In November of 1943 four of us went to Nebraska to pick up four P-39sfrom an abandoned air base in northern Nebraska up near the SouthDakota border. 0ur flight was chosen and our leader was Thomas J.Tilson (called TJ), Lloyd Bruce, Neil Ullo and myself. the four of uswere to stay together all through combat. 'TJ' was a nice lookingblond from Teaneck, New Jersey and was what we called a " huge timeoperator" in those days. He had girls where ever he went. Hisambition was to dance in all the huge ballrooms in the U.S andEngland. I think he eventually made all of them. Bruce was fromKirkville, Missouri and Neil Ullo was from California. Neil had beenan electrician in Pearl Harbor when it was bombed and as soon as hewas able to get back to the States he joined the service. Bruce andNeil were my closest friends in the days to come and after the warLettie and I visited the Bruces in Missouri and after Lynn was born,we visited the Ullos in California during one trip to Utah. Lynnstayed with her grandparents in Utah that time.

Now for the trip to Nebraska. We sometimes were real characters by now with ourleather jackets, rakish hats and our 45's in our shoulder holsters.We had to protect these planes from the enemy even in the middle ofthe U.S.!! We sometimes were to fly by commercial airline to 0maha so we loadedall our gear into a little army truck and exclaimed goodbye to all ourfriends. We made the two and a half hour trip to the San Franciscoairport to catch our plane. (It was the only time I ever flew in acommercial plane.) About four, and a half hours after leaving0akland, we finally took off. About two minutes into the flight welanded at 0akland, across the Bay, on our first stop. There were allour friends standing there waving at us! We could have gotten onthere and saved half a day of travel but that was the Army's way ofdoing everything. We landed in 0maha, checked into a hotel and set outto look for the nearest eveningclub. We had a steak dinner and the meatin the stockyard district was totally different from anything in theEast. The steak was about two inches thick and you could cut it witha fork. As soon as we found some girls, we stacked all our guns onthe table and danced the evening away.