Boise, ID

There were also two WWII Navy planes nearby and the conversation quickly turned to those. If I were an aircraft mechanic, I would probably have enjoyed his descriptions more, but all together, it was a learning experience.

I quickly mentioned that I had always wondered about the massive power plant in the Grumman F6-F Hellcat fighter. As he went into depth on a description of the engine, an other elderly gentleman sitting nearby spoke up.

“I flew that plane!” He said.

“You flew the Hellcat?” I replied.

“Yeah, I am an old Navy pilot and flew the Hellcat off of carriers.”

“I didn’t know they flew Hellcats in Korea,” I blurted out.

“I flew in WWII,” He said with a wink.

I yearned to find out what carrier he had been on, but his other family members tended to keep his attention on the air show.

The only other short conversation I got out of him was when the two navy planes took off. I mentioned to the two men that I thought the P-51 Mustang was the best fighter of the war.

“I flew Corsairs, too!” He blurted out.

Before I could respond, his lovely wife leaned forward and hollered in my direction.

“He was in the Navy! She snapped. “They could out fly anything!”

We all laughed, then turned our attention back to the air show. I only wish I had the time to pick the old fighter pilots brain on his wartime experiences, but it was not to be.

After returning to my seat, a small red stunt plane parked in front of us revved up his engine and taxied away. I grabbed both cameras-still and video preparing to shoot the entire show. Although I had plans to sit and enjoy the show with my wife, it was the elderly gentleman standing behind me whom seemed to be my date for the show!

With every acrobatic twist and turn of the stunt planes, or over flights by the old war birds-he had comments to make.

On the stunt planes:

“He’s got so much power in that engine, he may flip over!”
“They ought to arrest him for polluting the skies!”
“If he spun any faster, he would turn into a corkscrew!”
“Good thing they painted his plane red, not blue!”

On the war birds:

“Now that’s a plane!”
“Did you know that they were underpowered at first. Then came the Allison’s, then the Rolls Royce engines.”
“We had em’ in Korea early on, then came the jets.”

My wife didn’t mind. At every air show I have ever been too, I tend to get in longwinded discussions about military aircraft and the men whom flew or worked on them. I especially love talking to other veterans.

I did get some real eye opening images-both still and video. I haven’t listened to the video portion yet, but I can only hope that I recorded the conversations I had with these two gentle veterans of an era long past.

The wife and I had to leave the show early. I said my goodbyes to the two vets I had been talking to, as my wife said goodbye to several families with small children she had been playing with.

“I really miss our grandkids” She informed me, as we headed back to our car.

“I know, they would have had a great time.” I replied.

Instinctively, I reached my hand out for our grandkids and she did likewise. But instead of three kids in between us, our hands met. We looked at each other and grinned. It was a perfect end to our date in the sun!