We were old cadets and felt the importance of our experience. We were no longer treated as rookies but as potential officers. Before leaving Brooks we had conformed with cadet traditions and allowed groups of the new class to gather around us while we gravely spoke of examinations, check pilots, “Benzine Boards,” and “washouts.” We thoroughly enjoyed the awe inspired by our seventy-five hours of flying experience.
At Kelly our difficulties set in with renewed vigor. The De Havilands did not maneuver like the training Jennies, and we were required to fly as we had never flown before. If a cadet was not able to handle his ship in a maneuver which was at least equal to the standard, he was usually heading towards home within a week.
We were allowed a few days to become accustomed to flying the new type of plane, then an instructor would go up with us to see if our progress had been satisfactory. If so we were sent to the next stage; if not we went up with a check pilot.
From landings we went to the “eight” stage, where were assigned two landmarks such as a tree and a haystack several hundred feet apart, and required to do figure-eights around them. Then came the spot landing stage, when we throttled our engine at about a thousand feet and were required to land in a large white circle without using our motor. On this stage we were graded on our takeoff, climb, approach, landing, roll, distance from mark, and method of handling the ship. In fact at Kelly we were constantly under observation and our only method of relaxation while flying was when the sky was cloudy and we could get above the clouds.
On one occasion we were flying with a low ceiling and the visibility was not very good. In fact it was an ideal day to do the things we were not supposed to. I was hedgehopping along over the country when I saw another DH playing around on my right. I flew over, and after chasing each other around for a while we proceeded to do chandelles, vertical banks, wing-overs, and everything else we could think of; all within a few feet of the ground as the clouds themselves were only about three hundred feet high. At last I decided to go up close to the other plane for a little low formation flying, but as I approached I saw that there were two men in the ship and that I had been breaking every rule ever established about low flying with an instructor watching me from another ship. I left that locality with wide open motor and for several days expected to be called on the carpet before the commanding officer on a washout offense. That instructor must have been a good sport, however, because I never heard from him and never was able to find out who he was.
On another occasion, near the end of my course, I came very near being washed out for something I knew nothing about. I had been practicing landings in an S.E.5 on one corner of Kelly Field. When my time had expired, I landed on the pursuit stage, taxied up to the line, and turned the ship over to the mechanics. That afternoon I was called from class and ordered to report to the operations officer; whereupon he informed me that my flying days were over and that as I knew why, there was no use in explaining further. I was then ordered to report back to my studies.
It came out of a clear sky. I knew of a number of offenses I had committed but none of them at that time. I had actually no idea of what the operations officer was talking about.
When school was over I returned to the operations hut and requested an account of the alleged offense. It appeared that the propeller on my S.E.5 was cracked, and the spreader board broken on the landing gear. The crew chief had reported this together with a statement that there were corn stalks hanging on the landing gear, and as there was no corn growing on Kelly Field, that was a sure sign that I had landed away from the airdrome without reporting the fact. A washout offense. We drove to the pursuit stage and found conditions exactly as stated, except that the corn stalks turned out to be weeds, and it was decided that the damage had been caused by a stake left standing in the corner of Kelly Field where I had been landing, although I had not felt the ship strike anything. The cadet who flew the plane earlier in the morning was using the same part of the field and said that he felt it strike a bump on one of his takeoffs but did not believe any damage had been done. Who was flying the ship made little difference, however, because as long as he had not landed away from the airdrome without authority, the slight damage was of no consequence. I had come very close to the “Benzine Board” for an offense of which I knew nothing, but it was probably only the open-mindedness and sense of fair play of the operations officer that kept me from being washed out as a result.
Left to right: Paul Painlevé, Charles Lindbergh, M. Bleriot, Ambassador Herrick
One day during the beginning of our term at Kelly, someone decided that the cadets should stand reveille. How it came about or who caused the decision was never known by the detachment, but there was a strong rumor circulated to the effect that our beloved Cadet Sergeant had not forgotten the episode of the polecats. It was
