EAA Sport Aviation

memorabilia on the walls. People just come and go, but you do not come through the door without enduring a couple insults. Neither do you leave without a couple more being tossed your way. I’ve been around pilots all my life and career; I didn’t personally know any of these guys, but I was right at home.

Marle introduced me to the collective gathering: “This is our
speaker tonight.”
“Don’t expect no ovation,” John said.

I assured him that I didn’t and then added, “I have a short program
and a long program. If it’s not going well, I go with the short program.”
“Oh, great,” John said. “It’ll be our luck that it’s not going well and
you’ll still give us the long program.” You gotta love a gathering like this!

In the room was “Chili,” who was on the first U.S. Navy ship to sail into Tokyo Bay right after the Japanese surrender. “We didn’t know what to expect, but then we saw people on shore waving white flags,” he said.

Then there was Larry, a bridge beam expert. If something goes wrong with a bridge beam in California, Larry’s the guy they call. Everybody’s somebody!