They sent us to Monroe during Dark Cloud Pine Cone II. (Who names these things, anyway?) I don't remember how long we were at Monroe but it was at least a few days. We had government meal tickets and we ate all of our meals at a local home cooking type restaurant in town. We got to know some of the regulars and talked to them every day. They wanted to know what was going on, of course. Maybe they were thinking that the Russians were coming. (It was half expected at that time.) One couple found out that we didn't have anywhere to clean up except a sort of half bath at the airport and offered to take us to their house and let us take a shower. We quickly took them up on it. Nice folks. People always seemed to treat us really well back then.
We only had army aircraft one afternoon and they left the next morning. We had quite a few fixed wing and choppers come in that afternoon. They had a sort of ground control set up to land them and get them off the next morning. It seemed to work very well.
We just had to be there all the time except for meals. After lunch one day one of the guys suggested that we go to a local hobby shop across the street from the restaurant and look around. We did and a couple of us bought a U-Control model, glue, paint, and an engine. Everything needed to fly the model. We had a good workbench in our van that was not being used at the time and built the planes. I was out flying one afternoon and the Manager came out and asked if he could fly it. I said, sure, if I can fly yours. He said that he would take me up the next day.
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| Piper J-3 |
The next afternoon he came back from a crop dusting job in his J-3 Piper Cub and came up to the van and asked if I was ready to go. I said, Yes, and followed him to the crop duster. The other guys were all standing around and watching us. I should have know what to expect from the manager since he was a former fighter pilot anyway.
The J-3 is a two place front and rear plane and had been converted for crop dusting. It had DDT or some chemical powder all over the inside and looked like it had a hard life already. I would go up with anybody in anything, ... back then, anyway.
We taxied out and took off on the taxi strip instead of the runway. Yep, this was going to be interesting. That side of the airport was on a high fill bank and we were over the gully when he kicked it into a steep turn at just about runway level. He straightened it out and flew in the gully with trees between us and the airport and got his speed up and then pulled up into a steep climb. He said that he would give the guys a little show. Maybe I should have asked then to not put on much of a show but I didn't. That was my last chance to say much because after he had gained altitude, he put us in a steep dive with the engine screaming and the chemicals coming up off of the floor. Hey, fun is just starting...... He pulled out of the dive in the gully and screamed that back at the airport it looked like we were in the trees. Yeah, we almost were. He gained altitude again and pulled up into a hammerhead stall and kicked it into a spin back down into the gully again and pulled out just above the ground. No, I didn't scream or tell God that if he would let me live I would never get in another plane but I thought about it! He flew in the gully below the trees and then hopped over the bank and back onto the taxiway for a landing right beside our guys.
I was very proud of myself. I could climb out of the plane and even walk somewhat normally and even talked without screaming. One of the guys asked me if I was scared? I don't remember exactly what I told him but I didn't admit to it or deny it either.
No government ever voluntarily reduces itself in size. Government programs, once launched, never disappear. Actually, a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we'll ever see on this earth!
Ronald Reagan
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It seemed that the army rented all of North Carolina for the "Dark Cloud Pine Cone II" maneuvers. Our company had teams out all over the state. We spent some time at Bragg, NC, Camp Mackall, NC, and Monroe, NC during the maneuvers. As well as I can remember, The maneuvers lasted a couple of weeks and we were neutral between the two armies that were fighting (?). The 82nd Airborne and the 101st Airborne were having war games. We had umpire flags on our vehicles and we would drive down a dirt road on the back of post and they would stop shooting while we passed. They were polite to say the least.
We were camped out at an emergency air strip somewhere on the back end of Fort Bragg in the boonies of Camp Mackall. (Emergency airstrip means a fairly straight section of a dirt road with a few trees cleared out on both sides.) We had our power unit running, lights on in the van, and we were running our air compressor to pump up our air mattresses for the nights sleep. Sgt Classcock had brought his TV along and it was on fairly loud. Well, it was hard to hear over the air compressor.
One guy stuck his head in the van door and said that there were guys crawling around out in the woods near us. We went out to see and the airborne guys were all over the woods with sticks and branches on their helmets and charcoal on their faces. A 2nd Lieutenant stormed up and someone called "ATTENTION". The LT barked "Who is in charge here? Sgt. Classcock saluted and said that he was, sir. The Lt chewed him out and explained that this was suppose to be a war zone, blah, blah, and demanded to see our orders. The Sarge showed him our orders and the LT said, "Carry On" , can you turn down the TV? Sarge said that he would and the LT left. I never understood why, but our orders directly from 3rd Army seemed to impress folks whenever we went anywhere TDY.
Later, we went to Monroe, NC to a small private strip that had a grass runway. The strip was used as a base for crop dusters and had a few private planes. The airport manager/ crop duster pilot was a nice guy. He had been a P-38 fighter pilot during the War. WW II, that is. We were there a few days and he kept us entertained with tales of his war stories when he wasn't busy .
He stuck his head in the van one afternoon and told me that he had to go to Asheville, NC that evening and asked me to turn on the runway lights for him when he came back. He showed me the switch for the lights and I asked him how I would know when to turn the lights on. He said that we would hear him and I said we may be asleep and he said not to worry, we would hear him come back.
A few of us were sleeping between the bows on the top of of the deuce and a half. (The top will support 3 guys but not 4. Don't ask how I know.) I was sacked out good when there was this loud racket and I opened my eyes and saw this bright light that seemed like the sun coming right at us. We jumped down before it dawned on me that it was the manager coming back. He flew very low right over us, I turned the lights on for him, and he landed okay and thanked me. He said, "I told you that you would know when I was back".
Government's first duty is to protect the people, not run their lives.
Ronald Reagan
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| De Havilland Otter |
I understand that they took all the fixed wing aircraft away from the army and left them only with helicopters. The Army had quite a few different fixed wing aircraft in the 50's. I was fortunate that I wanted to catch hops to Atlanta and back since the Third Army HQ was at Fort Mac in Atlanta and there was quite a bit of traffic between Rucker, Bragg, and the Third Army Flight detachment at the Fulton County airport in Atlanta.
While working at Bragg I was able to catch a flight home every few weeks. I went to Simmons Field Operations one Friday to check on a possible hop home that evening. They said that they had an Otter that was scheduled to leave that evening that had space available for me. I logged in for the flight.
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| De Havilland Beaver |
The Otter and Beaver were Canadian bush planes that could take off from a short field. Both had a big radial engine and a decent speed. I dressed in class "A" uniform and went to operations to wait on the flight. I noticed that there were quite a few officers that came in to Operations. They seemed to know each other and were all talking and I was just a lowly E-5 Specialist Enlisted man off to myself. They called the flight and I followed them out and sat in the back of the plane. As I remember, the Otter would carry 11 including a cockpit crew of two.
I don't remember how many officers were on board but there were a few empty seats. I noticed them talking and looking back at me but I didn't know what they were talking about. We arrived at Fulton County and I was walking to operations to call my father to come get me. I noticed that there were two army staff cars sitting outside the front door with two drivers standing by. I assumed that they both were for the officers but as I walked up to the operations door one driver asked if I was Buffington. I said, yes and he said for me to get in the car. I looked at the other car in front and all the officers were crowding into that car and sitting in each others lap.
I asked the driver if the car was for me and he said, "Yes", and opened the back door for me. The officers were all piled into only one car and I had the other car all to myself. All the way into post they were in front of us and we could see the brass all crowded up and I could spread out all over the back seat. "No Fraternization" was sort of stupid and the driver and I did enjoy the sight.
We were talking as we rode into town and I told him that our apartment was only a block south of post and he said that he would just drop me by home. We decided that the brass didn't know what I was doing on their plane and they didn't ask me. They probably radioed for enough cars but only two were available then and they must have thought that I had an "official" need to be there.
The smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities.
Ayn Rand
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This is part of Simmons Field at Fort Bragg, NC. In the picture at the left you can see the "Balloon Hanger", an L-19 airplane, and two H-21 helicopters. Legend had it that an airborne pilot once flew an L-19 through the balloon hanger without crashing. I can't verify that because that was before my time there. I have been in that hanger and that would be a tight fit. The balloon hanger was used to house blimps (Like the Goodyear Blimp) that they used during WWII to patrol the coast and spot German submarines.
I caught a hop home one weekend and was to return on a Sunday afternoon. An L-19 flight that originated at Fort Rucker and was returning to Fort Bragg was to stop and pick me up. I was there well ahead of time and was waiting on him. I saw him landing and I said goodbye to Nancy and my Father and ran out to meet him. He barely had to stop for me.
He said that he was running late and I had cost him more time to stop and get me. I apologized but he was not happy. We were somewhere over South Carolina and he told me that he was supposed to stop for refueling at Fort Jackson but he thought that he had enough fuel to make it without stopping. He said that he was going to drain one tank and switch to the other one instead of drawing from both.
Later, the engine coughed and he switched the valve to the other tank..... It died. It sure did get quiet all of a sudden. He put the plane into a shallow glide while he tried to restart the engine. I looked out the windows and all I saw was trees with no place to land. He continued to grind on the starter with no luck. He said that we may have to jump if we got down too low. I don't remember how low it would be unsafe to jump. I know it seemed much longer than it actually was but it seemed like we glided for quite a while.
We had an emergency parachute on. The emergency chute is a little bigger than a loaf of bread and is designed to slow you down enough to only break your legs. Anyway, the plane crashed and we were both killed. Okay...., I lied. The engine finally started and we flew the rest of the way to Bragg with no problems.
We had a long weekend while we were at Bragg and one guy in our team at Bragg went over to Pope Field to see what flight they had going somewhere. Pope is an Air force base next to Bragg and it's main purpose is to take the airborne guys up and let them jump out. He caught a flight to California for the weekend and found some Reservists there getting ready to fly to Hawaii for the weekend. Yep, he went on to Hawaii and came back with them and then caught a flight back on time.
My record of catching flights was insignificant compared to his.
The Constitution shall never be construed... to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms.
Samuel Adams
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