Warbird Information Exchange

How are we all doing today? Alright would love to hear some stories of perhaps some moments you remember during the cold war years. Aircraft you remember flying over, or seen at airshows, or worked with during your service days? Did you ever stop to think that someday you would not see these fly anymore? Any special moments or just "WOW thats cool" times? Did you ever see a B-58 fly, B-36, B-50's, F-105's, etc, etc??? Any stories I and I am sure everyone here would love to hear!!

I missed out on these days since I was born in 1986. So many aircraft and some of the coolest ever I never got to see fly cause they don't fly anymore. At a very young age I do remember some aircraft at a few airshows that lived through it....A-6 Intruder I saw fly I can remember that. But I don't really feel cold war when I think about the A-6 so maybe I'll just exclude that one. haha

But.....my dad used to tell me stories of him as a kid and that once in a while he would hear a sonic boom! (This was probably late 50's early 60s and I just can't image what cool jets made the booms perhaps F-100, F-104's maybe! Wow gives me chills). Also he saw a C-119 fly over when he was a kid. He told me he never saw one before and had no idea what it was. He thought it was odd looking but later found out it was a Boxcar!!! My dad lived about half hour away from Benton AFS. Which was probably the reason for the aircraft activity.

I never got to see one but there was a C-133 being used in Alaska until 2008 when it was flown for the last time to Travis AFB museum in California. I like the C-133 and it still pains me to know that no more C-133's will ever take to the sky. Such a cool and often forgotten bird. Kinda got a B-36 sound to it which adds more to the nostalgia of it.

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A friend of mine, Reggie Urschler, could always be good for a short story or two about his RB-47 and RC-135 experiences. Rivet Amber histories can be found at:

http://community-2.webtv.net/@HH!B2!E8! ... age10.html

A couple quick notes, upon arrival at Shemya, he was told not to fly near the fishing trawlers off the coast. Well, Reggie being what he was....on his first mission, gave them a first class airshow. The 'Ruskies' were said to be seen putting on their life vests when he flew by! In his RB-47 days, he'd nod to the notion that RB-47s 'might' have flown over the Russian continent. To this day, nothing has ever officially been said. Though it is known a RB-47 was lost near the Russian coast with all on board. Presumably shot down.

VL

Maybe someone can shed some light on a story I once heard. I had heard that a Russian leader was giving a speech about how the United States had made up the facts of the B-36's range and that no B-36 would fly over Russia, and as his speech was ending, A B-36 at high altitude overflew the area, and then was followed by several other B-36's. A Veteran told me that, but not sure if it is true or not.

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Chris Henry
EAA Aviation Museum Manager

hi Chris,

I don't know much about the story but B-36's operated out of Alaska and thats within range of Russian.

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I've read everything I can find about the B-36 and have never seen even a hint that they participated in overflights of the fUSSR. There are more than a few hints that they overflew China...

What I remember most about The Cold War era is things like Air Raid Shelter signs on buildings and having to do the "duck and cover" drills once a month while in elementary school (mid to late 1960s). People were terrified that nuclear war could break out at any time, and we'd all be wiped out. Those were scary times, for sure.

As far as aviation goes, I grew up four miles northwest of New Castle County Airport (KILG) in northern Delaware. It's a Tactical Airlift Command base and home of the DE Air Guard, currently a C-130 unit. Back in the 1960s, however, there were C-97s and C-121s in and out of there all the time, with those thundering radials churning out sweet sounds as they climbed out from the airport, often right over our house (especially if they took off on Runway 31). There were also plenty of piston-powered civil freighters operating there. The Thunderbirds were flying Phantoms, and the Blue Angels were flying Phantoms and then Scooters. The space program was going full speed ahead, and I was really into it! We were bombarded by TV news reports from the Viet Nam war, and there was lots of film showing warplanes in action. We didn't have a color TV, so I got to see it all in glorious black & white.

Not sure why I remember this so clearly, but one day while I was outside on recess in the school playground, I heard faint turboprop engines overhead and looked up to see an Armstrong-Whitworth Argosy flying over! Only one I've ever seen, to this day. That must've been about 1967.

Around 1971 or '72, we were visiting my grandparents at their rural home on a mountainside in the Ozark mountains in Missouri. Two fully-loaded USAF Phantoms went screaming over the house at probably 100 feet, super-sonic, down the valley and up the side of the opposite mountain! The sonic boom broke every window in the house and garage and scare the living daylights out of all of us! Of course, my grandfather was on the telephone almost instantly, trying to find out how to contact the Air Force (which he did, and they paid for the windows). Luckily the windows of his pickup and my dad's station wagon didn't break. I assume the Rhinos were practicing some kind of tactical low-level target approaches at combat weight. All of the grownups were furious, my little sister was bawling her eyes out, and I thought it was the coolest thing I'd ever seen!

Occasionally, I'd hear jet noise and look up to see a B-52, or several, cruising overhead at high altitude, and each time I saw them, I wondered if they were heading for the USSR, and life as we knew it would be ending in an hour or so. Yeah, those were scary times.

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Dean Hemphill, K5DH
Port Charlotte, Florida

Wow, I couldn't imagine.

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Chris Henry
EAA Aviation Museum Manager

Appreciate the story, Dean. Keep 'em comin', folks.

Forgot one: I did see the F-4 fly a few times at airshows in Scranton Pa in the early 90's. Even as a kid and not knowing much about it I could tell it was something special. Long live the F-4! Also seen the MAPS Connie fly at Elmira a few times. That thing screamed as the engines powered up for take off. Can't beleive that same C-121 is now sitting Static in Korea!

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Sorry, no real stories to tell.

But also as a kid in the early 70's I recall:

Rhinos that seemed to be just above the treetops when we'd camp at a little lake "up north" on the Wisconsin-UP (Upper Penninsula of Michigan) border;

F-102's smoking out of Truax Field at Madison


But breaking the sound barrier isn't THAT rare of an occurence. It's happened at least 3-4 times in the last ten years I spent at my former place in Wisconsin. The town happens to lie underneath one of the combat training areas for Volk Field. Imagine what it would sound like if a home across town went up in a gas explosion...kaboom...windows rattle...a few car alarms sound off (but what kind of nitwit uses a car alarm in rural Wisconsin?)...folks run outside...folks walk back inside, muttering about those goofy ANG F-16 jockstraps.

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It was a good idea, it just didn't work.

(Said with a creaky/cranky voice).........

Back in my day, I remember:
Duck & cover air raid drills.
Sonic booms overhead from B-58s.
Sitting under final approach for St. Louis based silver F-100Cs.
Watching Grumman F11 Blue Angels perform.
Touring an a Destroyer tied up at Navy Pier.
Getting a ride in a C-123.
Studying the alert hangers at O'Hare. (Never saw any planes near them, but the doors were always closed.)
Wondering why my parents were so tense over that little situation south of Florida in 1962.

VL

vlado, ask "Lootenant" Reggie how many flights he did over the USSR in his RB-47.

Growing up in Minnesota in the early 60's;
I heard a lot of sonic booms.
Duck and cover drills in school.
Two of our neighbors had underground fall-out shelters built with access through a steel door in their basements during the Cuban missle crisis time frame.
The Mpls.-St. Paul airport had a Nike (not the shoe) missle site in some woods near the national cemetary.
I saw a lot of weather balloons, could they have been ones that flew over the Soviet Union?

I remember in the mid 60's seeing B-52's when they were at Dyess AFB and hearing the occasional sonic boom that on a clear blue sky day really scared me. This was when the the infamous Daisy commercial was running that ended with a mushroom cloud. In kindergarten and the first grade we did duck and cover drills that we just loved because we got to run and slide across the floor. We had no idea about why.

When we moved to Marietta, GA in the late 60's (dad worked on the C-5) Dobbins AFB and NAS Atlanta were pretty busy. I clearly remember C-124's, C-7's, C-130's, F-100's, F-8's, A-4's, C-141's, and C-118's that flew over my elementry school just about every day. Then there were the occasional sightings of P-2's, S-2's, C-119's, B-52's,and F-106's. Those old round engined airplanes were LOUD. I was in a soccer game in high school when a P-2 Neptune flew over on approach to the common runway that Lockheed, Dobbins and NAS Atlanta all shared. He was dirty, gear and flaps down, and I stopped in the middle of the game to just stare at what was the only chance I ever had to see and hear what was the backbone of cold war ASW prior to the P-3. And did I hear it from the coach! I pointed at the sky and said "but it was a Neptune!". That did not matter.

In NJROTC there was a lot of emphasis on the USSR being the enemy, and we spent a lot of class time learning about ASW. We had posters all over the office and our dedicated class room that were Soviet aircraft recognition posters. Our NSI was a pilot who flew the Warning Star on long range recon flights out of Labrador and would occassionaly talk about being 'escorted' by Soviet interceptors. By then, the F-100's, F-8's, C-7's, A-4's and C-124's were gone and the F-105 and A-7 were buzzing around. I was always aware there'd be a time I'd never see or hear any of them again so I always stopped and looked up whenever something flew over. I dearly wish I could find CDR Newman and talk to him about naval aviation in 50's, 60's and early 70's from my 'adult' perspective.

Ahhhh, the good ol days! I remember the yellow and black fallout shelter signs everywhere. We practiced golf in the school basement, hitting into nets, while waiting for the snow to melt. Half the room we were in was full of cots, crackers, chem toilets, geiger counters and all kinds of cryptically stenciled stuff. We had a few overflights of a flight of 4 deltawinged fighters, 100's or 102's...not sure,low buzz over the house (our neighbor's son was a pilot in the Air Guard and he liked buzzing the folks!) C-130's and Hueys on mock attacks on Camp McCoy (WI) flying low hugging the terrain. Got to see a flying Vulcan at an airshow...WOW!

On Choir Tour by Bus one year, we were going up through the Dakota's and someone asked what all the little fenced areas with razorwire around them were. I answered simply, that they were nuclear ICBM's, part of our nuclear triad (such a geek I was...um...am) it got real quiet on the bus as the word passed around. It is an odd feeling to be driving past silo after silo. Quiet, yet quite menacing.

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As a kid growing up in the 80's I missed the bulk of the Cold war, but I remember they would do drills and the PA ANG then flying A-7's would fly around the city. I flew on the Air Heritage C-123 ThunderPig a few times. That's about it. There is still a NIKE site in Pittsburgh just south of the city. I am not sure what they do there now, but it is still a military installation of some sort, and they are not about having observers.

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Chris Henry
EAA Aviation Museum Manager