LAV 02436 thru 03167.pdfI
DATE: \q ~\!~2.
Air University
. 35ltd
-'
,. ~
Date: 17-24 April 1978
Location: McLean VA
CATEGORY 3. Perrilission required from interviewee for access to tape and/or transcript.
LAV 2441
SUMMARY OF CONTENTS
General John Daniel Lavelle, former Seventh Air Force Commander, was a native of Cleveland, Ohio, where he attended- John Carroll University and graduated with a bachelor of science degree in 1938. The interview covers his entire military career commencing with his entry into the aviation cadet program in 1939 ~nd concluding with his removal as Commander of Seventh Air Force in I972.
Topics covered in the interview include his World War II experiences, his association with Secretary Robert S. McNamara and General John D. Ryan, his frustrating tenure as Vice Commander -of Pacific Air Forces, as well as a. de­ tailed account of the circumstances leading up to his removal and demotion in March 1972. Approximat.e1y 50 percent of the interview was edited by General Lavelle prior to his death in July 1979, but this does not detract from the interview's exceptional candor and overall quaU,ty.
iii
The following is the transcript of an oral history interview
recorded on magnetic tape. Since only minor emendations
have been made, the reader should bear in mind that this is
a transcript of the spoken rather than the written word.
Additionally, no attempt to confirm the historical accuracy
of the statements has been made. As a result, the transcript
reflects the interviewee'S personal recollections at the time
of the interview. It should ~lso be pointed out that the late
General Lavelle had the opporturii ty of a !'first" edit only
through page 454 prior to his death; therefore, this trans-
cript may contain information that could have been subject
to additional changes or corrections by the interviewee.
Editorial notes and additions made by USAF historians are
enclosed in brackets. If feasible, first names, ranks, or
titles are also provided. Any additions, deletions, and
changes subsequently made to the transcript by the inter­
viewee are not 'indicated. Researchers may wish to listen J
to the actual interview tape prior to citing the transcript.
LAV 2443
1 Early life in Cleveland
10 Not greatly affected by depreSsion
13 Worked in steel mill while attending college
16 Majored in mathematics and business administration
19 No restrictions against Irish
23 Traveled to New York City for vacation
26' Went to work for Italian tailor
27 Quit after 6 or 8 months
28 Fraternity brother suggested taking exam for aviation cadet
31 Received numerous job offers all at once
32 Sent home by Air Corps doctor because of eye trouble
33 Readmitted to aviation cadet program after another physical
35 Long history of heart attack deaths in family
36 Enjoyed flying training at Dallas
42 Gave former instructor check ride
48 No discrimination against USMA cadets in pilot training
53 Trained for 2 weeks to become instructor
56 Took advanced flying at Kelly and Brooks Fields
iv
.~-.<.
./ . ~~: ....... '
Could not apply for Regular co~fuission after 1 July 1940 if married
I '~} Met future wife through p~ri~~ priest
: if Lived in Schertz, Texas, ~or~several months
Commander walked into base:c:f4arters unann6uI'l6~d " \ j ,
Ttaining pr6gramwasrapidlyexpanding
Why General Disosway replaced General,L.andon in Europe __ -rt"
Suddenly: ordered to pen~_qgon ;1fif:-~-~r'ec.L)r of Programs
(jeneral p,tsO'S"w~~ was well liked : ...• ":. ",,:.:~ •. ;.;-'e····'· .
_J1~:C6,vArmy Air Field was under construction /r:c'in 1942
High accident rates in training ,-
Ordered back to Waco because of high accident rates
Landing gear problems with P..,..39 . '-:'. '. . -' ;
--... . - .:", .~:_:.:. ': . ~ . '.... .. ". .... .:' '.1 Sent to COlone.lDi,1Cl~W:Qr!h IS 'ins;trument school
Worked ,lqng hours in tra:lnipgprogram
Colonel Sprague had nothing to do with flying part of training program
Most training personnel could get into combat
Committed to a military career during World War II
Was almost forced out of military at the erid of the war
v
Took over as commander of fighter squadron
Flew 21 combat missions in Europe
Wanted no part of bomber activities
General Patton ordered sergeant to deliver six truckloads of Cognac
Fighter 6utfit moved forward as battle lines advanced
Returned to US in June 1945
Suffered from bursitus after long missions
Accepted job with statistical services at Wright-Patterson
. First encountered Robert S. McNamara
Many difficulties in shutting off production and closing bases
First became acqu~inted with Secretary Symington and other important figures
Mobile Depot was initial test installation for computerized supply system
Assisted in writing agreements for separate Air Force
Acquired Quartermaster funds to buy first Air Force blue uniforms
Became disappointed with Symington
Traveled to Washington frequently
vi
Page(s).
172 Was only one unable to bring family over in time for Christmas
174 Returned home to take care of personal problems
178 Disliked way in which FEAMCOM supported Korean war
180 Requested by General Doyle to refute scathing report
181 Ordered-by General Doyle to become depot supply group commander -
184 Sergeant averted grounding bf F-80s
189 One Air Force wing would not give up parts to another wing
190 Accountability for parts instituted at wing leve·l
191 Had to report to headquarters when North Koreans invaded South Korea
192 Flying across Yalu River despite restrictions
195 General Schinz was shot down over Korea
200 Received assignment at McGuire because of General Strother
201 General. Strother had great influence on what Air Force did
202 Received - F-86D aircraft at McGuir'e
206 Plane with Maine .lobsters broke down en route to MCGuire
208 McGuire transitioned from ADC to MATS base
210· Received tremendous assistance in opening new alert facilities
vii
215 New facilities were built for Air Nation~l Guard
216 General Taylor took over MATS, Atlantic Division
218 Transferred to MATS
220 Ran carniv~ls for 2 years to acquire charity money
222 Heavily involved in community work
223 Contractor wanted to build houses near McGuire if sufficient demand existed
226 Contractor gave Air Force widow blank check
228 Encountered problems with Catholic priest over influx of military into his school
229 Work at McGuire .was probably forerunner of CHAMPUS
231 Attended. Air War College
232 Significant aspects of, AWC
234 Became Deputy Director of Requirements at HQ USAF
237 Was very fortunate to have worked for Generals Ferguson and Holloway
238 General Ferguson was a politician while' General Holloway was not
240 General Ferguson kept a diary of all his activities
244 Served on ad hoc committee headed by General Smart
247 Weapons Boar,d was organized with panels underneath it
viii
251 Secretary McNamara did not know how to handle people
253 Data collected by McNamara was often meaning­ less
257 Review of important programs while serving on Weapons Board
262 Did not always agree with General LeMay
263 TAC was trying to make fighters do the work of bombers
264 Disagreed with notion that General Everest was one who started F~lll conc~pt
266 Tremendous change in Air Staff after General LeMay became Chief of Staff
268 Promoted to· general while serving as Director of Programs
270 General Spicer did not like to appear before Congress
272 Air Force did better than other services on budget
274 Secretary Zuckert ~as frightened of McNamara
275 Worked·day and night to rewrite Air Force budget for McNamara
276 No clear lines of communication emanated from McNamara's office
279 Recommended by General Timberlake for assign­ ment to 4ATAF
280 Served as DO under General Landon
ix
.:0'
Had excellent relationship with French General Marias
Worked with Canadian Air Vice Marshal Kerr
French wanted equal say in how NATO was run
Communications problems within NATO
Took over Seventeenth Air Force Combat Ops Center: for all NATO exercises
SACEUR messages did not mean anything
Small nuclear planning cell at 4ATAF
General Landon replaced by General Disosway as USAFE Commander
, i
General Lemnitzer flew to Paris to meet with all four-star generals in Europe during Cuban missile crisis
German general knew everything US was doing in Europe
Failed Cognac tasting quiz
Germans acquired command positions by bailing out the Fiat-built G-91 fighter
French Mirage was not what it was cracked u'p'to be
Wife had to fly commercial to Oslo because of restrictions
Went to Grafenwohr for 2-day demonstration
Wife served as aide
x
Page(s)
322.
324
325
326
329
331
332
333
336
337
338
340
341
342
345
351
354
Became both Director of Programs and Chairman of the Air Staff Board
General Crow knew the budg~t inside androut
OSD fosteied competition
Used systems analysis to obtain T-38 against MCNamara's objections
OSD programmed Vietnam war to be over in 6 months
OSD wanted to take programmed attrition aircraft away from USAF
Acquisition of the F-4E
Supremacy of the missile over the gun on USAF aircraft
Navy was developing Phoenix missile
One-pass type of fight occurred during Vietnam war
Infrared missile problem in Vietnam
Air Natiorial Guard mobilized and sent to Europe
General LeMay objected to loss of four B-47 wings
SAC objected to base closures
Air Force is not steeped in tradition as the Army and Navy
Final act of Secretary Zuckert was signing request for additional aircraft
Requested by two friends to command Seventeenth Air Force
xi
00352$
Requested to stay at Pentagon by Secretary Brown
G~ne~~l de Gaulle was ordering US forc~s out . of France
French picketed US bases because of proposed closures
Facilities at bases had to be left intact
Returned to Washington after only 16 months
McNamara's dual-base plan
One American killed in Tripoli
Incident with unidentified jets approaching Wheelus
384 Aircraft turned out to be Algerian MiGs
386 General.Agan was. sent to Wheelus to represent General Preston
387 Ambassador Newsom was outstanding US representative in Libya
388 Arabs airlifted out of Wheelus by mistake
390 Good staff at Seventeenth Air Force
394 Fired wing commander at Aviano, Italy, for failing ORI
395 General Preston thought Colonel Patillo was too inexperienced to take over wing
397 Black colonel brought in to run squadron
399 General "Chappie" James eventually took wing at Wheelus
400 Problems in filling assignments
xii
Thunderstorm disrupted gunnery' exercises at Wheelus
E'xterlsive damage created by storm
Greater esprit found on overseas bases thi;m in the ZI
Germans could not understand US rules of engagement in Vietnam
Reasons why moved out. of seventeenth Air Force
Reported to General McConnell's office
Did not feel q~alified to replace General Starbird
Agreed on 15 January reporting, date for DCPG job
Reporting date changed to 6 December
Had surprise ,party at base quarters
General Starbird actually ran three jobs
Flew immediately to Vietnam without signing 'in
Flew to Germany'on Christmas Eve to pick up family
Ordered back to Vietnam by General Starbird
Navy felt P2Vcould not deliver sensors with accuracy
Put priority on getting LORAN-equipped F-4s to Vietnam
General Momyer would not deploy with informa­ tion from sensors alone
xiii
442 Problem with General. Ryan over relay aircraft
445 Watched flight demonstrations in the drone mode at Eglin
446 Argued with General Ryan over accuracy of LORAN.;..equipped F-4s
447 Reported directly to Secretary of Defense
448 Sent engineers to Ubon to study LORAN problems
451 Problem with aircraft breaking LORAN lock
453 Conducted towel bar antenna tests at Eglin
456 Sensors seeded around Khe Sanh area
457 Sensors put in place by helicopters
459 Accuracy of sensors
460 Battery life of sensors was short due to noise factor in jungle
461 Overview of sensor program
463 General Starbird worked 18 hours per day, 7 days a week
466 Barrier across DMZ was never built
467 Marines felt barrier was useless
468 Khe Sanh sensor effort was big success
470 Monitored sensor information at Nakhon Phanom
472 ~~ner~l Keegan claimed to have targeted all strikes at Khe Sanh
473 Sensors are difficult to destroy
xiv
475 Viet Cong took sensor into their field head­ quarters
477 No security problems with sensor progra)TI
478 Services were reluctant to accept sensor program
479 General Starbird had research and development section in DCPG
480 Marines sent to build electronic fence on DMZ became part of fighting force
481 DCPG personnel had high morale
483 Dr. Sullins replaced Mr. ~nthoven
486 DCPG turned back $712 million
489 Became familiar with Engineering Change Proposals
490 Imbroglio over ASPRs
492 Sensors were not originally designed with ground soldiers in mind
493 Sandia developed the PSID
496 Marines insisted on new batteries for each use of the PSrD·
497 Made 13 trips to Vietnam in 1967
500 Infrequently briefed Secretary Laird
502 Disparaging articles written about DCPG by Jack Anderson and others
503 Heated phone discussion with Jack Anderson
505 USAF dropped the ball in not continuing sensor program
xv
506 Beacon bombing dld not vlOrk in fighter air­ craft
508 Army has system called REMBASS
509 USAF Base Installation Security system
510 D,CPG was disbandeq
513 ,DCPG worked in a coridemned warehouse
517 Internally scrutinized the spending of DCPG money
518 SPOs have too' little authority
522 Less d~legation of authority in civilian 'business than in the military
523 Efficiency.of civilian business world doesn't exist
524 Did not baveto divide loyalty between OSD and USAF
526 Problem arose with General Ryan
528 Proposed USAF actions for Lockheed overrun on C....;5
530 Disagreed with plan for USAF to take over C-5 program
531 Met with Secretary ·Seamans on USAF C-5 plan
533 Lunched with Secretary Seamans and Under­ secretary M6Lucas
5 34 r~ecei ved chewing out from General Ryan
537 Approved for assignment as Vice Chief of PACAF
539 Felt "put out to pasture" while in Hawaii
xvi
542 Planned to retire within a year
544 Received briefing on unusually high amount of North Vietnamese message traffic
547 Was not informed of impending Son Tay raid
549 Received letter from General Ryan re nomina­ tion as Commanding General of Seventh Air Force
555 Discouraged about General Gil Meyers' early retirement
557 General Brown served as McNamara's aide·
559 No briefings received before taking over as Seventh Air Force Commander
562 Met with General Abrams
563 General Brown and General Abrams were clo$e friends
564 Problems existed with intelligence
565 Intelligence problems disappeared with arrival of General Jumper
567 General Abrams was heavily involved in wind-down in Vietnam
569 North Vietnamese MiGs we+e more aggressive than ever before
570 MiG penetration into Laos
574 North Vietnamese installed two new radars
576 General Ryan was upset with inaccuracy of bombing
582 Statistics on North Vietnamese missiles; aircraft, radar sites, et cetera
xvii
583 MiG attack on B-52 in November 1971
584 Briefed at four-star conference on how to bomb'Moc Chau GCl radar
588 Put Mac Chau radar out of commission for 18 d'ays
589 Gene~al Slay testified incorrectly to Senate Committee on Mac Chau raid
591 Requested more liberal interpretation of rules of engagement
593 General Holloway ground.ed all B-52s because of rules of engagement
596 General Ryan was upset over grounding of B-52s
597 Conference in Hawaii addressed by General Vogt
598 Chairman of JCS was disappointed that field commanders were not aggressive enough
602 Se~geant's letter to Senato~ Hughes regarding false reporting
603 Directive issued to fly all-out number of strikes against North Vietnam
606 Received call from General vogt regarding strike against North Vietnam
~08 Launched intensive r~connaissance effort to determine accuracy of LORAN bombing
610 Navy later joined "Ptize Bull" effort against the north
611 Mission against North Vietnam was politically motivated
612 Attack by two North Vietnamese divisions on the Plaines des Jarres
xviii
618 "Proud Deep Alpha" operation against the North
621 Received "bitter wire" from General Ryan regarding use of secure communications
622 Wire from Ambassador Godley said USAF neglected Laotians
623 Flew with Ambassador Godley to visit General Vang Pao
624 Ambassador Godley sent wire to State Department ap·ologizingfor earlier remarks about USAF
627 Received message to meet with Thai Prime Minister and General Prapot and Marshal Dawee
629 Went to Thailand with General Abrams
630 Ambassador Unger did fantastic job in keeping Th~is £ighting in Laos
631 Made d~al with Marshal Dawee to throw a big party for every crew that knocked out a l30-miliimeter gun
633 Received wire from General Ryan to return home
635 General Wilson appeared for IG investigation
638 General Ryan testified that air defense system in North Vietnam had been netted for years
640
642
645
General Abrams felt there was no excuse for false reporting
General Ryan said he could not condone false reporting
Refused to sign retirement papers
xix
Did no~ report heart attack
General Ryan recommended reti.rement as three­ star general
Wound up in hospit~l over affair
secretary Laird knew of North Vietnamese buildup
General Slay would chastise junior officers in front of others .
Met with Senator Stennis and two counsels of Armed Services Committee
CINCPAC was theoretically MACV's boss
Preplanned unauthorized str{kes did not accomplish much
No way to explain false reporting
Met with New York Times reporter Seymour Hirsch
Article was not withheld until after Congressional Hearings
High-ranking civilians visited Southeast Asia and were briefed on North Vietnamese buildup
House Report completely sided with actions taken in Vietnam
Use of Air Force in Southeast Asia was a shame
Generals should have been more outspoken on how war was administered
Military went overboard in trying to appease civilian superiors
xx
683 Received support from General Brown
687 Committee returned recommendation for three­ st~r retiremerit with no ~ction
688 Senator Goldwat~r was iriflu~ntial member' o£ House and Senate Committee'
689 Press ~lipping~ on Lavelle affair
691 Actions in Vietnam were absolutely correct
693 Senate never called General Vogt to, testify on Hawaii me~ting
697 General Ryan's actions did not make sense
698 Was only hero in vietnam war according to General Eaker
701 Met with chief counsel of DOD
702 First time in 200-year history Army was without Chiet of Staff
704 Statement to Senator Stennis, Chairman of Senate Armed Services Committee
xxi
Oral History Interview #K239.0512-1036 17-24 April 19i8 UNCLASSIFIED Ta'ped In terview with Gen John D. Lavelle Conducted by Lt Colonel John N. Dick, Jr.
D: I would like to begin with your early life, something
about your parents. Was there a military tr~dition
in your family?
fourth grade education, city firem~n, ended up as a
chief in the Cleveland Fir~ Department and was adamant
that I would get an education because he never had
one. When I got out of high school in the middle
of the depression, I thought I had to go to work,
and dad's attitude was, "Fine, if you go to
work, move out. If you stay iri school~ stay home
with us." He ,was that insistent. I never had any
connection with the military nor did he, nor any of
our relatives nor family.
D: l"lhen did your people first come from Ireland over
to the States?
L: My father is one of five brothers who lived; I
\61S1 'fj~:" .!d'~
think there were more, but I knew five thai lived .•
And he is' number two of the five. Numb'er one was
born in Ireland .. [My father] was born in the United
States in oakland, California. I really don't know
how he got to Clevel~nd.
D: . Were there many of your family in the Ohio area?
L: Yes. The Lavelles in Cleveland, Ohio. There are all
kinds of them and all related somehow or the other.
I had a couple of old aunts, .but only one living,
who k.new all of those relationships I but none of us
do.; We don't see much of the Lavelles any more~
D: Were you from a large family?
L: Three sisters and myself.
D; And which were you? In what order?
L: Two sisters then myself and the younger sister. The
younger sister is still living, and she lives in
Seattle, Washington. The older two sis~ers are dead.
2
LAVELLE
D: So there's not too much family b~ck in Ohio then?
L: One aunt, my father's brother--Dan Lavelle--his wife,
Margaret Lavelle. She has always been very close. I
still see her [Margaret1 every year, go up to say,
"Hi." Sheill be 90 years old in October. She is the
only one left of the older generation.
D: What was it like growing up in Cleveland?
L: Oh, I would say about as typical as anything could
be. I grew up, of course, in the height of the
depression. I worked from about the sixth grade on
but so did everybody else. I wasn't any different
than anybody. Everybody in those days had to •
I started selling papers. About the lOth grade in
high school, I woiked with Fisher Foods grocery
store. I stayed there working after school and
~aturdays until after my sophomore year in COllege
when I got a job in the steel mills during the summer.
D: Was that ~ood pay in those days?
L: Fantastic pay, it was $40 a week, making twice as
3
much as each of my brothers-in-law. The latter
part of August, I went to the coach and said, "Hey,
coach, you're going to have to do more than just
partial tuition, or I'll have to keep my job." He
said, "You1d better keep your job." (laughter)
D: How.did your father afford the first part of college?
L: College was quite inexpensive in those days if I
remember correctly. I went to John Carroll university
in Cleveland, Ohio, and the tuition and fees were
only $250 a year. I got a ~artial athletic scholar­
shib to pay $~O or $100 of it, I don't remember~ it
wasn't very much so that the net I was able to afford
quite easily [with] my job in Fisher Foods grocery
store. I had enough money to pay my high school
tuition and my college tuition. High school tuition
was $50 a year, I remember that, at Cathedral Latin
High SchooL I think college was $ i50.
D: Was it a strong Catholic high school?
L: Yes.
LAVELLE
D: I assume you vlere bro·ught up in a very strongCa tholic
tradition?
L: Always.
D: How did the Irish get along with· the people in •
Were you in an Irish community?
L: Yes ahd no. Part of our life we were in the west
side of Cleveland, and the west side was solid Irish.
And quite apart of my life was on the east side; my
father was battalion chief of the 26th Battalion,
I think at l05th and St. Clair on the eastside, and
we lived in first a Polish community and then a
Jewish community. We just mixed with everybody. We
didn't have any problems when we moved to the east
side. I didn't see anything different. When we
moved back to the west side, to the Irish community,
I wasoid enough to be shocked at how deep the ties
in the Irish community were. When we moved away, I
wasn't old enough to realize it.
D: There were still very strong ethnic ties from the old
country when they came to the united States.
5
L: There sure were. Everybody knew everybody and knew
what count~ they carne fro~, and what relatives they
had who we~e still in, Ireland, and those who were
over h~re. I was amazed when we moved back into it~
but by then I only stayed another year or two and
left 'to join the'Air 'Force.
D: I can remember when an Irish Catholic and a Protestant
German couple would be really looked qown upon.
L: Right.
D: So that was that way still, I am sure. What kind of
sports did you get intere~ted in in high school?
L: Well, in high school I played basketball and tennis
on the high school team, and I played a little amateur
baseball. In college in my 'freshman and sophomore
years, I played basketball, football, and tennis.
D: Tennis?
L: Nothing after that. In fact, up until I went to
Vietnam, I hadn1t played tennis for 30 years.
6
D: Tennis wasn't too popular in those days, was it?
L: No. I don't know how I got started in tennis; I
guess it came about through ice skating with my
closest young friend, Emmett Dowling, who is now
dead. He ended up as president of Youngstown Steel
Door. He died of leukemia, but Emmett was quite an
ice skater, and I got involved in ice skating which
in those days was speed skating--racing. Then he
took up tennis, and I guess I got involved in tennis
because of him. In neither [sport] did I come any-
where near being the kind of player he was. He won
all .the championships in Ohio that ever existed in
speed skating and, eventually, became one of the top
tennis players in Ohio. Through him we played quite
a lot of doubles and got pretty well known as a good
doubles team in Ohio because of Emmett Dowling. I
watched the alley, and he played the xest of the
court. (laughter) I had enough tennis so that ~hen
I went to high school and college, there weren't too
many who played a lot, and there wasn't much competi-
tion, so I was able to make the team. But after the
summer of my sophomore year at college, I never
played anything from then on. I finished college
7
D: You had no scholarship, during the latter 2 years,
then? Did your scholarship end?
L: I got $50, I think, for basketball. I thin~ tuition
was $250, and I got $50 or something like that~
11m not even sure the second year if I got it. I
know'the second year I did~ th~ first year I didn1t.
D: What kind of student were you in high school?
L: I spent my life flirting with the honor roll--on it,
then off of it, probably on it much more than off.
For those days, I guess I was considered a fairly
good student.
,D: Were you self-starting, or were your parents demand-
ing that you spend s6 ~u~h time Was it just
recognized that you will do the work?
L: Just the opposite. I think I was purely lucky in
that I_was able to get the grades without studying
very hard. I didn't study very hard. I suspect that
8
could have been a much better student. I find that
-true with my ~ids. They don't a~ply themselves too
diligently, or they didn It, and they weren I t the kind
of students they could have been. I think they got
it from their father.
D: Did ybu get in much trouble wheri you were a kid?
L: Same as everybody else. Never arrested, if that's
what you mean. Well, that's not true either. [I was]
never booked ~ . (laughter) I got arrested for swimming
in Lake Erie in the nude one day.
D: Hope it wasn't in the wintertime? (laughter)
L: No. Three of us skipped school, went down to the
Lake and "'lent swimming. . The cops came out in a rowboat.
artd pitked us up, wouldn't let us get our clothes,
tbok us in ahd made us run across the beach into the
paddy wagon-~naked. (laughter) They put us in a
cell and wanted us to call our parents. We were too
afraid to.
D: Anything but that.
L: Yes. Finally one of the kids called his bigger brother,
and he went down and got our clothes and brought them
there, and they let us out--never bodked. us Or any-
thing. That's the kind of thing ~ll kids get in-
valved in~ nothing
D: Did you have a fairly stable homelife during the
depression?
L: It was a homelife you donlt understand today; it was
stable as could be. It couldn't possibly be more
stible. My father, at that time, was a captain in
the Fire Department, and the city of Cleveland went
broke. They cut his pay some large amount--I wouldn't
know, I guess th~y eut it about half. And then they
couldn't pay that, and they issued script. It was
city script and would only be taken in the city stores.
You couldh't spend it outside of the city of Cleveland,
and you could only spend it for groceries. The land-
lord initially wouldn't take it for rent but eventually
was forced to by the city.
10
one [child] and one was pregnant besides. One of my
dad's brothers was out of work, and he moved in with
us, and a cousin of my oldest sister's husband moved
in with us. This was kind of common.
D: Now this was the house you were living in--a rented
house?
L: A rented house with three bedrooms and one bath.
D: Wow!
L: And what happened was: My younger sister moved in
with mother and father; and the oldest sister, her
husband and baby were given a room, and the other
sister, her husband and baby were given a room.
Uncle :Pat and I laid some boards across an un insulated
attic and put a bed up there--colder than hell in the
. winter and hot as hades in the summer. We stayed up
there. And they put a cot in the living room for my
brother-in-law's cousin--still one bathroom.
L: Yes. It wasn't uncommon in those days. It wasn't
uncommon. Nobody thought we were being hurt or
being put upon or that the world was treatirtg u~
poorly because this was common. Everybody. was hurting.
D: What kind of at~osphere was there within this l~rge
family grouping?
L: Good. We had our problems. One family house became
a four-family home or five-family. There were differ­
ences, disagreements, difficulties between us, as
usual, but there was always my dad who took care of
everything.
D: He was the patriarch?
L: Y~s. He seitl~d thing~ whenever there were problems.
D: Was he tough?
L: Yes. He only hit me once. I guess I was in the fourth
or fifth grade. I went ice skating, and I fell through
12
LAVELLE
the water up to my chest when the ice broke through.
After I got pulled out, instead of-coming home--I was
afraid- to come home for fear that they'd see I'd been
skating and fallen through--I stayed out till I dried
or until my clothes dried on me and were icy, and I
didn't get home until, I donlt know, but after I
should have been home for dinner. He asked me where
I'd been, and.I don't really rememher other than I
didn't tell him the full truth, and he hit me and
knocked me across the room. Boy, it scared him. He
never hit me again. The only time in my life I
remember my dad spanking or hitting me or anything.
But that one scared him too much and never again. I
don't even remember him touching anybody except that
once.
L: Oh, yes. Buti historically, my last years in college
I worked 48 hours a week in the steel mills; I went
to school 1 week like from 7 till 3, and then I went
to the steel mills and I worked the 3 to 11 shift.
D: Who got you the job?
13
LAVELLE
L: Well, it was my brother-in-law who got me the job. I
worked 3 to 11 one week and 11 to 7 the next week.
D: What kind of" work was it?
L:" I was in what was called the punch press mill where
we had punch presses puriching out parts for a~to-
mobiles. I went from there into the open hearth. I
was down chasing a crane, hooking on ingots, and
moving them around.
D: It was probably both exciting and dangerous work,
L: I don't know. I don't really think" it was dangerous.
I don't believe so. It was exciting, ihitially, and
eventually got pretty tough. But, see, the first
week I would leave for school in the morning, and my
mother would pack lunches in two tin buckets. One I
would eat between classes in school, and the next one
I would eat at the break that night in the steel
mill. I'd get home about I o'clock in the morning
and up ag~in at ? to go to school. The following
week I would work from 11 to 7 iri the morning, so I
14
LAVELLE
would sleep in the afternoon, go to work. at 11 o'clock
at night, finish at 7 o'clock in the morning, be out
to school for my 8:10 class in the morning, stay in
school until 1 or 2 o'clock, and go home to bed in
the aft~rnooh. I had a deal with the professors wher~
I would do all my homework on Sundays. Weld get up
and go to the B o'clock Mass on Sunday and from then
. until midnight or 11 o'clock, if I was going to work,
I would do all my homework for the whole week--all my
assignments. All the profs would let me ·turn it in
then on Mondays.
D: There are a lot of jobs that you could do some study-
ing oh the job, but the steel mill is certainly not
one of them.
L: No way.
D: What did you study in college, and what interest did
you have there?
L: I started out strictly for a Bachelor of Science--
chemistry, physics. Then I found that I didn't have
enough time for the labs. I had to be sure I could
15
compress my scheduie and pick only subjects that
could be taken between 8 and 1.· So I ended up getting
my Bachelor of Science in mathematics and all my
electives in business administration. I had started
with mathematics; physics 7 chemistry. I had 2 years
of physics, 2 years of chemistry, ·and 4 years of math
in college. I. didn't continue with the advanced
chemistry becau~e of the lab time. I didn't hav~ the
lab time.
college? Why pursue this area--science, physics?
L: No idea. I graduated from colleg~ ~nd didn't have
the faintest idea in the world what I wanted to do
for a living, or where I wanted to go. In fact, I
thought I wanted to be a truck driver, because they
were making big money. It was something new: these
long-haul truck drivers were bran'dnew, and they were
making big money, and I decided maybe that was what I
wanted to do.
D: Had you gotten a chance to tra~el before £hat time?
16
L: You knmJ, I went with football and basketball teams,
when I was playing, to Toledo, Pittsburgh, Youngstown,
Akron, and all of those areas. And then this friend
of mine and myself. • • The last 3 months of college
I quit work and I was rich. I had been working for
the last couple of years at very,very good pa¥ and
never had 5 minutes to spend a penny of it, and so
when we graduated from s~hool, this friend of mine,
who was from a well-to-do family--his dad had given
him a n~w Chrysler convertible--we took off for New
York City. Other than that, I had done little or no
traveling.
(pause)
D: What influence did your mother have on you as you
were growing up?
L: Not nearly as much as my dad. I idolized my dad.
Mother was the old Irish Catholic family stead; sh~
17
didn't know anything but to cook and wash and clean
and bake and stay around the house. bad was the
predominant influence, not much from mother.
D: Were you able at that time to do much together?
L: No, no. It's kind of h~rd to understand these days,
but dad worked 72 hours on and 24 hours off. Firemen,
in those days, put in a 144-hour workweek because
they felt that--you know they slep~ at the station~­
they really weren't working that much. And ev~n tho?gh
they sleep at the statton today, th~ fireman puts in
a ~O-hour workweek. In those days, it was 144 hoursj
No, he wasn1t around an awful lot, and then as I got
a little older, well, then he went on a 24 hours on
and 24 hours off .. He worked a day, 24 hours, and
then was home a day. In those times, we got to know
each other a little better. Well, we didn't have the
money ~o do things with, go on vacations. I guess we
weren't a vacation-type family. I don't ever remember
us taking vacations as a family.
D: Oh, i~ that right? You didn't go out and visit
relatives or anyplace else?
LAVELLE
Li All we ever did was visit.r~lativesi but that was in
the ci~y of Cleveland. Anytime we ever went out we
ju~t went.to visit r~latives. We did that quite
frequently as I was growing up. But you just went to
. th~ aunts and uncl~s and spent the evenirig with them,
or they came over and spent the evening at our place.
That, again, wa~ typical in those days~.
I I
D: Was being fire dhief then a fairly prestigious job?
L~ I thought sb. My dad didn't think so. I ~anted to
·be a fireman, and he always told me II After your
education, if you go into ~he fire department rill
break your legs." I always thought I wanted to be a
fireman. He would have no part of it.
0: Were the Irish restricted at all in the kinds of work
'they could do?
L: Nb. I've read all the st6ries.about the restrictions
o£ the iri~h and the way they were held down, but
that was much before my time and I never saw it. I
came from a very foreign city--Cleveland, Ohio.
Cleveland, Ohio, had its Slovaks, Polacks, Italians,
19
and a Slovak church and a Polack church, all tatholic,
and a Lithuanian church, and there were more Irish.
churches because there were more Irish. All the -rest_
were Irish. There was a Jewish neighborhood and a
black neighborhood. Cleveland was a very cosmopolitah
city back in my young days. I didn't really under­
stand or know anything about this conflict of rac~s~-
black and white--until after I got into collegci. I
went to high school with black kids, and they all ate ,
with us. We didn't have any race problems. I guess
it was because we were in the city with this cosmo-
politan group of all kinds and every kind, and we
were all the same.
D: it wasn't always so much the blacks and the whites;
it was all the ethnic groups that had a little bit of
a standoffishness.
D: The Micks , (laughter) the Wops. Is th.ere anyone
ar~a that stands out in your mind that does.so because
20
it was depressioh days? Did it re~lly affect you
noticeably that you knew this country was in a
depression, or did it not affect you that much?
L: Oh , I was quite aware of it. We were hard up enough
that I was selling newspapers on the corner, and I
would make 15 or 20 cents and it would buy a couple
loaves of bread for the family. Times were tough in
those days. My dad was on this 24 hours on and 24
hours off in the 1930's, and he and a couple of other
firemen ran a soup kitchen down at our cathedral in
Cleveland. Many times I went with him to the soup
kitchen and stood in line ladling out soup to these
people " who came through the line. They didn't have
anything to eat. They didn't have any clothes."
As hard up as we were, we were wealthy. We took
clothes down there that dad gave out to people, and
we went down and made this sbup and bread and pa~sed
it out. NO, I was well aware of the depression. I
was well aware that my sister married a young man who
h~d his own window cleaning business in Michigan and
[End Tape 1, Side 1]
21
LAVELLE
Two or three years later he was back living with us
without a dime~ They didn't e~en hav~ the money to
get to Cleveland; dad and I went up and got them and
brought them back, and a few months later he Willingly_ . .
took a j6b for $15 a.week and was well worth. it.
Times were tough.
D: Did you have a feeling, at your young age, that you
were contributing to this family?
L: Oh, sure. Absolutely. Absolutely, that's why I
didn't want to'go to college, and that's why, in high
schooi, there was.no way my family was going to pay
my tuition, even if it was only $~O a year; I still
paid it.
D: But you were going to go; there was. no question about
that?
L: Yes~ to high school. As far as college, I wasn't
going to go, but there was no question about it as
far as my dad was concerned. I went. As I say, he
had a fourth grade education, and he was pretty
adamant that I was going to have a college education.
22
L: Yes, oh, yes.
D: Did he f~el t~e same about the girls, your sisters?
L: No, no. Although my younger ~ister had a college
education also, my two older sisters didn't. They
just got out of high school and went to work. But
when the boy came along, he was pretty adamant.
D: How was your hig~-jinx jaunt to New York at the com­
pletion·of college? That must have been a very high
time. (laughter)
L: Well, it was either the first edition or one of
t~e first editions of a magazine called Life that
came out that weekend. And a friend of mine, Bill
Maddox, and I went to New York in his Chrysler con-
vertible. I was being treated for ulcers, what with
working the hours I was working and eating the way I
was and the pressure and what have you, I had ulcers
and was on a very bland diet like soft-boiled eggs
and milk and mush. We got to New York,. and we stayed
23
at the YMCA, but Bill's sister, Mary Maddox, was a
writer for one of the radio networks. I don't know
whether it was ABC, or NBC, CBS, or what it was· in
those days, b~t Mary was the one who had instigated
all of this coming to New York to visit. We called
her from the YMCA, and we met at a place called "Jack
Dempsey's.1I She walked in to meet Bill and I with the
tvlO models who were on the cover of Life Magazine.
(laughter)
L: It kind of impressed a couple of hick-town seniors
who were just about to graduate. It was the spring·
before we graduated. Then her boyfriend joined us,
and we went to an Armenian or Russian restaurant or
someplace for dinner and had a very highly seasoned
dinner. There was no way I was going to admit to
anybody that there was anything wrong with me, you
know. I hadn't had a meal in 2 or 3 months. I had
been eating milk, eggs, toast; bread and mush, and we
ate this highly seasoned food, and I knew I would
have to have a doctor that night. I spent the
night back at the YMCA and never felt it. Didn't
4\3,,~i~ .' OU~u~. '. .
24
J.--
LAVELLE
bother me a bit. ~laughter) So from that day on, I
had no more ulcers. These models that. Mary brought
in, why, we weren't about to let them know it.
·D: Life looked pretty rosy about that time.
L:· It sure did. It sure did. I was amazed. I thought,
"Boy, I'll pay for that. I'll be sick all night."
Not a thing.
D: You probably were having too good a time.
L: We wsnt out the next night and did the same thing.
D: How long did you stay in New York then?
L: Three nights.
D: What was your impression of the "Big Ap~le" at that
time?
L.~ (laughter) Well, of course, I did all the things you
are supposed to do--went to the top of the WOolworth
Building, went out to Staten Island, to the Statue of
25
just ev~rything you w~re supposed to do, typical
tourist. I always thought it would be great. At
that time I thought I would like to live there.
Wouldn't it be wonderful if you could live in· New.
York! How that changes, huh?
Well, so much for college, and that's about it. I
guess the next subject to cover is the transition
from college.
After I graduated from college, I went to work for an
outfit called LaMaida. LaMaida was an old Italian .
man who made caps and gowns and uniforms--a tailor.
He'd made a big success out of it, making caps and.
gowns and uniforms, and selling them to all the
Catholic girl's schools in the North Central United
States. Mr. LaMaida was very well-to-do and very
successful, and he had a son, Vince. Vince was in
many of my classes in college, and he wanted very
desperately to be a doctorj and his father wanted him
to come into the business with him. Vince wanted no
part of the father's business. He wanted to be a
doctor. To make a long story short, I went with the
26
We had a big disagreement, and I left him--a misunder-
standing on h.is part or mine, or both. I thought I
was on a $lS a week salary plus commission. After
about 6· months of work, I h~d gone all bver Ohio.
Mainly, I had ~ couple of cousins who were nuns who
let. me sell uniforms to their .schools. (laughter) I
think I estimat~d I had a $600 or $700 bonus check
coming, and I got a $150 check or a $200 check, ·and
Mr. LaMaida said, "NO, you are on a $15 a week draw
which will come out of your commission," and I said,
"Np, I was on salary plus commission." I felt he
wasn't treating me right, and I quit.
D: How long had you been working for him?
L: I would guess about 6 or 8 months.
D~ Did you have your own car then?
L:Yes. I had to have·that car in the steel mill to get
back and forth. I had a beautiful 1934 Ford, a Model
A Roadster with a rumble seat.
27
D: Oh, beautiful!
L: t paid $250 for it; I rememb~r that. I drov~ it for
about 3 years and fin~lly ran out of money when r was
between and out of jobs and sold it for $200. But
a£ter the LaMaida thing I, through a friend, put in
an application for this executive training at General
Electric which. has Nela Park in Cieveland-~which is
an R&D light bulb division, R&D area--and I also put
in a request for executive training with General
Motors.
One of my fraternity brothers came in one day and
said he was going to take the exam to become a flying
cadet. I said, "Why?" And he said, "Don't you realize
how much airline pilots are making? Take the exam,
spend a year as a cadet and a year as a flying officer,
get out, and you'll be hired immediately by the air-
lines as a pilot." So I checked with some people
and found out that was true. Airline pilots were
making $1,000 a month, some of them. So I went
with him.
D: Had you had any association with aviation before this
28
L: Yes, but funny and indirect. The National Air Races
were held in Cleveland every year. It was a lO-day
show, and my dad, for several years, was detailed out
there in ch~r~e of the fire department detail for the
air races. .The f ire department had a lookout" on top
of the j~dges' stand with a big siren up there and a
man with glasses who watched everything and radioed
down to the engine companies. I spent my time up
there with him watching the air races. I guess the
pursuit group that flew down from Selfridge Field
took my fancy, to see 12 ships, P-35s, in formation
flying. I always wanted to do that but never got
close to it. I did meet some of the pilots there;
but, you know, I was a kid. I talked to them. But
11m sure those air races and the day after day after
day I spent watching them was what made me w~rit to be
a figh~er pilot, or pursuit pilot as they called the~
in those days. I went down and took this exam.
Frank Carney, who was the guy who talked me into it,
and I went down there; he failed it, and I passed it • . . -c
He was the one who was all enthusiastic about it.
29
D: Did you need a college degree at that time?
L: Yes.
D: Was there a large failure rate during the initial·
examination?
~: Yes. I donft really know what the number was but
only a small percentage, one out of every few hundred,
got in. I don't know what the right numbers were.
D: Did you ever have any problem with your past ulc~r?
L: No.
D: Or did you just let that lie?
i L: What happened was: After I took this test, I decided
I ought to apply for the Navy, too, at Pensacola.
With the Army Air Corps there was a traveling board
that came through, and you went in and filled out the -
papers, had an interview and a phy~ical, all at once.
The Navy didn I,t have such a thing. I wrote, got the
papers, filled them out, submitted them. Then every-
30
thing broke at once. The Army Air Corps came through,
and I went downtown fdr another physical of some sort
and .swearing in, neither of which were . I really
don't remember. I doubt if it was the swearing in
interview at the local post office. I got accepted
and was sent hom~. They sai~ they would send m~ a
train ticket, and I'd be on my way in a week or two.
While I was home waiting for that, the Navy came
through; General Motors came through, and GE came
through • • .
L: But I was already signed up. (laughter) After wait-
ing, you know, for months, months, hoping something
would happen, they all came through at once.
D: Where did you take the Navy test?
L: The Navy was different. They said that I was accepted,
conditionally, upon reporting and passing a physical;
whereas/. with the Army I had already had the physical,
I thought. But I ended up going down to, I think it
is called Fort Hayes in Columbus. At that time I
31
was tremendously impressed by a sergeant who had a
bunch of stripes on his arm, you know. I figured he
was the highest ranking officer on the base. (laughter)
He took care of us, and he: was pretty gruff.-
We had to take another physical, and I got-sent home
withconj~nctivitis and blepharitis of the eyes.
They said I would,never be able t6 fly because my
eyes would always weep and get scaling on them. I
said, "No, this just happened because my friend drove
me down here to Columbus in an open coupe." The Army
doctor, a captain, said, "No way. That's .rermanent."
Cdngenital, I guess, is the right word. I got sent
home. You donUt think that was a blow, because the
guys in the fraternity and the gals in the gang and
everybody had had a great, big tremendous sendoff
party for me to leave town. It's kind of like an
athlete--and a pretty healthy guy, pretty capable--
and you say goodby to everybody and turn around and
come home 2 days later. I hid.
My dad took me down to an eye specialist in Cleveland,
Ohio, who doctored my eyes and wrote a letter and
said the Army doctor was wrong, and this was sQmething
32 ;
.i
that flared Up and wasri1t congenital and permanent.
Then I had to go up to Selfridge Field and take
another physical. This time the Army doctor agreed
with the eye specialist, and so I was back to Fort
Hayes in Columbus 4 months later than the first
time I was there. They had a new doctor this time.
The original one who sent ltle home was not there •
. I passed the physical and was sent on down to Dallas,
Texas; ~hereas, had I gone the first time IUd have
gone to Randolph Field, because there were no primary
schools open. But by the time, I was back the second
time, the primary ichool sy~tem was in effect~ and I
went to Dallas. It turned out that the old doctor
was Erobably right, because I have had these weeping;
crying, scaly eyes my whole career.
D: What do you mean by scaly eyes? What does it do to
your vision?
L: Noth{ng. But any cold, any wind, any change, or what
have you, my eyes run. That's always been annoying.
live always kept a handkerchief in my hand when they
were running. live never been able to get rid of
that. It1~ been there all my life; the guy was
33
". Ii.
right. But it hasn't affected mej it hasn't hurt me.
D: After you failed the second Air Corps physical,
didn't you. consider, at that time, trying the Navy?
Or did things ha?p~n so fast, your father taking you
down, that it neyer had a chance to mature?
L: Both dad and I were upset. I was kind of like a big
man around campus, if you will, and it hurt my pride.
I guess it bothered me, and it kind of bothered him
that I had not passed the physical, had gone down
there, had s~~ned up, had moved out of the house, said
g60dby to friends, and then got turned down.
D: (laughter) That's an old movie story line.
L~ So we went back into it--just fought it if you will--
and got back in.
D: What did your parents think about aviation?
L: I don't think they knew anything more about it than I
did. They didn't really know, and at that time I was
only leaving home for a s.hort time f because. I was
34
003512 .},.:.~'
LAVELLE
going to go in, get my training, get out, and go to
the airlines. That never happened, of course.
That's the way they looked at it. By then my mother
was dead. She had died when I was in college. So it
was just dad, my sister, and I at home.
D: What did she die of?
L: Heart attack. So did my father, and so did one of my
sisters. The doctors keep telling me all the time,
"Boy, you've got to watch that."
D: What age. was your father?
L: Sixty-one or sixty-two.
D: How about your uncles?
L: Heart attacks, three out of five. I don't know what
the other two died of.
D: Upon graduation from college and preparing to go into
the Air Corps, did you have much of a sense of what
was going on in the world at this time, about the
35
at all?
L: None. None. You know it's amazing. Even after
World War II and the Korean war, when we go back to
Cleveland, Ohio, people there have never had any
idea. It's not like Washington, New York, Chicago, or
Los Angeles. Cleveland, Ohio, never knew the Korean
war was going on, as far as I'm concerned. When
I went back there -after the Korean war, why, no
one even mentioned there had been a .Korean war or
that I had just come from Korea. They were always
forried about their local city problems. Prior to
Wprld War II, not till I got into the cadet program,
did I realize there was a world o~t there and the
world was at unrest. I didn't realize it.
D: What was Dallas like?
L: Well, the lap of luxury as far as I was concerned, a
very easy day, and we didn't work very hard. The
classes you went to were pretty easy, pretty simple.
Half of every day you were flying and nothing could
be sweeter. It was perfect. I struck up some close
36
cers and. flying cadets at Dallas that lasted all my
life ~ Ienjoyeq l.t. Flying came easy for me. I was
lucky, had no problems at anytime t~rough my cadet
.year with any of the flying. Never wept up for a
check ride or a washout ride or any of those things
that later .on I was giving al~ the time.
D: What was your initial impression of the Air Corps
when y,?u fi.rst arrive.d? The.re wasn I t too much dis-
L:
cipline th~re? There wa~nlt too much hazing b1 the
upper class?
No. _ There was -ali t t le b it of. haz ing there but • .'~:\t~~ . I don't remember much. I guess I just didn't under-
stand the military. The military didn't mean anything
to me, and you really weren't in the military in one
of. those civilian primary schools. I guess the
couple of shocks I had--our class w~s 50 percent
student officers ,out of the class of 1939 at'liJest
Point.
One of the student officers was having a tough time
and was eventually eliminated, washed out, whatever
37
LAVELLE
you want to call it. Hell, I went up to him and
said, "Hey, John or Joe or Jimi you can lick this
thing. You've got the right attitude. Heck, you can
fly." And he turned. to me'and he said, "Mister,
you're a cadet and I'm an officer,' and it's only here
in this school that you~d be allowed to talk to me."
I was amazed. (laughter) That's one extreme.
The other extreme wa~ another student officer, who
also was eliminated, who was in my flight. We had
the same instructor. The first time he was up for an
elimination ride he .came by the barracks after 10
o'clock at night, and I went out the window and went
with him to town. Neither one of us were drinkers.
(Interruption by ringing phone) I got tipsy for the
first time in my life that I can remember You
know we h"ad enough to drink, or too much. At 2 or 3
o'clock. in the morning, he drove me back, and I went
back in through the window again, back into my bed,
and he passed his ride the next day.-(laughter)
That's oh~ student officer
LAVELLE
D: .So you really did~'t have any certain expectation on
what the military was going to be like, because you
had never been associated with it. You are in a
situation with West Point cadets, officers nOvl,
who've been through a military indoctrination, and a
very stringent one, for 4 years, and you're just
there .
lieutenant and me and the sergeants that worked on
the.airplanes. As far as .I"was concerned, we were
all the same. I must say, in my opinion, this
one particular second lieutenant who told me I
wouldn't be allowed to speak with him except in that
particular civilian school was the exception not the
rule. I didn't run into that very much at all in the
service.
D: Now' this is one of the first times they used civilian
contract. Could you tell me a little bit about how
that was? Were they good instructors? Were there
military check pilots?
L: I don't think things were any different than when we
39
went all military. In fact~ they were probably better
than our original attempt at all military. We had
good ones and we had bad ones. We had mediocre ones;
we had those who really had an interest in their
students and wanted to get them through,. and we had
others who were there for the money and a good time.
Just typical. I don't think there was any ...
People are people.
D: How about your o~n instructor?
L: I was very fortunate in that I had an exceptionally
good instructor. He was an older man. In fact, he
was a real old man. He was probably 40 years old,
had a tremendous amount of patience, and he just
instilled confidence. I was extremely fortunate,
just a real good instructor. Right off the bat, he
built up my confidence. He told me, heck, I could
fly. I'd have no problem. It turned out everything
he. said was right. An anecdote on that: Approximately
2 to 3 years later, in the rapid movement of those
times, I was the director of flying at Waco, Texas.
And they made the decision to open a contractor-
operated basic training school. So we were given a
40
who was ,my pr imaryinstructor:,' showed: :upthere o'
Somewhere in the program, I don't know how far along,
his instructor put him up for a:n elirriinationride,
and I had to ride with him. So here I am now sitting
ihthe "front, seaf·;dfa'·BT;"13 .:I:wasa·'majorand
I, w·a!::f tunrii:nsf:this' schbbL· 'M:r .:' Aldr.ich's-instructor
'hadserit"'hinl' o'ff: for eltmihabion',' '[because] he was:
tod ;6Idchidwasri; bqu:tckenough 'ahd, fast . Einough:tCi
h'andle a>basi'b t.rainer~· - ;1 ·r:bde'·with·h.itn>,a'nd he "
: .... hadn;l t'chan:ged a' -bit.:He was st;ilr:a· very' oompetent I
,.pilot... He' ::w a's n "et: 'a young kick ... it...::a'round·an:d'do...:.it-in-
':a-'hur:ry ;type, but' he was just as sotrnd' as: '.C(yuta;be'-.
So I passed him on his ~heck ride and assigne~ hi~ to
another instructor, and he did fine and then went on
to teach in bas ic train'trig.
D: You :aid 'follovi<bj:/;:arid> civiTians did ,contract bas'ie
-. _ .... -.
L: Yes, I think the first place they Changed to civilian
instruc'to-rs was',SanAngelo i . Texas; 'i f:·my' 'memory· is
41
LAV 2502
.\ ,
right. I think that's .right. Th~y did go into basic,
and Aldrich was a basic instructor; he did a fine
job. It's amazing though. This man.
(End Tape 1, Side 2]
L: He said he was having trouble, and he was losing his
confidence; and this youngster was highly critical of
him, and he thought he could fly, but he was worried,
concerned, and 4 or ~ days later, by mutual consent
of his instructor and myself when I checked into it,
why, .we s~nt him out for this check ride. It seemed
funny to me that here I s the man who taught me how to
fly; and now I am here checking him to see if h~ is
capable of flying to teach students.· Hell, he taught
me.
D: He had his product right there.
L: Yes. He still could fly rings around me as far as I
was .concerned. He was a good pilot but very careful,
very slow, very safe.
D: Hmv many studerits was he carrying when you first
began?
42
LAVELLE
L: Oh, when I first started flying with him, he h~d four
st~dents, two officers and two cadets in primary
training at Dallas.
D~ What type aircraft was the first one that you flew?
L: PT-3.
L: Well, I thought that's what all airplanes were like.
(laughter) I didnlt know any different. You know, it
had no brakes. If you wanted to stop here, you had
to figure out how far back ~ou cut the ~hrottles so
you stopped there. They wanted you to come in and
line all your airplanes up as you parked them; there
were no brakes to stop it. You had to figure out
back here where to cut the throttle, and how far
you'd coast so you could line up. It had no tail
wheel; it had a tail skid. So with no brake~ and no
tail wheel, you never turned down wind. It was
impossible. If you wanted to turn the airplane, then
you had to go into the wind to tur~ it. Otherwise,
.. it was impossible to turn it. They had bungee cords
43
fngs yo"u would break the bungee cord, and it would
leave you sitting there (laughter) with one wing on
the ground.
L : Yes. There were no runways.
D: He was your first instructor then?
L: He was my instructor through primary flying.
D: And you flew' the PT-3 the whole time?
L: The whole time.
L: Could it have been 80?
D: That I s probably right •.
L: I think the total for primary, ba~ic, andadv~nced.Mas
44
200. I'm not sure, but I belie~e that's right.
D: Were many washed out, initially; in primary?
L: Ye~. I think the washout rate in primary was pretty
heavy. It wasn't nearly as heavy in basic, but it
was pretty heavy in primary. I don't really remember
what it was--20, 30, or 50 percent. It seemed like a
lot. We were always worried. Everybody was worried.
That was the atmosphere. You had to get through; you
wanted to get through, and you were worried in case
you didn't.
D: What were the military check pilots like?
L: We had one who was pretty tough. He had quite a
reputation. With those open cockpit airplanes·coming
in, you could hear him when he was on the base leg
shouting at the student. Everybody was afraid of
him. I really don't remember. his name, but he had
quite a reputation. The officer in charge of the
school and the chief .check pilot was, his name I am
sure was Joseph Hicks [Maj Gen Joseph H.], a fine
man. Everybody liked him .and had an·awful lot of
45
respect for him. Of course, as you watched the schedule
each day to see what check rides there were? you just
hoped that if you had to have one, you had ·it with
Hicks. I was never lucky enough to get with him. I
had both of mine w~th--I forget the name of the other
officer.
L: He was a rough customer.
D: Tell me the names of some of the ~eople you met
first at primary and maintained friendships with?
L: Well, I guess, Jack Merrell [Gen Jack G.], who all
through the years we were close; "Jim" Knapp [Maj Gen
James B.] was .in that class in primary; "Milt" Adams
[Maj Gen Milton B.] was in that class in primary;
all of these ended up as two- and three-star generals.
perry Hoisington [Maj Gen Perry M.] was in that class
in primary. To the best of my knowledge, I was the
only flying cadet in that primary class who eventually
became a general. Some of them, Gene Daugherty,
"Blackie" Boedeker [Col Charles W.J, I still correspond
46
with, and Jack McAuliffe. These were cadets. Jim
Hunt was a cadet in that cl~ss. All these people
stayed in and got through their full colonel before
they got out--Gene Daugherty. Many of the student
officers in that class, "Jim" Wilson [Lt Gen James w.]
was a three-star general; Jack Merrell was a four-
star; Milt Adams, a two-star; Perry Hoisington,
two-star; Jim Knapp, two-star. They were the student
officers in that little group; a few of us got to
know each other pretty well. All through our careers l
we knew each other very well. When we come home
tonight, we will look. at the pictures there on the
wall and pick them out.
D: Sir, there wasn't a strict dichotomy between the
student officers and the aviation cadets as far as
the flight line was concerned?
L: [On the] flight line, we were one. Of ~ourse, we
[cadets] lived in the barracks; they [~tudent officers]
rented homes or rented rooms. But generally they got
two, three, or four together and rent~d a place and
lived together. We went to class together, and we
were on the flight line together. But .during the
47
they were nowhere to be seen. Same thing when we
went to Randolph. We went to Randolph Field, and t\YO
cadets were assigned to a room, but the student
officers lived in town. Again, they rented homes.
They got together, iwo, three, or four and rented a
house and lived in town. By then several of them had
beco~e quite friendly with several of us and we
went to their homes in town. When we were on the
fli~ht line, we would have the same instructors and
call each other "Jack," but if we'd see them off the
flight line, the~ ~ere "Lieutenant, si~,~ till we
went to their house, and they were "Jack" again. It
was pretty good.
D: There is some contention that before this time, when
the instructors and check pilots were not Academy
graduates, they weren't overly fond of the united
States Military Academy graduates who were going
thr~ugh pilot training, and the student officers
then from the Academy had a Ll ttle tougher time
getting through. Do you have any comment on this
now~
L: I didn't notice that in our time. We had the im-
pression the student officers had an easier time
)S:c~~586 48
LAVELLE
of it and didn't have to do as well as we did. I am
sure we were just as wrong as the other impression.
D: Were there many Mili tary Academy graduates who \v-ere
instructors or check pilots at that time?
L: Allot the check pilots and flight commanders were
Military Academy graduates.
L: The instructors were not. But in 1939 everyone of
the flight commanders, operations officers, and check
pilots were all Military Academy, West Point graduates.
D: rhis obviously wouldn't hold then.
L: No. I don't know about it before 1939. In 1939
in our flight, for instance, "Tren" Meyers [Col
Trenholm J.] was the flight commander; he was a West Point
graduate. Captain "Hal" Mace, West Point graduate, was
the as~istant. "Gabe" Disosway [Gen Gabriel P.], a
West Point graduate, was one of the senior instructors
and the ops [operations], officer was Montgomery [Lt Gen
49
:1.-.-
Montgomery. There were about 14 instruc.tors in our
flight who were West Point graduates.
D: This was when you were a student at Randolph?
L: This was in 1939 when I was a student at Randolph.
D: Did you get to know these people fairly well then, or
when you came back again?
L: When I came back? Oh, no.
D: That's what I ...
and Lieutenant Disosway, they were away over • . •
0: Did everybody go to Randolph from primary?
L: Oh, yes. There was only R~ndolph.
0: What's the first airplane you started to fly then?
50
LAVELLE
L: BT-9. We flew the BT-9 all through Randolph. Oh, no,
that's not true. I flew the BT-9 and the BT-14. The
-14 was a newer airplane, a little more powerful
engine, ~nd it had straight wings, and it didn't spin
in the final tUrn, more stable. ( interruption)
D: Now, you are in a military environment; one that is
all military. ;Was there quite a bi t of difference
going from a p~imary atmosphere into the basic as far
as the military trriining was concerned?
L: Oh , sure. Same for as several hundred thousand other
peop;te. ,
D: How about the instructors now?
L: Well, again, I got real lucky. I was assigned to a
young man. This was the first class he had ever
instructed. .He had just graduated fro~ flying school.
He ~as a second lieutenant named Frank WoodS1 Frank
was my age. He was a real competent pilot, and I had
no trouble understanding him arid doing what he told
me to do~-no confusion. It was simple. I was very
lucky, came out real well.
51
L: He carried four.
D: Did they all make it?
L: No,·actually only two of us made it:--two out of the
four.
ing . Anyone who has gone through pilot training
feels the same way until they get to. that last day
and put their wings on.
L: Yes.
D: Was the training good?
L: Well, as I look back, no, it was pobr. I say this
because after graduation, I went into the training
business--into the Training Command for about 3
years--and I looked at the students we turned out,
and I looked at the studerits I got in a fighter wing
10 years later~ Those students 10 years later were
52
LAVELLE
three or four times the pilots we were turning' out or
I was when I got out.
D: What kind of training did you. receive after you got
your wings and became a pilot to become an instructor?
WaS there a formal course that you went through?
L: One week.
D: One week.
L: One week of riding in the backseat with .an instructor
while he pretended he ·was the student and showed us
the kind of mistakes the students made and what was
expected of us. And that was it.
. D: Did you fly with a lot of different instructors
during this basic period of time? Did you keep your
one instructor and also fly with others?
L: I kept the one the whole time but flew with several
others.
D: So your thoughts of how to do the training were by
53
.the experience of having different instructors, the
good and the bad, looking at them?
L: Well, in primary lid had two. One I've already told
you about--Aldrich. Another one was Speigel, and
there was quite a big difference between the two of
·them. In basic I had Frank Woods, and we rode with
several others. We were in the beginning of the
ihr6es of expanding the training business. In ad-
vanced, again I had good luck, I had a hell of a good
instructor.
D: Advanced at Kelly?
L: Yes, at Kelly. You know, I looked at some of my
classmates, and they had a lot of problems. Their
instructors weren't too good, in their opinion, but i
had good ones all the way. I was real fortunate.
Things they taught me and things you learn after you
start instructing yourself, you just develop your
attitude and your capability_
D: You just mentioned that things were starting to gin
up a little bit--war on the horizon or the threat of
54
war on the horizon. I know you were totally involved
in learning how to fly an airplane, but what kind of
feelings were you getting now as far as the world
situation was concerned?
L: Well, as yol..1 look back on them, probably not so sharp.
But the well-known and well-talked-about and oft-
repeated theory was that there was no way the Japs
would ever attack' us. Our Navy would take care of
the Japanese inl week~ We had the most powerful
Navy in the world out in 'the Pacific, and all these
scares about the Japanese were just that, scares;
they weren I t real. Nothing to worry about, the Navy
had that completely under control. I heard that so
many times. With the size and the power of the
Pacific Fleet, Japan would never make that kind of a
mistake. I heard that many times.
D: Were your classmates, many of them, looking along the
same line, or were you still thinking about an air-
line career?
L: No, I was still thinking about an airline career.
55
D: Many of the othersal~O?
L: Yes. The iirs~ I evei th6ught 6f the war {ri Europe,
that it was real, was wh~n latei tob~ Major G~neral
Peterson [Virgil L.] was washed out of our class.
As a cadet you don't"knbw the reat reason, b~t i
think the reas6nw~s _that he had_misrepresent~dhis
age and he was not-going to be 21 ~h~n he graduated. ; -
He was washed out, and he went to Canada to fly.
His goal was going over with the Eagl~ Squadron. - -
Th~tLs whe~ I fir~t started thinkirig about the fact
that, "Hey, this war is nearer to home than I realize."
That I plus listen-ing to people talk about the Japanese I
ahd the menace the~ seemed to pose, gave me th~
opinion, oft stated,th~t, boy, our Navi has got
them, no sweat. I think that's about the first I
ever realized there was something I should be interested
in other than learning to fly and going to the air-
lines.
D: Did everybody go to advanced, to Kelly?
L: Yes, we went to Kelly and Brooks, over on the other
side of the field. ~hat was decided alphabetically.
56
LAVELLE
up through such a letter in the· ~lphabet, you went to
Kelly [or otherwise] you went to Brooks. At Keliy we
lived in what was called the new barracks. The new
barracks were built for World War I, and they were
tar paper buildings. We had one latrine for about
150 people, open showers. About 30 of us could go in
there at once to the shower. And there must have
been 30 or 40 washstands. It was built in a cabbage
field. In the heat of the summer, that stinking
cabbage patch was so~ething beyond belief for a ~ity
boy. 1111 tell you 1111 nev~r forget the smell of
that cabbage patch. Kelly Field was the only place
where there was any advanced training, so everybody /
went to Kelly.
D: Did you decide on being an instructor, or was that
decided for you?
L: No, it was decided for me. When the assignments came
out after graduation, actually it was well before
graduation, I was scheduled to go back to Randolph as
an ~nstructor. As I mentioned, about that time they
were starting this expansion and acceleration.
What happened was that for those of us who were due
57
to go back as instructors, they hurried us up and
finished our required hours. I think it was 200. I
was finished flying about i week before graduation
and was moved back to Randolph Field and back into
one of the cadet barracks again. They doubled up the
cadets to make room for us. And we were assigned to
flights. I was. assigned to Up" flight, and I spent a
week going through instructor's school in UP" flight.
D: Before you even had your wings?
L: Before I had my wings. The following Friday we - .' -
graduated, got our wings, and had that ceremony. We
had 1 day off, and the next day, Saturday, we came
back and instructed students. In that lies one of
the colorful incidents of my life.
At that time, this was 20 June, asa Reserve officer--
effective 1 July 1~40--ifyou were married after that
date, you could not apply for Regular commission.
D: Oh, is that tight?
L: If you were married by 30 June 1940, your marital
58
Regular commission..
D: . And you made it by the 22d.
L: Well, it's strange, because I had no idea I wanted
a Regular commission, . but all of my classmates who
wer~ planning on getting married--and I had been
plannin~ oh getting married--pushed their wedding
forward so th~y would be married before 1 July.
So we pushed ours forward.
It ~urned out that the day after graduation, when I
was going to be married--we graduated on 20 June and
I was going to be married 2 days later on the 22d--I
went to my boss and tried to get a day off to get
married, and he wouldn't give it to me. Actually, my
boss said, "Yes," but his boss said, "No." His boss
said~ "Hey, the rule was put in, and the only reason
it's in is that no second lieutenant can afford a
wife. So why should I give him a day off to get
married when we are trying to stop it and discourage
it? . Bels a second lieutenanti he can't afford a
wife." So I didn't get a day off; yet my wife, my
59
father, my best man and my sister were coming from
Cleveland, Ohio, for the wedding.
I went back to my boss, Captain Tren Meier, who was
the flight commander, and told him my problem, and he
said, "Well, why don't you show up at 6 o'clock
tomorrow morning and fly the weather ship. Having
flown the weath~r ship, you have worked£or the day,
and you can take off and go ~et ~arried." I showed
up at 6 o'clock~ and it was zero-zero. (laughter)
You couldn't get an airplane off that ground no matter
what. I kept going out and looking, and as soon as
we had about a 50-foot ceiling, I was saying~ "d~y,
let me go." Captain Meyer wouldn't let me go ahd
wouldn't let me go, and I finally went to him and
said, "Look, I'm going to be late for my wedding.
W.hat can I do?"
"You and Jack go fly the weather ship." Gabe looked
at him and said, "Hey, are you nuts? You know we
can't fly. I can stand here and see that we can't
let cadets go off yet." Well, Tren Meyer said, "Look,
I told you to go fly the weather ship. Go fly it."
Gabe said, "Well, what am I looking for?" Tren Meyer
60
said, "Watch the weather and give me an estimate of
when it's going to break. n . Gabe said, II I can do that
here~" Meyer said, "I told you to go fly.1I (laughter)
So we climbed into this airplane, Gabe and I, and we
went over to an auxiliary field called Wardlaw that
we used for cadet landings, and Gabe landed the air-
plane and shot a landing and taxied around and came
back and said, "Okay, you shoot a landin~." We had a
200-foot ceiling at this time. So I took the ~irplane
around and landed and he said, "Well, what do you
think? Is the field dry enough'for cadets?" .And I
s~id, "Yes. lid open the field to cadets. 1I He
said, "Why don't you make another landing just to be
sure?" I said, "Hey, Lieutenant Disosway, I got 15
minutes until I'm to be at the altar to get married."
Old Gabe took off and never got the throttle back off
the stop and never over 50 feet, and we landed at
Randolph. There were no runways at Randolph in those
days!
L: All grass. He landed right straight into the ramp,
61
LAVELLE
and as we came in he said, "Get out of your parachute,
open your canopy, and hit the ramp running. I'll
take your parachute and equipment in.",So I hit
running, and I got to the BOQ, started dressing, and
the first thing that happened 'to me was--I was being
married in a white suit--I couldn 1 t find my white
shoes. As it happened in those days, the first man
out is the best dressed. After I got dressed, with
no shoes, I was running down 'the rootnsand opening
the doors and looking into them until I found a pair
of shoes that I could steal. They were £our times too
big or too small forme, white shoes. So I took
"~ill" Seldon's [Col Littleton C.] shoes and wore them
to ihe wedding. Forttinately, a train came across
the Alamo highway that was from San Antonio toward
Austin, and the train held up my wife-to-be, my
father, my sister, and my best man for ~b6ut 15
minutes, and so w~ came in, both of us, 15 minutes
late.
D: At the Chapel at Randolph?
L: At the Chapel at Randolph to get married on 22 June
1940, 2 days after I graduated.
62
LAVELLE
D: You did a lot of good things at·one time. How did
you feel when you first got those wings and second
lieutenant bars?
L: Like everybody else, proud as could be. My father
was there. You know, everybody else felt the same
way. I was jus~ one of a. bunch of cocky young guys.
D: Wher~ h~d you first met your wife-to~be?
L: At the parish Catholic Youth Org~nization, CYO. when .;
I got out of college and had the job that I referr~d
to before. It was the depression, and there weren't
many people with jobs, and there wasn't much money'
available. The depression was now 8 or 9 years
old, and we had a couple of young priests in our
parish who really were sponsoring this Catholic
YciuthOrganization to get all of these high school
and college age, and after college age, kids off the
street and involved. They kept trying to .get me to
join their organization, and I wouldn't .. My next
door neighbor was a brandnew, started that year,
doctor, Al Hart. They tried to get him to join
and he wouldn't.
Somehow or the other, I started playing golf with
them on Thursday afternoon. I had never played golf
in my life. But these two priests, Al Hart, and I
went out to play golf each Thursday afternoon. They
taught me the game. [I was] a cocky, young athiete,
and ~fter about three times around I thought I was as
good as the'y were. The deal this Father' Mur'phy
offered me was: We'd pl~y 18 holes-~I don't know if
it was match or medal or what--but if I were to win,
he 00uld pay for dinner and, a show downtown for me
and'a date, and if he beat me, I had to j.oin his CYO
club and take this gal to the CY6 dan~e that he had
litied up for me. I lost. (laughter)
D: Lost and ~{Qn all at the same time.
L: Yes. probably the greatest thing that ever happened
to rne,but I lost her in a golf game. (laughter)
D: Well, you hadn't known each other. very long then
because you were off and running pretty soon after
that.
L: No. I had known her brother for 10 years, and we had
64
all o£ the same friends, the same group; we knew
every •
D: You were saying your wife and yourself both had
mutual friend~, and you knew her broth~r, but didn't
even know that the brother had a sister. When did
you have tim~ for this budding romance?
L: That was in that last 6 months I mentioned when
I was with _LaMaida. I then did a lot of job hunting
and ,what have you, and it was, oh, about 9 months
from the time of that dance until I left to get into
the cadets. That was it.
D: You did a lot of letter writing in between, I guess.
L: And a trip home at Christmas when I was in the cadets.
That's it. It has lasted 37 years so far.
D: That's a pretty good track record--just out of cadets,
wihgs, and shiny brown bars. Where were you going to
live?
65
D: Know it well.
one bath, all utilities furnished, $21 a month.
(laughter)
D: Bought yourself a car, too?
L: Yes, but not a new one. I was one of the f~w cadets
who was willing to accept a 1937