University of Kansas - Jayhawker Yearbook (Lawrence, KS)

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5, 'L fav' THE JAYHAWKER

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ocroarzx 1941 Z9 Flying Jayhawkers arms Dear Dad: I got my private pilot's license today! I've been working hard all semester for this license, and so you can imagine how proud I am of it. For the past week, we have been flying about two hours a day in order to get our time turned in before the deadline date. I was fifth in the primary course to finish. The test was hard, too. The flight examiner spent about an hour with me, and he put me through those maneuvers in a hurry. First, I did 5 or 6 spot landings solo, and then he went up with me. He started by having me climb to 3500 feet and then called for spins, one right and one left. He then tested me on vertical turns and stalls. My stalls were good, smooth as glass, with perfect control. He liked them, he said, but he was unhappy about my figure eights and my power landing. He nearly scared me to death when he reached over and cut the gun at about 1200 feet and then just looked straight ahead and said, NWell, where are we going to land?n But I finally spotted a long smooth wheat field and came in toward it at just about the right height. I had a bad few minutes during the test, but he must have liked my flying, because he signed my test sheet and promised to recommend me for the secondary course. You see, there are four courses under the CAA program: the private pilot, or primary course, the secondary or advanced course, which gives you a commercial rating, the cross country course, and then another course which gives you an instructor's rating. The University of Kansas offers all four. In fact, we have the second largest single operation center in the United States. There are fourteen planes for our use at the airport. Seven of them are Aeroncas, four are Waco Trainers for the advanced course, and there are two Stinsons and a Beechcraft for the cross country course. They use ten or twelve instructors full time and train about 75 or 80 men in these courses every year. We got a good rating last year by the Civil Air Administration because of the large number of pilots turned out, and for our safety record---we haven't had a single flying accident at our airport. That's a good record, because we almost always have from 12 to 15 planes using the same runway during an hour. However, the instructors are very careful to see that we learn the traffic regulations before we ever get to fly solo. I remember my first solo flight. It came as a complete surprise to me early one Saturday morning when Rex, my instructor, stepped out of the plane and said, UOK, boy, do you think you can take her around alone?H I know I must have gulped and turned pale, and I couldn't say a word, but I did nod---feebly. So I took off, that was easy, and started to circle the field. The surprise wore off a little then, and I began to look around and enjoy myself. Gee, that was a thrill---up there flying around alone, depending on nobody but myself. The air is clean and cold and pure up there. I had a feeling of intense freedom. I wanted to laugh and yell and sing all at the same time. Nothing in the world was bothering me, at least, until I remembered it was time to make my landing. Just for a moment I wondered if I could make it, but not for more than a moment. It wasn't a matter of whether I could or not---I had to. I did not get the jitters until it was all over. Now I can go up and do spins, steep turns, stalls, and land fContinued on Page 681

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C 'l' O B ER 1911 31 .-, 'X photo! by Bmnine