WORLD WAR II PILOT VISITS THE WINERY
August 25th, 2010
A few months ago, we had a very special guest visit the winery – Jack Klein, retired chief master sergeant USAF. Jack was one of the WWII pilots that trained on our family’s property during the 1940s. Below are some of the notes that were compiled from his visit:
Jack came to the Airport Ranch for secondary flight training on December 15, 1942 after doing his primary flight training in Cle Elum beginning September 15 of that year. The primary flight training included ground school in the high school building and the first 40 hours of flying at the Cle Elum airport. Cle Elum was chosen because it was the first airport 90 miles in from the WA coastline. The Air Defense ID Zone mandated no-fly for 90 miles from each coastline.
Secondary flight training included practice of handling planes in aerobatics as in rolls and loops. At first they flew Travelair bi-planes which were open cockpit, two-seater planes that didn’t have inverted carburetion so they couldn’t fly upside down. Later they got the UPF-7 WACO planes which could.
At first the training was for civilian pilots, but half-way through the school it was changed to the War Training Service Program. They were training to become instructor pilots. The instructors came from the Olympic Air Transport Company owned by A.W. “Art” Whitaker and the planes were either owned by Art or leased to the airfield by the War Assets Administration. Art Whitaker was a Reserve Captain and was in charge of the planes and their mechanics.
The pilot training center (located at the present-day Airport Ranch) opened in October of 1942. It consisted of four barracks (which could house 60 men each), hangars on the south side, a shop, and an office/mess hall-kitchen building which had the only telephone on the base. All the buildings were unpainted. On the north side of the buildings, a subdivision had been platted with streets laid out, but the houses were never built. There was one runway cleared through the sage brush. Farm land was miles away.
The group consisted of about 100 enlisted US Army Air Force reservists there for the training and 20 Marine active non-com officers. The reservists wore old WPA uniforms which were brand new, but made of dark green wool. They were issued in the late spring when it was already warm.
When the training group arrived in December, a group of student pilots from Brazil also on contract with the Olympic Air Transport Company were just leaving. They had completed their secondary flight training and were going home. They were the pick of the country and had sharp uniforms, but had their share of mishaps. In fact, they had wrecked one of the airplanes.
Just after Klein and the others arrived, it snowed. The base was snowed in for two weeks and there was no snow removal equipment so there wasn’t any flying for a while. The men had time to organize a Christmas program for the cooks.
The mess hall was large enough to feed 50-60 at a time and they ate very well. There were 12 ladies who did the cooking. They got ration cards for eggs, butter and meat from local farmers because they raised their own and were glad to share theirs for the war effort.
Sunnyside was a quiet town, at least 25 churches, and no one in town after 6:00 p.m. on Saturday night. There were dances at the Juanita Grange Hall and the guys didn’t have any trouble finding women for the dance. One of Jack’s buddies, Lee Williamson, met a girl from Grandview and married her after the war.
Another buddy, Lotus Conser, was a tail gunner in a B-17 plane that was shot down in Belgium in May of 1942. He landed in a haystack and walked away. He now lives in Portland.
Chet Stimson, the chief instructor, became an aircraft salesman after the war. Jack himself stayed in the Air Force and has been retired now for 40 years.
We’d like to give a special thanks to Senator Honeyford and his wife Jerri for arranging Jack’s visit. We are especially appreciative of Jerri Honeyford for compiling these notes. She is also spearheading a project to unveil the historical roots of the Airfield, and we eagerly look forward to her findings.
