Pilot Here or Pile It There: a Memoir

Pilot Here or Pile It There is an autobiography relating many of Bill's experiences during 45 years of a widely diversified career as pilot. It also includes a few unusual events or circumstances that Bill encountered as a direct result of being a pilot. He attained his civilian instructor and instrument ratings in mid 1946, which early on qualified him to engage in almost unlimited piloting endeavors. Considering that his activities as a pilot included; a military career, manager of a civilian flight school and charter service, a non-scheduled air-freight pilot and Civil Air Patrol pilot, some interesting situations were bound to occur. I neglected to mention he was chief pilot in a failed attempt to start a scheduled air shuttle service. Bill's one ambition that he never achieved was to be in a combat situation. He received his Army Air Corps pilot wings and commission in June 1944, during WWII at the age of nineteen. He had two breaks in military service from which he was recalled in August of 1950 for the Korean conflict and again in 1958 prior to Viet Nam. Bill's three tours of active duty certainly provided ample opportunities for the Air Force to fulfill his one missing challenge.