25 – Fast

This blog post theme is "fast" which brings my uncle, Harry Kenyon Jr., to mind, and in particular his fascination with flying and attempt to get into the Air Corps, the precursor to today's Air Force. The story is told in his regular letters home to Fond du Lac, Wisconsin.

Cal-Aero training field in Ontario, California

Normally after the second year at West Point the cadets got a summer furlough; in 1942 that was looking unlikely because of the war. Late second year was also when the second-year cadets, or "yearlings," had to decide on particular career paths in the Army. Harry showed his interest in the Air Corps in his letter home on January 18:

The big news of the week is the poop-sheet all the yearlings were given to fill out. One side says (1) Tentative plans provide that all yearlings planning to enter the air corps after graduation will be given flying instruction starting in July, 1942, and continuing thru 2° and 1° class years. (2) This instruction will be given at Air Corps elementary flying schools, beginning after 30 days of furlo. It will also be given every other day thereafter here. (3) Yearlings who don’t take Air Corps will take some other branch instruction this summer. (4) All men interested will take the air corps physical exam in the near future.

The other page has three choices: (1) I want air corps (2) I do not (3) I haven’t decided, would like to take the physical exam. After crossing out paragraph 2, I had to decide which other choice to make. I finally crossed out paragraph 1. So I do not reject anything, while I have time to decide about air corps if I pass the physical exam. 

In his March 16 letter, we get an idea of how much Harry has set his heart on the Air Corps:

In regard to the exam, if you were praying for me, thank you. I almost felt like praying myself by the night before I took it. But it was easy. From the way I worried, I must have wanted flying pretty badly.

This must have alarmed his parents a bit. We have a letter from Harry's uncle to them which supports Harry's choice unreservedly:

You’re worried about the war, are you? Regardless of anyone’s attitude toward the thing in general the fact remains that we’re in it and we have to win the damned thing – right? Don’t condemn Jr. Kenyon for wanting to fly – the next generation may be in a position where they can thank God we had enough young fellows with his desire – because he happens to be a member of the family doesn’t change things either – all the boys up in air belong to someone. If I were young enough and no family obligations that’s where I’d be – and why? Because in that particular branch of the service you’re more of an individual and less a very small cog in a very large machine.

Harry was doing well academically, and training air fields were picked by academic rank; Harry set his sights on California:

As you see, I shall probably get my choice of field, or at least my second or third choice. But I don’t know where to go. Dunwoody, Jackson and I wanted to go to the same field. We rank about 25, 225, and 525 respectively. What a mess. 

You said you’d like to visit me this summer. Look at where the fields are – Alabama, Texas, California. The eastern fields stink; the Texas fields are deep in the heart of, with rabbits and cactus in place of women and bright lights; the California fields are in California. Distance makes no difference financially, we get mileage. I can’t possibly be near home. I probably can’t pick my companions. So now it looks like San Diego or one of the three coastal California towns. It’s hard to say.

By April 12 Harry knew where he would be training:

Thursday night we drew for air fields. The drawing went by scholastic rank for the first 1 ½ years. I ranked 18 – same as at the end of plebe year – and no. 10 of men taking flight training. So I had my choice of fields, and took Cal-Aero Academy at Ontario, California. It’s a big school and one of the best if not the best. It’s located about 30 miles outside of Los Angeles, and nearer to other towns. If any of you saw Abbot & Costello in “Keep ‘em Flying” you’ve seen the field. The film was shot at Cal-Aero.

By June 3 Harry was at Cal Aero for training, after a 3-day and 4-night train trip from West Point. A newsy mid-June letter to his father indicates Harry is finding this training a challenge:

Teaching us to fly here is comparable to teaching an Eskimo to drive a car in an hour or so. I don’t believe there’s any able bodied man today – barring those afflicted with air sickness – who can’t learn to fly. But we’re expected to learn by 40 hours what our instructors picked up over a period of years. So flying requires the most intensive effort I’ve ever put out to grasp a new subject. I can’t tell how well I’m doing – I’d guess about average. There are so many mistakes one can make we have a wide choice. Today I almost applied the brakes by accident on my first landing. I pulled the same thing last week on a take off. The brakes are on the rudder pedals, and if you don’t keep your heels on the floor you’re apt to catch them. Well anyway, having pulled the same thing twice, I caught hell. Deservedly, of course, since the trick is the easiest way to flip a plane on its back. And altho that’s been my most serious error to date, it’s just one in a multitude. 

Harry, second from left, with some fellow cadets

A July 1 letter shows Harry struggling to keep up:

Day before yesterday I was taken out by the ass’t F.C. He soloed me. Yesterday I took my second supervised solo. One more and I’ll be free, to make or break myself. Another man & I who are behind in time have been given to the ass’t F.C. He will bring us up to schedule. And since he’s one of the best men here, he’ll teach us to fly or – well, just or.

Of our original 38 men, one quit, two never soloed, one soloed but was later eliminated, 5 of us have just soloed and are fighting to get back up with the rest of the men. This record is not bad, and speaks well for Cal Aero. They play very fair, and everyone here is convinced that he got the best field on the coast.

Harry's July 5 letter included photos:  

"Took a picture of me and my first solo ship"

Flight tower, with white flag (solo ships may take off) field & Puente Hills in background, PT (primary trainer) and behind. B.T. (basic trainer). Both are two place. The rugged little number in the front is the Stearman P.T. 13B, the ship I fly. Washing it out, however, would cost Uncle Sam $13,500. If I wait and wash out the low-wing monoplane in the rear, the Valtec B.T., I chalk up around $40,000 to my cadet store account. Incidentally, I cannot ever remember seeing the hills as clearly as shown on this view.

In his July 13 letter Harry brings us up to speed on his progress as a pilot, including plane damage to date:

I’ve started acrobatics now. Supposedly I’ve had enough of spins, stalls, turns, etc., so now I attack, or butcher, rolls, loops, vertical reverses, etc. These won’t be as hard to learn as some of the precision work.

I am still on the fence, the problem child of the flight. I’m just too careless. Had 3 ground loops in 4 days last week (those lower wings are worth $450 apiece, incidentally – the ailerons $150. I did all my dirty work on the ailerons). There was no excuse for any of them but I was given the benefit of the doubt on the first two, which were made in a strong side wind. I almost had to take an army disposition ride for the last, entirely my own fault. But my pal, the ass’t flight commander, put in a good word, so all that occurred was a change of instructors. Now I have to be a good, or at least careful boy, from now on.

A week later we see that Harry is going to make it through flight school:

We’re winding everything up this week. Our finals in ground school began today and will finish on Wednesday. Then the time we finish depends on the day we get our 60 hours flying time. When I finish today I shall have almost 53 hours. So if all goes according to schedule, Thursday should see me thru at Cal Aero.

My final check will come any day now. On it I should show proficiency in all the fundamentals, and some mastery of acrobatics. The former include turns, stalls, spins; the latter vary, but usually include chandelles,  lazy eights, and rolls. I need practice in the latter.

Back at West Point in September, Harry is an Air Cadet, training for the Air Corps, and has learned that his class will graduate in 3 years rather than 4, so this begins his final year at West Point:

I don’t know how to feel about early graduation. The sooner I can get my wings, the better. We would lose the most valuable year of academics, First Class Year, for which all the others are mere preparation. Yet, if civilian colleges are shortening 4-yr. courses to 3 yrs, - because of the war – how can West Point hold to 4 yrs?

What the short course will mean to us, you can guess. I have no spare time now. Flying takes 5 hrs per day, the entire morning or afternoon. Our only free time has been 3 PM to 6 PM yesterday. Evenings are busy, studying for Chem and Mechanics, no snap courses.

But in September 22's letter we hear that Harry has washed out of the Air Corps; he claims he isn't heartbroken, but this was becoming part of his identity and he must have been greatly disappointed:

No. I’m not sick or disabled. I was just in the process of washing out of the Air Force and into the Ground Forces. They finally got me last Saturday noon. Went up before the Board; the decision came out yesterday noon.

The final opinion of the Air Corps was that if I continued flying, I’d kill myself, and perhaps somebody else. I heard that all thru my 70 hrs. So they’re probably right. Which would seem to point to a mediocre, if not unsuccessful career in the Air Corps, regardless of my opinions. Therefore I’ll take my chances in some other as yet undetermined branch. My heart isn’t broken, so I must not have fallen in love with flying. Solo was fun; dual I always felt as tho, I were butting my head against a wall. But I went along for a ride until the end of the line. And so to work.

It wasn't for another month before it looks like Harry has finally come to terms with this failure; from his October 25 letter to his father:

As for my feelings now, I still consider the Air Corps the most exciting branch. I could never have been more than a fair pilot – I had too many days on which I stunk. But I would have stuck, even if I were wrong, because of pride. Looking at it, rationalizing, I will probably be prouder of myself later as a good ground officer, than as a barely proficient flying officer. The question now is: what branch?

Harry spent until May of that next year, shortly before graduation, agonizing over which branch to join; he started with Engineers, but finally ended on Infantry since it gave him the best chance to become a paratrooper. Impatient to finish up at West Point and get into the war, Harry's whole life seemed to go by fast, from skipping two years in grade school, to finishing West Point in three. He was only 22 when he survived combat in the Battle of the Bulge, and 23 when he died in the drop over the Rhine. If I could go back in time, I'd tell him to slow down, but I'm sure that advice would have been ignored.