Post 11 for real

There are lots of parallels that can be drawn when comparing most aspects of life to boarding school. Whether it's raising kids in the city, being a kid in the city, being in the Army, focusing on your career, being in school, learning respect for your parents, neighbors or authority figures, boarding school is a wonderful platform for developing those skills and the conduct that so many seem to have trouble with.

Greg and I took to parts of it like a duck to water. We worked in the dairy with Brother Victor and learned early on about milk production, hay farming and the somewhat shitty duty of composting all the manuer from the cows as they were being milked. Pardon the pun but for a guy who at one time, was referred to as "The King of the compost pile", I just had to say it.

Brother Leo was in charge of the kitchen where meals were prepared 3 times per day for all 109 students and the Franciscan Brothers who lived and worked at Morris. We liked the kitchen work because Brother Leo and Uncle Charles had known each other for decades and he more or less took us under his wing and showed us how to bake sweet rolls for that many people....from scratch.

Brother Ferdie was in charge of the "Junior Dorm", potato peeling and wine making. Long after graduation, Greg and I used to say that "if they decide to cremate Brother Ferdie, he will NEVER go out". We were of course referring to the never ending taste tests that he went through when making his wine. He was, by no means, a drunk but he always smelled of wine and potatoes.

Brother Robert, Brother Bill and Brother Giles were always around the gymnasium and the 3 of them shared the duties of keeping the swimming pool, the basketball court, the football changing room, the concession stand and bathrooms in the gym, in clean working order. Gym duty was pretty cool, too.

Brother Giles was a different sort of Franciscan. He had been in World War II and he smoked like a chimney and clearly suffered from combat fatigue, shell shock or whatever you want to call it. He was a good guy and I liked him even though he was, at times, very strict about our conduct.

Brother William, not Brother Bill, was in charge of the "Senior Dorm" and in that respect, was Brother Ferdie's counterpart. He was also the Prefect of Discipline like Father Junkin was at Jesuit, but these two guys appeared not to be from the same planet.

I can go on and on about each of the departments Greg and I worked in when time for chores arrived. I guess it's fair to say that we liked the farming and dairy operations so much that Greg and I stayed one summer for hay season. Brother Gabriel drove the tractor for the hay production and then drove the truck when it came time to collect the bales of hay that we would put away for the winter.

If you scroll down to the bottom of this page you will see a picture of me and Greg leaning against Aunt Grace's Pontiac as it is parked in front of the gym. It wasn't far behind that building that I administered Saparito's lesson regarding bullying the kids. In any event, neither Greg nor I were power lifters and bailing hay and throwing them up to the flatbed elevation of the hay truck was a work out that exceeded anything I'd ever done. Even though I was two years older and a bit taller than Greg, he was stronger than I was.

If you read all of this from the introduction and then Part 1 to here, you might remember that Greg's Mamma, my Aunt Grace, is Uncle Raymond's sister and Uncle Raymond was a Golden Gloves boxing champion and a guy that could more than handle himself.

In any event, we liked most of it and especially liked the outdoor parts where we went camping at Letona Bluffs, squirell hunting, mountain climbing, tubing down the White River and hiking all over the country side.

All went well that year except for the last week of school when I fell off of the basketball goal where I had climbed for some unknown reason. I broke my left arm and was taken to Searcy to have it set and unfortuanately, the doc set it incorrectly and I had to be transferred to St Vincent's Infirmary in Little Rock to have it rebroken and reset. Momma and Aunt Nell came for all that and after I was released, we went home to Shreveport for my summer rehabilitation.

When I think back to that particular year I have to mention that I discovered the library and history. I managed to read every book in the library relating to World War II and I did so while sitting on one of the benches near to the Saparito Instruction spot.

I studied every fighter group including the 356th. As an 8th grade kid, I knew who Dick Bong was as well as Butch O'Hare, Joe Foss, Gabreski, Gentile and a number of other pilots of great fame during the War.

I thought about Joe Messina alot and wondered if I would ever get to see him again. More than anything, I really woke up to the part of combat aviation that had to do with strategy. You can google "Thatch Weave" and see what I mean much easier than I can explain it here.

I even knew who Saburo Sakei was and some of his Japanese counterparts like a bomber pilot named Nishizawa. Saburo was the highest scoring Ace in the Imperial Air Force.

As a side note, in the early 80's I had the great historic fortune to communicate with his office at Saburo's Mueseum in Tokyo where they were attempting to rebuilt the famous Japanese Fighter Plane, the often feared Zero.

They were on a world wide search to find an engine for that type and, having flown combat missions just north east of Saigon where a Japanese Zero had crashed on the side of a mountain, I knew where one was.

The Japanese Imperial Navy had a Base in "Nha Be" which was adjacent to the Saigon River that flowed to the South China Sea at Vung Tau. It was also used as an airfield and was located on the southern outskirts of Saigon where they would primarily refuel, re-arm and repair Destroyers.

The airstrip there provided aviation fuel that would allow a solo flight to the next stopping point which I think was Hong King and from there, many Zeros flew back to Japan.

One year, a Zero Pilot was returning to Japan but the monsoon season was in full force and his Zero and his life ended on the side of Signal Mountain which was on the east side of Xuan Loc where Fire Support Base "Mace" was located. "Mace" was my forward operating base when I was flying Nighthawk Gunship Missions for the 199th Light Infanty Brigade between May of 70 and September of 1971 when the entire Brigade was shut down and returned to the USA.

Chief Warrant Office Terry Femmer (rip) showed me the Zero one day and I longed to go hiking up the mountain to inspect it or even arrange a sling load to get it off the mountain, but that was never to be.

In any event, despite my connection to the historical aspects of the Japanese Empire during the Second World War, I thought about Joe Messina alot and wondered if I would ever get to see him again. More than anything, I really woke up to the part of combat aviation that had to do with strategy. You can google "Thatch Weave" and see what I mean much easier than I can explain it here.

I guess it's fair to say that, as an 8th grade kid, I emersed myself into every aspect of aviation, strategy, the strategy of all sides and how the constant changes in strategic methodology brought about different results. I even managed to use some of those strategies in life at boarding school where Greg and I managed to stay out of trouble...............for the most part. More coming later. Stand by.






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