the car around to a local shop and replaced the windshield why we waited. This was great service. A week later the car was repainted. 

I reported into the Consolidated Base Personnel Office (CBPO), my place of duty. I was assigned to the unit that prepared orders for transfer – outbound assignments. I did this job for a while, and my experience in both the Marines and in the Radar Evaluation area, made me qualified to work in the area of force readiness. I was assigned to the Mobility Unit. My job was to help run a processing unit for troops being deployed to needed area around the world. These movements were practiced often and were called Operational Readiness Inspections (ORI). The command was Tactical Air Command (TAC) and the unit was the 366^thTactical Fighter Wing. The planes were F-4 Phantom Fighters and F-4C Reconnaissance Aircraft. My office was in a hanger, and while there I designed and built a processing center, with special counters and equipment areas. This processing center was called the “Showplace of TAC,” and an Air Force Training Film was filmed there. This was my one and only time of being a “movie star!” Before the movie, we decided the hanger floor needed painting and so I got my team together and we painted and entire aircraft hanger floor with gray paint. We used rag mops for brushes. We had a problem in the hanger with black-widow spiders. I caught one and kept her as a pet and fed her flies. She lived in a jar on my desktop.

We started our tour at Mountain Home by renting a house in the village. Mountain Home wasn’t really in the mountains, although you could see the mountains on the horizon. It was originally called Rattlesnake Junction and in the 1800’s the town fathers wanted to attract the railroad. A railroad through Rattlesnake Junction would boost the economy. However, they decided that no one would want to visit such a place and they needed a more attractive name. They felt that everyone would want to visit Mountain Home, so they renamed the town. Did it work? No, the railroad passed by about twenty miles to the south. As soon as base housing became available, we moved onto the base. Our next-door neighbors were members of our LDS Branch, Brother and Sister Kennedy.

Scenes of the Mountain Home area.

In a few months, base housing became available and we moved onto the base. Once again we were in Wherry Housing.  Our building was in a court with a building on each side and a building at the end. We had a corner unit on the left side and Brother and Sister Kennedy were in a corner unit at the end of the court.

 

Mountain Home AFB, Elmore County, Idaho

In December 1970, we went to Ohio and Tennessee for the holidays.  In Tennessee Becky was ill and we took her to the same doctor that was Mary’s childhood physician.  He gave her two days of penicillin shots before we could leave Tennessee.  After we left Tennessee, heading west, we stopped at a military base in Texas because David was ill.  So now we had two children on medications with different schedules.  We hit bad weather across the Texas panhandle.  The roads were icy and we almost got hit head-on when a car came speeding down the wrong side of the interstate.  We stopped in Farmington, N.M. for the night, and headed out towards Utah the next morning, but the road was blocked, because a twin-engine plan had made an emergency crash landing onto the highway.  We waited until the plane was towed off.  We endured all this with two sick children and Mary pregnant with our third child.  

  

At Gilliam Farm, Somerville, Ohio 1970

Because we were rated the top unit in TAC, I was offered a position on the 12^th Air Force ORI team based out of Bergstrom AFB, Texas. Our job was to pull surprise ORI inspections on Air Force bases both active and National Guard around the U.S. On some Thursday mornings, usually twice a month, I would take an Air Force flight from Mountain Home to Denver, where I would switch to a commercial airline and fly to the team destination. When I arrived, I would sign out a GSA car, make hotel reservations for the rest of the team and pick them up at the airport when they arrived. On Friday morning about 5:00 a.m., we would head to the base in the GSA car. We would stop at the main gate, leaving a man there to make sure that the base was not alerted about our presence. We then headed to the Command Post, where we announced our presence, directed the military police to pick up our teammate at the gate, and called a base-wide alert and recall. For the next 48 hours, we inspected response times and combat capabilities. The team was not large. There were six of us. Even though nothing would prohibit me giving their names, I have a very good reason not to. The names were hilarious in combination. Whenever we would check in at hotels, the clerks would often ask us what our real names were. I can only say this, the combination of names made us sound like we were stars in an X-rated movie! Late Saturday night I would fly back to the base and wait until time for the next ORI. Some of the bases we inspected were National Guard sites in Louisville, Indianapolis, Denver, Wichita Falls, Las Vegas, and Reno. We also inspected TAC regular bases such as Nellis AFB, Nevada, Holloman AFB, New Mexico, and several others. On one visit, I was getting ready to relax in my room at the hotel, when the team commander called for me. I supposed that he had some paperwork that needed my help, but when I got to his room he informed me that I would be spending the evening baby-sitting! It seems that he met a lady who had two small children and they wanted to go dancing, but she needed a baby-sitter, so he volunteered me! I protested, but when he offered me $50, I gave in.

While at Mountain Home, I began to realize that my future after the Air Force was limited. I didn’t possess the professional skills that would give me a good job in civilian life. I didn’t want to go back to carpentry or selling insurance, and work on the farm wasn’t even a consideration. So I decided that I needed to go to college. I had taken a couple of courses at Weber State College in Ogden while stationed at Hill AFB, but I knew it was time to get serious. I enrolled at Boise State College through the Base Education Office and started taking courses on base. The professors and some base personnel with higher education were instructors. I wanted to major in history and took some very good courses in both history and literature. I then applied for the Bootstrap Program. This Air Force educational program gave up to a year off with paid education on campus. You would continue to draw your salary, but attend college full-time as long as the degree furthered your military career area. I changed my major to Personnel Management and started full time at Boise State. This was really tough. I would get up at dawn and get ready to make the 60-mile drive to the campus. My first class of the day was at 7:40 a.m. I wanted to get the most for my dollar, so I signed up for 21 semester hours. This load meant that I attended classes five days a week from early morning until late in the evening. I stayed with friends in the Church, Mark and Marcine Evans for a couple of days each week. They lived in Meridian, just outside of Boise. My math skills were so poor that the college recommended Math 190, a non-credit course. But I refused and signed up for Algebra 1 instead and bought a self-learning workbook and spent the summer before studying and preparing myself. I got through the course with a B+ and was elated. I did my studying in the LDS Institute and took an Institute Course on the Doctrine and Covenants. This was a very successful education period and I was always grateful to the Air Force for the opportunity. It paid off handsomely in later years.

Mary gave birth to our third child Karen in March of 1971. This was a traumatic time. In Ohio, Mary was treated at the Smith Clinic in Marion. Our pediatricians partner, Ed Charnock needed to fill a military obligation and when we got to Mountain Home, Dr. Charnock was now Captain Charnock. Because we were from the same town in Ohio, Ed and I had a closer relationship than with most doctors. I had dropped Mary off at the hospital because she was in the very early stages of labor. I had gone home to take David and Becky to a baby-sitter and had stopped off at the office for a few minutes to let my supervisor know and then headed back to the hospital. By the time I got back, it was all over. Mary had given birth. When I got there, they had called for Doctor Charnock, the base pediatrician. They wouldn’t let Mary or I see the baby, and I knew something was wrong. The other pediatrician was on call and Ed was on his way, when I was informed that Karen had been born with a bi-lateral cleft palate. When Mary woke up she was informed and we were permitted to see the baby. This was very traumatic, seeing our child so deformed. We were then told that this would require a plastic surgeon to correct. Karen had trouble eating and couldn’t be nursed normally. She was fed though a tube and syringe. We learned how to care for her and Ed let us know that regular military channels didn’t apply. If we needed him, we were to call him at home and he would come to our quarters. House calls in the military were unheard of. I don’t think he will ever know how much we appreciated and loved him for his service.

A plastic surgeon, Dr Call, was found in Boise and he did the corrective surgery. Everyone at Church and on the base was so supportive. The surgery was wonderful and a beautiful little girl emerged. Karen was extremely active and loved to kick. One Sunday morning she was lying on Mary’s lap in Church, her nose and mouth all in bandages and gave a mighty kick and propelled herself right off Mary’s lap onto the floor. She screamed! Mary broke into tears! Off to the hospital we rushed! No real damage was done except for our pride. We were so embarrassed.

By this time, our oldest child was a toddler and starting to talk.  One day, he was looking out the window saying “doggy, doggy.”  We didn’t have a dog and looked out onto our patio.  His doggy was a coyote!

David’s “Doggy” 

The Church at Mountain Home was different. We were totally military. This is the only place we have ever been in the Church that had a problem with rank. This problem didn’t exist with the brethren. We left our rank at the Church door. However, several of the sisters that were married to officers, formed an exclusive group and were standoffish. Oh well, why not tell it like it was. They were snobs! Our Branch President was a Master Sergeant, and they just didn’t think that this was proper. The Branch President should have been an officer in their minds. One sister in particular was married to a Lieutenant and her father was a full Colonel. When she bore her testimony, she never failed to say “My father, the Colonel.”  We tolerated it and ignored it as much as possible. We had another sister who was a disciple of the teachings of Joseph Fielding Smith. I think she had memorized every thing he had ever written, and she managed to quote him in every Gospel Doctrine Class we attended.

The men and boys decided that we needed a winter outing. So we took our sleds and tubes and snowmobiles up to Sardine Canyon above Brigham City on the way to Logan. This was a great winter recreation area. We were having a great time, until disaster hit. We were sledding and tubing over a saddle between two hills when the Branch President and his son, who were riding together on an inner tube, lost control and went over the side of the saddle. There was a twenty-five foot drop onto the highway. A pickup truck was parked along the side and they landed in the bed of the truck. The Branch President broke his back, and his son had a broken elbow. They were airlifted out, and shortly thereafter, the Base Commander outlawed tubing.

Actually, this was not the only disaster. A member of our branch, a dentist, broke his hip on one of our scout campouts, when he drove his snowmobile into a ravine. We had been warned about traversing a slope horizontally because there could be filled gullies, but he did not heed the warning. Another time, we were tubing and sledding near Sun Valley. We were on the mountain and stopped to look out from a scenic overlook, when someone decided this looked like a good spot to tube. It was steep and fast and fun. We spent several hours tubing, and I started down through the twisting gully on a very large truck tube. On a turn, I over corrected and shot out of the gully about 10 feet in the air and flew over a rock outcropping. When I hit the ice slope on the other side, the tube went one way and I went head first down the slope out of control. I plowed a small furrow with my bottom teeth and looked ahead and saw that I was going to hit the top strands of a barbed-wire fence. I managed to turn sideways and tuck and hit the fence. It was like a slingshot. It stretched and tossed me back about six feet. My shoulder was twisted, my lip was cut and my dignity was definitely bruised. I crawled back up the slope and we headed home.

Just to show that I did not learn my lesson, I will relate an incident that happened some years later. We were stationed at Hill AFB, and gone tubing as a family. Karen was seven years old and sitting on my lap going down a slope, when the tube slipped off the intended path and went down a step grade, over an embankment, and we landed in a frozen streambed. Karen was terrified and has never been tubing again. My bottom was sore for a week! 

While we were at Mountain Home, Mary decided she needed to lose weight and joined the local TOPS club.  She did a great job!

 

Mary and TOPS and KOPS

 

As a family, we often went to Boise, especially to the Hogle Zoo and Julia Davis Park.  Our kids loved the trips and so did we.

 

Scenes from Boise, Idaho and area

 

Hogle Zoo, Boise, Idaho

 

Kids in Idaho

I knew that I was due a remote assignment. The Vietnam War was raging and I knew that it was only a matter of time before I would have to go. I received orders for Danang, Republic of Vietnam, leaving in June. We were shipping our household goods back to Ohio where Mary would stay for my year in Vietnam. The moving van was just about out of sight at the end of the street, when a staff car came up to the house moving fast. It was the out-processing supervisor who informed me that my orders had been cancelled. The unit that I was to join had been moved from Vietnam to Thailand and that manpower was being reduced. We were in a panic, the car was packed, we had just vacated base housing, and our furniture was on its way east. What were we to do? I went back to the personnel office and we called headquarters in Randolph AFB, Texas. They immediately opened up a slot in the 49th TAC Fighter Wing at Takhli Royal Thai Air Base, Thailand instead, and we headed east.

We rented a house in Marion for Mary and the three children. Mary drove me down to Wright-Patterson AFB in Dayton, and I left for South-East Asia (SEA). Mary needed a pediatrician again, and who do you suppose had been released form the Air Force? Yes, it was Ed Charnock.

 Saying goodbye – Wright Patterson AFB, Fairborn, Ohio