Good Friends

We have known George and Sue Ann for a long time.  In fact, they are the oldest friends we have.  I first met George when he came on the tanker crew I was on; that was in the Spring of 1964.  George was the copilot and fresh out of pilot training, along with the usual stops for KC-135 upgrade and Survival training. 

Our boss was an old hand in the flying game; he had flown B-29s and some other aircraft  before getting to the KC-135.  His name was Ernest P. Vicchio, and he was a senior captain, not far from becoming a major.  George always referred to him as “Ernie.”  Not to his face, of course.

We were a good fit.  Everyone got along well and knew their jobs.  George was a competent copilot and a gregarious soul.  George was then a young bachelor.  I was newly married to Linda; we hadn’t been married a year at that time.  After our first ground alert tour of duty I invited George to our house for a late breakfast of pastries and coffee that Linda had put together.  Apparently our hospitality made an impression on George because he would recall that morning many times over the fifty-plus years we knew him.

I knew that George had been dating a very pretty Air Force nurse; Linda and I had met her once or twice.  She was impressive; she and Linda hit if off from the start.  We double dated once or twice.  A little more time passed; we had to fly to Spain and spend a couple of weeks refueling B-52s on airborne alert.  It was George’s first TDY (temporary duty).  We did the usual things for a trip to Spain:  flew a lot and took whatever chances we could to take a bus to Madrid to take in the sights.  

Sometime during the two weeks in Spain, George had a serious chat with me.  His relationship with very pretty Air Force nurse was becoming more serious.  They were thinking about marrying.  George asked me what I thought.  I told him that I thought that marrying Sue Ann would be great choice.

George proposed; Sue Ann accepted.  Time passed.  Plans were made.  Our daughter, Krista Lynne, was born.  Their wedding was held in the Ellsworth Air Force Base Chapel; that was far from the homes of both George and Sue Ann; the hospital commander, a doctor, stood in for Sue Ann’s father and gave the bride away.  Linda and I were part of the wedding party.  That was in 1965. It was a great time.

More time passed.  We got a new boss; our new pilot was a “good ol’ boy” by the name of Ernie Davis.  We were tagged for a special mission to Guam; we had to fly out to California and join another crew.  Our task was to fly a load of cargo for B-52s flying out of Guam.  The day before our mission was to launch, we all went to San Francisco to take in what was then becoming a habitat for Flower Children.  Our pilot led the expedition since he had recently come from the base we were launching from.  Our crew got the second leg of the flight from Hawaii to Guam; it was a night crossing over a stormy Pacific Ocean.  It kept George and me busy all night long.  George and I were having some recollections of that trip just a few days before his passing.

Soon after we got back to Ellsworth, George was assigned to another crew.  The people in charge were impressed with George’s performance and started the grooming process that would take him from being a copilot in the right seat to pilot-in-command in the left seat of the KC-135.

George and Sue Ann were instrumental in helping Linda and our children while I was on a year assignment to Southeast Asia. Sue Ann and Linda always had been close, especially then.

Over the next five years, or so, George became an aircraft commander, and later, attended flight instructor school for the KC-135.  He was a member of the initial group that opened a new squadron of airborne command post operations at Ellsworth.  He was instrumental in my returning to Ellsworth after my year in Southeast Asia. 

He had his own overseas assignment, but not to Southeast Asia.  His was a “career broadening” assignment to the air defense business.  It was a non-flying job and ended with a remote assignment to Galena, Alaska, on the banks of the Yukon River.  He returned to the airborne command post at Offutt and began a career that took him to a job in the Pentagon. Along the way, six children were born to George and Sue Ann.

I retired from the Air Force; George retired also.  Yet we kept contact over all the years.  We visited George and Sue Ann; they visited us.  We met in Hawaii twice in a kind of reunion and enjoyed ourselves immensely.  By that time the wear and tear of time was taking over all four of us.  We never visited again, but we kept in contact.  At some point, I can’t recall now, George mentioned that he had ejected from a crippled T-33 while in pilot training.  That qualified him as a member of The Caterpillar Club, but I don’t know if he ever made a membership application.

November 18^th was the last time I will ever get to talk to George.  He was the same jovial guy I had known for over fifty years.  I guess that was a good way to end a friendship.