March 1, 1944

Ryan Field

Tucson Ariz.

Mar. 1, 1944

Dear A.P.

I have a chance to write a short letter because I want to get to bed early.  I have a check ride tomorrow which I can pass if I stay "on the ball" and it will be easier if I get a little extra sleep tonight.

Today I got a dual cross country ride of about 45 miles.  We had a little head wind so we made it in about 38 minutes and came home in a somewhat shorter time.  The plane wasn't too good and would only cruise at 85 miles an hour.  It also would not climb too well because we were about 11 miles from the main airport before we got to our altitude.  We went over some rather mountainous country and as I had a map I got a little used to picking out check points along the way.  As a whole the ride was rather uneventful.

We made a stop at a little airport and then came back over the same route.  on the way back we ran close to a pretty good size range of mountains.  We had a little fun watching them go by.  The air was pretty rough but not too much so.

I guess I kind of mislead you with this link trainer business.  All a Link Trainer is is a gadget to teach you instrument flying while still on the ground where you are still safe.  They can stimulate any kind of conditions in the plane that you can encounter in the actual flight.  You can do stimulated maneuvers of any kind in the ship but stay on the ground and move only around the axis of the plane. All the instruments are run by little .... and not by actual conditions.  They are called all kind of names and the name of "Infernal Gadget" really describes it.  It really is a series of gadgets and things can certainly go haywire if you don't know how to make the thing work for you.  I think I can find a picture of one if you want one but all you have to do is find a flying magazine around and you can find a picture.  They are not all you expect.

Well we are getting pretty well done here.  I have 10 more hours to go to finish the course and I could finish that in about 4 days easily or even less if they would let me.  As it is I guess I can't get my time in so fast now as I have been doing.  The instructor keeps talking about "when you get to Basic", so I guess I may get there yet.  We are scheduled to leave here the 11th or 12 of this month.  When we do go I can't say right now I am sorry.  The trouble is that the next place is likely to be much the same as this only a lot worse.  The only complaint is that most of these places are out in the desert and rather uncomfortable places weekends.

Pretty soon I am going to have to make a big decision, shall I go in for fighter or light bombardment training.  These are the only two choices we have.  If I go in for Fighter I may get assigned to P38s which is not too bad or I might get my choose of fighter planes.  I would kind of like that .  However if I go in for light bombardment I may get an A20 light bomber which would be just the thing but probably I would get a B17 or B 24 which are heavy bombers.  That is not so much to my liking.  You see twin engine fighters (P38) and multi-engine bombers are the only schools available out in the command area.  If I qualified for anything else I doubt if I could get it because they hate to train men out here and then lose them to other sections.  Right now I don't have a lot of choice to make anyway.

P38

B17 Bomber

B24 Bomber

It seems I am not too big to fly P38s or P47 and most of the modern fighters because they are really building big planes around the present motors.  I hate to think of driving a B24 or maybe a B29 because they handle like Mack Trucks even thought the training is the only training I can use after the war.  Very little in a commercial way has been done with single engine fighter training.  Well I won't be too disappointed which way it goes.  It isn't a choice of picking the least dangerous because none are safe.  I guess I have a lot to do before I get to fighter planes.  So I must get some sleep.

With love

Austin

February 17, 1944

Ryan Field

Tucson Ariz.

Feb. 17, 1944

Dear A.P.

I vow right now to not write later than 2000 (8:00 p.m.) because I am very tired and need the extra hour of sleep.

I got your letter today and as I haven't written to you for some time I guess this one is due to you.  I got 4 different letters the day before yesterday but I can't answer them for a couple more days because I am again short of paper but have enough envelopes for the whole outfit.

A "Link trainer" isn't much of a plane.  It has all the instruments in it for cross country blind flying.  It has a two way radio although we only use it one way, instructor to student, no back talk.  They have 10 or 12 of these in a hanger and the instructors are non-coms who have had the training required to train others.

The instruments in the plane have identical sets upon the instructors table so that he can watch your altitude, air speed, rate of climb, etc while you watch them in the little plane.  You get a series of exercises on each lesson so that you get so that you can control your speed with the stick and not the throttle.  In the last lesson you get a chance to fly a course and to trace circles on a paper.  They are drawn by a machine that is synchronized to the trainer so that you can fly a course and have it traced for you to show your mistakes.

Link only lasts 5 hours so that every thing we learn is very elementary and little or no use in our present flying.

In our planes we have one way communication and it is of course from the instructor to student, again no back talk.  They use gas ports which is a rubber tube more or less that is attached to the helmet in such a way that the instructor can be heard very well.  The planes are equipped for electrical communication but we are not so we don't worry about it.

Today I had a check flight and it was not very much of a ride.  I gave him a pretty good ride and all he had to say afterwards that I had no dangerous characteristics and that my sight for a "forced landing" was not quite what he had picked out, my lazy 8s were appropriately what he wanted.  He didn't have any unfavorable comments however.

3 days ago I had a civilian check ride which was not quite so good.  He said that my torque correction in stalls was weak, my chandelles were not too good, my forced landing field was not too good but otherwise all right.  I also didn't try to gain enough altitude after a spin recovery.  I passed it all right. I don't have to sweat out any more check rides until I have completed 40 hours or more and that is not too long from now as I now have 36 hours to my credit.

From now on we will have to get 2 hours a day to finish on schedule.  I have 12 hours of solo now but must have 30 before the course is over so you see I have quite a way to go yet.  Everything is going according to schedule.  I have passed the 90 degree stage and the 180 degree as well and have only the 180 degree cross wind stage to go.

I got a letter from Aunt Emma the other day and she seemed to think that grandpa was coming along very well considering.

Well I must close now.  Tell Mother to write as soon as she gets her box and tell me what she thinks.

With love

Austin.

January 27, 1944

Ryan Field

Tucson, Ariz.

Jan 27, 1944

This is that Christmas seal you sent in my Christmas packages.

Dear A.P.

I am writing this letter in a little spare time I have before supper.  I haven't written for some time so I guess it's about time.

Flying isn't going too hot right now.  I don't know just what is the matter other than I haven't caught on to landings well enough to solo.  Several days I could have done it but the good weather has broken and cross wind landings here are messing up the works.  I now have 10:32 hours and that is 1:32 hours more than I have to have.  I have 56 landings and that is a lot more than the minimum.  On a whole I am very disgusted with myself.  Something is wrong and I should be able to take care of it. 3 of the fellows have soloed all ready.  I should have by this time but I guess I will just have to see what happens tomorrow.

We have a pretty tough schedule out here but it is not monotonous.  Each week we either fly first and go to school first and the next week we will do the opposite as last week.  This week we have classes in the morning along with P.T. and Drill.  We fall out for drill at 6:50 and drill till 7:30.  Then we have P.T. until 9:00 or later usually later so that we get in the barracks at 9:30.  Our classes start at 9:50 and last till 11:15.  We then have dinner and report to the flight line at 1300.  Between 1300 and 1700 we get an hour or more of flying and in between time we walk wing times and amuse ourselves in any way possible.  Sometimes they have classes and flying skills and such things as flight patterns, order of maneuver in flights.  They are usually very interesting and very helpful in flying if you can remember all that is said.

The field doesn't have mile long runways but they are pretty near as long.  It is somewhat longer than 3 miles around the field so it would make the diagonal about a mile long.  We have plenty of room to come down and have a long taxi at the end.  You see we use flaps and this cuts down the landing space as well as the speed.  Flaps increase lift a lot more than decrease speed.  You see we use only 10 degrees of flaps and the maximum is 30 degrees.  There are 3 auxiliary fields placed about 5 or 10 miles from the main field and it is here that we do our landing and later do stages.

Ryan Airfield

The whole set up is ringed by mountains that rise anywhere from 1000' to 6000' above the floor of the valley.  These mts form the boundaries.  These mountains are not so bad as you might think because they are very visible and as long as no flying is done in foggy weather there is not danger of running into one.  Of course your engine might fail when you are over that way but you should have enough altitude to stay out of them.  In fact they suggest that you fly over the valley rather than over near the mountains.

Taken from here.

We are going to be let out for 2 hours tomorrow night to go to town.  I will get a little chance to see what the world is like again.

Well I have to get about my business so until later.

With love

Austin.

Hope I get the watch soon!!!

January 19, 1944

Ryan Field

Tucson Ariz.

Jan. 19, 1944

Dear Mother:

I got your letter yesterday and was very pleased as usual.  It only takes 4 days for mail to come along now instead of the regular 5 to Calif.  Yes we are a little nearer home but there still seems to be a lot of desert between me and home.

Letters never meant too much to me before I got to Santa Ana because I still felt that I was near home but when the mail took so long in coming it began to mean  a lot.  Yesterday, although I didn't fly, around noon time I was tired and felt worn out.  I felt as if something was on my mind but I couldn't find out what it was.  When I got the letter at noon mail call I lost a lot of the tired feeling and began to feel good again.  It seems rather strange what a letter will do but it is no exaggeration to say that the longer you are away the more important the mail becomes.  It has a lot to do with morale.  When you are under tension the way we are to put out our best for only one hour a day the moments we can get away from it all help a lot lot to cure the tired feeling.

Now as for the interestingness of my letters I am sure I could not say as I only write them and get too little time to read them.  Therefore you must find many many mistakes in spelling, punctuation, and general silly errors.  {Graciously edited out by the transcriber.} Anyway they may convey some of  the ideas that come into my head and some of the things I see along the way.  

My training is coming along on schedule as far as I know.  We have progressed far enough so that I am now learning to land.  Today I made 4 landings and take offs.  None were any too hot but I guess the instructor hasn't given up hope for me.  We had a very strong wind at 300' and diminished until the ground wind was practically nil.  This required a number of changes in the flying altitude. (We just got some "good" news.  We are going to be restricted to the past for 2 more weeks.  That means that I won't see any of Arizona for another 2 whole lousy (such language) week ends.)  Oh Well!  Tomorrow we will do landings again I guess and they would be done under better circumstances if we can help it.

I have learned the procedure for many of the elementary maneuvers but have 2 more to go before I have a 20 hour check flight.  I have only 0509 hours put in all ready so I don't think a check flight after that time will offer any great obstacles.

I should tell you something about my instructor.  He is about 5'4" tall and is really a shrimp beside me and the other tall fellows who fly with me.  I don't know whether his teaching us is an accident or a design of the high ups.  You would think that the big fellows would be taught by someone somewhere their size.  However he makes up for his size in his flying because he can really make a plane perform for him.  He must have infinite patience to teach a new bunch of "dodo's" each 2 mos.  Of course he loses patience once in a while and he bangs the controls around a little but if you don't take everything he says to heart you can learn from his impatient moments.  They always say a lot of things they don't really mean and try to impress you with others because in the future your life will depend upon what you retain from all you are told.  They are really trying to get you "on the ball" and I might say they really know the right methods.  If not they would not have the important job they hold.  If anyone learns to fly safely he can figure that his life will later be saved by what has been told and taught him by the very unglorified "Primary Instructors".

Some one has brought the "mumps" with them from Santa Ana and that is why we will be restricted to the post for 2 more weeks.  I guess I can save some money again.  I have about $50 that is burning a hole in my pocket and I guess that before the next restrict is up that you will get the money to put in the bank for me.  In 2 weeks we will get paid again so I won't need the 50.  I rather wish I could spend the money because I get so little enjoyment out of it if I just send it home.  It's going to be a long war yet so even though I should save more I don't have to save it all.

I wrote to Mary the other day so I hope she enjoys her new job, I guess I didn't know if she really had it or not.  I hope she can have some fun this winter.

I wrote to Mabel (a card) the other day and told her not to get too mad at me.  So she thinks I have changed by getting to fly.  Well my change may be apparent when I get home but right here I don't see much difference.  I may be browner and a lot heavier but aside from that I can see little difference.  I may not be so peace loving as I used to be and I might be getting a little wild but I guess I haven't changed so much that you won't recognize me.

With love

Austin    (Mr. Hyde?)

P.S. Did I forget to write anything.