Expanding Horizons
Just after arriving at club 658 my mother had sent me a package of books and cookies. The cookies were great but the books helped me more. The Air Force’s concept of training is to take a large number of people and stress them in the classroom. Those that can’t take it are put into different fields. Our class started with 600 people, I don’t think there were 300 at the end. I was in the electronics training class. The graduates would go on to other training, airborne fire control systems, ground radar, communications, weapons, etc. One day in class we covered algebra and trig in four hours. If you were a good student in high school, then this was just a tough refresher. If you were a poor student or had not taken these subjects, you were toast—burnt toast. It helped me focus. Many of the other GI’s would go to the day room after chow and play pool until midnight then come crash in the barracks until breakfast. I would study. I also bought other technical books to read. I finished in the top ten of the graduating class. I did learn to play pool in Denver but I was not very good. There was a snooker table in the day room. Which at night became a place to hang out. I usually went to the airman's club (not sure why it isn't the airmen's club). They had real food (cheese burgers) and Dr. Pepper. They had 3 pool tables. I was playing an old (20 something staff sergeant). Finally, after being bored, he began kicking my ass one-handed. I did get better but that was in the future.
After completing the two hour a day basic training, we were allowed off base on the weekends. Now there were places in town that were restricted—many of the GI’s headed straight for these places. I found a Christian club in downtown Denver. It was a great place to hang out. Good people, music, books. I got involved with the local Youth for Christ and the Sixth Street Baptist Church. The Sixth Street Church was a good church, but the pastor used his pulpit to try to get people to vote for Nixon rather than Kennedy because of Kennedy’s Catholic faith. I didn’t think this was fair. I still don't. Since then I have spent a great deal of time terrorizing Baptists.
Frequently I would hitchhike to Golden, CO and visit the Buffalo Bill museum. I never did go on the Coors tour; now I wish I had done that too. The road out of Golden to the museum has many switchback turns. One sunny day as I was walking up the hill, I saw the remains of a wrecked car. I climbed down several hundred feet to inspect it. The car had painted on the left rear tail fin, “Devil or Angel”. It made me a safer driver.
November and December weather was unseasonably warm. I was out of doors as often as I could. One week it did snow heavily and we built a snow Santa Clause. Someone went to the BX and purchased some red and black crepe paper that we used to dye the snow. Other people constructed a 10 foot tall airman. We dyed him blue and decorated him with medals. The unit's executive officer thought it was modeled after him (it wasn’t). He came and took pictures of the snowman. So did the Denver paper.
November brought another change. No more basic training first thing in the morning. Now the Air Force didn’t forget to
give us extra work, but it was easy. A friend and I had to sweep and mop floors in the electronics lab where we were being trained. We usually completed our two-hours of work in about 30 minutes. We sometimes hung around the lab talking to the older GI’s (25 year olds). When we finished our chores we returned the mops and bucket to the janitor's closet on either first or third floor. One day upon entering the elevator on the second floor, I punched three at the same instant that my friend punched one. The elevator kept going from three to one and back again, but never opening the door. We finally figured out how to stop the elevator, but it was half way between floors. This was the first time I was ever stuck in an elevator. It is not as much fun as you might think.
One day while cleaning the lab a female sergeant was flirting with another airman. He was trying unsuccessfully to insert a piece of wire in to a small hole. She kept telling him he just needed some hair around it. I was so naïve. I had no idea what she was talking about—now I know. It does help :)
The electronics lab was fun both in class and during our mopping duties. We got to build real electronic circuits. Since I had learned well, the experiments came easily to me. I had time to build and try other things. It was just like having Christmas every day. Our final project was to build a five tube radio from a schematic. (Those of you under 40 who are reading this will have to Google electronic tube...they came before transistors.) It was a good project and required some planning. My older teammate was a sergeant who was cross training into electronics. He kept trying to make the actual soldering look like the schematic. This is very impractical. I could not convince him that my way would work and his would not. So often I would rebuild out project in the morning. In spite of his help we aced the project. My older lab partner had been at the Air Force Academy, near Colorado Springs, and had washed out. They made him a Tech Sergeant but he still wanted to be a real officer. Often he was a horse's ass.