A Good Year
Only the most deluded and egotistic of us can claim to have had any control over the year in which we were born. The rest of us have to content ourselves with nailing down the significance of that year that earned it the distinction of seeing us into this life. I am certain that for all of us, that is easily done.
At first sight 1931 would seem to be among the very worst years, because it was at the outset of the Great Depression and it was right before Hitler and his thugs took power. Yet, it was still a great year in which to be born (since I wasn't expected to make a living). It was just in time for the Golden Age of Radio and too early to have my brains permanently scrambled by TV -- which all by itself is more than enough to sing high hosannas for 1931!
I was born too late to take part in WWII (except stuff like scavenging tinfoil from discarded cigarette packs alongside the road to fashion into neat-looking, heavy cubes to contribute to the war effort) and way too early to take part in the Vietnam mess. But betwixt and between I did serve in the military during the Korean "Police Action" -- there've been so many wars that I couldn't possibly have missed them all. I arrived in time and a place to be subjected to a mild form of Jim Crow but not lynch law, and just in time for the great outbreak of Civil Rights and to be exactly the right age, 30, for the onset of the best decade of a great many centuries, the Glorious 1960's!
My military experience in particular illustrated how my date of birth placed me right in the midst of some big transitions.
I was drafted, and after playing with the idea of seeing whether I could deal with the rigors of being a Marine or jumping out of a plane in the paratroopers, I decided that the less hysterical Air Force was more my speed. I was inducted in 1952, shortly after two big changes that had been wrought in the U.S. military.
A little earlier, in 1947, the Air Force had been detached from the Army and was now on an equal footing with the Army and the Navy, though for me, as a mere enlisted man, that was mainly manifested in the peculiar mix of leftover khaki and olive drab and new blue uniforms that we were issued.
Much more importantly, in that same year, 1947, Harry Truman had desegregated the military, which, among other things, meant that for the first time someone my color wouldn't be automatically relegated to certain jobs regardless of aptitude. I had a chance to become a flight officer of some kind, but I chose to stay in training as a ground radio crewman.
(I have always had a lot of strange notions, as shown by that paratrooper idea earlier.)
Aside from the desegregation order, the significance of my birth year as it applied to the military was best demonstrated by the historical transitions of the planes that I climbed in and out of so often during my nearly four years as a hotshot radioman. By being assigned to the Air Defense Command in California and later to the Strategic Air Command in Okinawa and Nebraska, I worked on the Air Force's last prop-driven fighters and bombers in active service -- F-51's and B-29's -- and on some of the first jet fighters and bombers -- F-94C's and B-47's.
(One of my Bomb Wing's B-29's, at Kadena AB, in Okinawa, exactly 50 years ago.)
Since then I have seen many other endings and beginnings, as we all have, but those shifts in some interesting warplanes first highlighted for me the good fortune involved in the timing of my birth.
At first sight 1931 would seem to be among the very worst years, because it was at the outset of the Great Depression and it was right before Hitler and his thugs took power. Yet, it was still a great year in which to be born (since I wasn't expected to make a living). It was just in time for the Golden Age of Radio and too early to have my brains permanently scrambled by TV -- which all by itself is more than enough to sing high hosannas for 1931!
I was born too late to take part in WWII (except stuff like scavenging tinfoil from discarded cigarette packs alongside the road to fashion into neat-looking, heavy cubes to contribute to the war effort) and way too early to take part in the Vietnam mess. But betwixt and between I did serve in the military during the Korean "Police Action" -- there've been so many wars that I couldn't possibly have missed them all. I arrived in time and a place to be subjected to a mild form of Jim Crow but not lynch law, and just in time for the great outbreak of Civil Rights and to be exactly the right age, 30, for the onset of the best decade of a great many centuries, the Glorious 1960's!
My military experience in particular illustrated how my date of birth placed me right in the midst of some big transitions.
I was drafted, and after playing with the idea of seeing whether I could deal with the rigors of being a Marine or jumping out of a plane in the paratroopers, I decided that the less hysterical Air Force was more my speed. I was inducted in 1952, shortly after two big changes that had been wrought in the U.S. military.
A little earlier, in 1947, the Air Force had been detached from the Army and was now on an equal footing with the Army and the Navy, though for me, as a mere enlisted man, that was mainly manifested in the peculiar mix of leftover khaki and olive drab and new blue uniforms that we were issued.
Much more importantly, in that same year, 1947, Harry Truman had desegregated the military, which, among other things, meant that for the first time someone my color wouldn't be automatically relegated to certain jobs regardless of aptitude. I had a chance to become a flight officer of some kind, but I chose to stay in training as a ground radio crewman.
(I have always had a lot of strange notions, as shown by that paratrooper idea earlier.)
Aside from the desegregation order, the significance of my birth year as it applied to the military was best demonstrated by the historical transitions of the planes that I climbed in and out of so often during my nearly four years as a hotshot radioman. By being assigned to the Air Defense Command in California and later to the Strategic Air Command in Okinawa and Nebraska, I worked on the Air Force's last prop-driven fighters and bombers in active service -- F-51's and B-29's -- and on some of the first jet fighters and bombers -- F-94C's and B-47's.
(One of my Bomb Wing's B-29's, at Kadena AB, in Okinawa, exactly 50 years ago.)
Since then I have seen many other endings and beginnings, as we all have, but those shifts in some interesting warplanes first highlighted for me the good fortune involved in the timing of my birth.
posted by Carl (aka Sofarsogoo) | 10:02 AM
2 Comments:
A fascinating reflection on your personal history. Reading it makes me feel like a little child (by comparison). It's incredible to think that the military remained segregated throughout WWII.
Hi! Thanks for visiting and leaving a comment. Your being in Japan is especially interesting to me. After my service in Okinawa, I later went to Japan proper on my own and spent two summers there, traveling over all the main islands except Hokkaido, in 1959 alone (except of course for all the Japanese!) and again in 1966 with my wife. Your pictures bring back a lot of good memories.
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