No, dad was an Army Air Corp Crew Chief civilian mechanic (they wouldn't let any of those highly trained specialists enlist) back then who worked on the planes before they left the states. . . . and for the chase planes that injured his crewman, when they were returned. Dad later thought the chase planes should have been dropped in the ocean. Apparently they were brought back for testing purposes to see what affects the radioactive debris would have on the plane materials and other parts. . . especially the one that flew through the mushroom cloud. I used to know the name of that plane but my old mind has misfiled its index card. If I recall correctly dad said it was trucked in, rather than flown in. They dismounted and crated up the engines. I'm pretty sure it eventually got cut up and buried.
Dad's crew were considered the go-to team for engine tune ups and for special projects.
The Doolittle guys were doing practice take offs where my dad was working at McClellan Army Air Base, while the planes were being worked on.
They had a strip marked off with the length they had available to them . . . but they did not know what they were training for yet. They though it was an island strip. . . so they kept trying to LAND in that distance too, even though they were told not to worry about landing, which had them thoroughly confused. They couldn't do the landing no matter how hard then tried. Dad said they always overshot. They hadn't been briefed yet that they were going to take off from a aircraft carrier! The planes were lifted onto the Hornet by crane as I understand it.
By the time they finished practicing they could all take off with room to spare on their marked runway.
Just before dad died we went to the Air Museum at McClellan which he had never been to even though he lived in Sacramento, and did was looking at some of the photos there. . . and found his picture along with his team. They had some the names on the caption wrong. So he introduced himself to the Museum Director and showed him the photos and the guy did a double take looking back and forth at my dad and his much younger self (my dad had had hair so blond he didn't even notice he'd gone completely white until my mom had to tell him it wasn't blond anymore!) in the photos. He really hadn't changed much, a little stooped, but still very tall. Dad said "That guy there's name isn't spelled that way, and you've got the wrong first name on that guy. Oh, and that isn't Colonel. . . " and they were off. . . two hours later my dad was still talking into a tape recorder as they were picking his brain about his 40 plus years working at McClellan including the stories about the Doolittle planes and the other famous planes and people that had been there. Dad knew everybody.
He'd been asked to go to the South Pacific as a civilian expert for tough jobs and on location training of servicemen, but declined. . . and then in the mid-sixties had been offered the position of half-time Civilian manager of all the Air Force repair facilities in South Vietnam (half time there, half time idle in the states while another Civilian manager did the Vietnam job, swapping back and forth) but he also declined that; I think my mom talked him out of it. Pay was really good, but money was never his motivation. Strange thing. . . he absolutely HATED to fly. Scared him silly. That might have also had something to do with it.
Some of that may have been that part of the job he was doing then was writing all the books for one of the jet models the Air Force was flying and when one crashed, he had to go and assist in the crash investigation. One of the jets he had been responsible for before was the F-86 which he described as a jet engine with an aluminum can with wings bolted around it, and the pilot sitting on the can.
Someday, ask me about his F-86 washer story. It's too involved to go into tonight.
He added water injection to his motorhome RV. . . I kept teasing him that if he added one more gas saving gadget to it, he'd have to stop every twenty miles and syphon gas out of the tank to prevent it from overflowing. His dashboard had gauges he'd added for everything he could think of. It looked like an aircraft cockpit. After his death my mom had me strip everything out just so it could be sold, because no one else could ever understand what they were looking at, or what those controls would do. LOL!
Love your stories Dad too knew the names what their jobs were back in the states. Where they were from. We have a little town that’s now privately owned called STORY. He’d tell me about Jim Story every time we drove thru.
Many he kept in contact with via their reunions.
One day we were sitting in a restaurant. He and another lawyer started telling war stories. They started practicing law together and had been in the same law school so had known each other for years but had not spoken about the war Finally one said he’d been in Army Air Corp? South Pacific? . Small island ? Me too ,to make a long story short. Dad’s friend had been on same island but had been the radio operator on top of the island. They had spoken together regularly in the war but had never met Didn’t know each other by sight but had been friends here in the states without realizing they had been “friends” on that little south Sea island!
Your dad must have prepare the planes and sent them to dads island and they went on from there. Wish dad had spoken earlier of his experiences but at least we did get to talk some about the war.
Love your stories. Suggest you record audio via youtube for family and friends. Maybe video. History is important.
Bkmk for l8r, thx.