Oral history interview of George W. Kennedy

Collection:: Veterans History Project: Oral History Interviews
Title:: Oral history interview of George W. Kennedy
Creator:: Lowance, Lynn
Kennedy, George Wallace, 1921-2005
Date of Original:: 2003-11-19
Subject:: World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Stearman airplanes
Catalina (Seaplane)
Kennedy, Louise Hunnicutt, 1922?-1978
Kennedy, Jacqueline Thiesen
Power, Tyrone, 1914-1958
Taylor, Robert, 1911-1969
Georgia Military College
Civilian Pilot Training Program (U.S.)
United States. Naval Air Transport Service
United States. Navy. Seabees
University of Florida
Location:: Guam, 13.47861, 144.81834
Japan, Okinawa, 26.53806, 127.96778
Japan, Volcano Islands, Iwo Jima
United States, California, 37.25022, -119.75126
United States, District of Columbia, Washington, Joint Base Anacostia–Bolling Heliport, 38.84289, -77.01553
United States, Florida, Duval County, Jacksonville, 30.33218, -81.65565
United States, Florida, Escambia County, Pensacola, 30.42131, -87.21691
United States, Florida, Pinellas County, Saint Petersburg, 27.77086, -82.67927
United States, Georgia, 32.75042, -83.50018
United States, Georgia, Atlanta Metropolitan Area, 33.8498, 84.4383
Medium:: video recordings (physical artifacts)
mini-dv
Type:: Moving Image
Format:: video/quicktime
Description:: In this interview, George Kennedy describes his career as a Marine Corps pilot in the Pacific during World War II. He already knew how to fly before the outbreak of the war; he describes his training and then instructing during the following year. He describes his war-time marriage and trip to California as well as his voyage to the Pacific as a passenger on an aircraft carrier. He describes the living conditions there as well as experiences throughout the islands. He recalls having to censor enlisted men's letters home. He describes visiting occupied Japan and his separation from the Marines. He recounts hearing about the death of Franklin D. Roosevelt and how he felt about Truman. He remained in the reserves for seven years. He describes his post-war education and careers, and how he felt about his military service.
George Kennedy was a Navy pilot in the Pacific during World War II.
GEORGE KENNEDY VETERANS HISTORY INTERVIEW Atlanta History Center November 19, 2003 Interviewer: Lynn Lowance Transcriber: Frances Westbrook Note: Two transcribers tried this one and found tape inaudible. We have done a re-recording on microcassette to try to get better sound. There are still many gaps. Present with the interviewer and Mr. Kennedy were Mr. Kennedy's son, George Kennedy, Jr., and another interviewer, Stephen Goldfarb. *** INT: Today is Wednesday, November 19, 2003, and this is the beginning of an interview with Mr. George Kennedy at the Atlanta History Center in Atlanta, Georgia. My name is Lynn Lowance and I will be the interviewer. Mr. Kennedy, could you tell us a little bit about your early years? SON: I think you also want to say, also present is . . . . INT: Thank you. Also present is his son, George Kennedy, Jr. Thank you. GK: Uh, I was born in Jacksonville, Florida in 1921, one of five children, I was the middle one. And, uh, we lived in Avondale, I graduated from Robert E. Lee High School, uh, then I went to Georgia Military College in Milledgeville where I had family connections. My mother's folks were from there, and then I went to the University of Florida for a year. From there, uh, [?] in the meantime, and I got accepted as a Navy flight cadet, and was sent first to, uh, do you want to get into the military part? [yes] OK. I was first sent to Athens to pre-flight school. They didn't have any planes for us to fly right away so they sent us over to these pre-flight schools to quote get us in shape and learn something about the Navy and ground school work, like navigation, and weather predicting, et cetera. I was there three or four months. It was very strenuous for me because I had half a day in classrooms and a half a day athletics. And not being an athlete, I always [?] a spectator sport, I was on the reserve squad and it wasn't all that much fun for me. But, however, I did know how to swim, having been raised in Florida and some of the big football players that were there couldn't, some of them almost drowned. Anyway, from there I went to Anacostia which is a naval training field, basic training at, uh, outside of Washington. There we learned how to fly Stillmans and you go back to something that was important in my case, because I already knew how to fly this before I got in the Navy. Uh, Franklin Roosevelt in anticipation of us getting in the war at some point, and realizing we were behind the Nazi powers, and so forth, decided to stir up some interest in flying since he and many others felt that was where the future, most of it was going to be fought in the air. Anyway, he started, and offered to college students what they called Civilian Pilot Training Program, and I was given flight lessons at Georgia Military College to learn how to fly their single engine, bi-planes. So I did at least know how to fly. We were, going back to Anacostia. I, uh, was the first to, I may have been the last to go out of pre-flight school, but I was the first to fly in my class, ‘cause I had had some previous flight training. From there I was lucky to go to Pensacola, which is the cradle of aviation, and steeped in military and naval history. And there got in the second round of training, and then decided I wanted to be a multiple engine pilot rather than a fighter pilot. Not being, I guess, an aggressive type for foreign duty, having anybody shoot at me. I chose twin engines and got in, was taken and trained in PBI, which is a patrol plane, sea plane. And after graduation, pure luck had it, knew some instructors and I was on the list so I got assigned for a year's instruction in PBI sea planes. Is that enough or do you want me to keep on? INT: That's fine. GK: Well, I'll be out, the war'll be over soon. [laughter] I'll have to say in the meantime I did get married, a girl I had met in Athens. She was from St. Petersburg, and I probably would not have had I not gotten this training and being in the states for a while. I doubt frankly she would have had me, and it probably would not have been advisable to get married and go overseas right away, which a lot of guys had to do. One issue is my wife, being social minded, planned a big wedding in St. Petersburg, and sent out invitations, et cetera, and I asked to come down. And when I applied for my leave for the weekend or a week I was called into the executive officer's office, and he said, “Well, you just got your wings a few months ago, and you already had your vacation. We're not going to let you go anywhere.” And I said, “Well, it's going to be bad news, ‘cause my girl's not going to like that.” Which they didn't. And, my mother-in-law was supposed to have said, “You tell that commander or whatever he is up there that I said that he's got to be in St. Petersburg the night of the wedding.” And he consented, and said, “Maybe it would be good for public relations,” which it was, a big thing, and all that jazz. INT: Were you in Pensacola the entire time that you were in the service? GK: No. Uh . . . INT: What years were you in Pensacola? GK: Well, I guess it took me a year total to get my wings. I was in training down there probably three or four months, because I had pre-flight and then basic training. And then there, the next assignment I was stationed in Pensacola a year. INT: Do you remember what year that was? GK: I went overseas in '44 or '45. No, I don't remember dates, I'm not very good at that. INT: Where did you go when you went overseas? GK: We went first to, uh, California and my wife insisted on seeing me off, quote, and we borrowed enough gas rationing from both families to drive out there on re-retreaded tires. We thought we'd never get there. But, uh, but we did. And she had to come back on a plane, and they were put off three times to make room for servicemen. You weren't supposed to be flying in those days. Another little item, when we went out there, we could not stay, nor could she stay, just before I left, for more than two nights in any tourist, quote, kind of motel. And that was the limit anybody could stay in any public hotel because they had everybody and their brother coming to California to see ‘em off, which we did, which she did. Anyway, we loaded on a Navy carrier as a passenger, and went to Guam, which is where I was stationed, which was my main base for the year I was overseas. INT: Tell me a little about your experience on Guam. GK: Well, I, we, primarily were to transport, for the Marines, personnel, equipment, and supplies, to the Pacific islands. The war was winding down and we were not all that busy but we were standing by, had a thing going with the Navy NATS, called Naval Air Transport. They were much bigger than we were, the Marine transport, so they got most of the jobs, but I flew, I guess, onto every island in the Pacific. It was very interesting, the different ones, and some of them fell soon after they were taken. I went to Iwo Jima just a few weeks after it was secured, and ran into a buddy from high school, and he was a captain in the infantry Marines, and he wanted to know if I wanted to go up in the mountains. There were a few Japs set up there, and we can get them. And I said, “I decline the invitation.” Well, another, one other time I went to Okinawa and they were still fighting on the end of the island. And that was the one time I did sleep in a trench because prior to that one of our planes, air transport planes, was there and spent the night, and the fellas that slept on the plane, the pilot and the crew, it just happened that the Japs had captured one of our transport planes, and came into the air field and succeeded in attacking whatever aircraft were on the ground. So, they wouldn't let us sleep in the planes, they didn't want that to happen again. INT: When you were flying your transport missions, did you have one crew that always flew together? GK: No, the crews were interchangeable, as the pilots were. INT: Who do you remember from those missions, flying with you? GK: Well, of course, I would remember a movie star, Tyrone Power had gotten his wings. And by the way, he did it the hard way, not like somebody like Robert Taylor who was well known and got his wings easily. Tyrone Power went through basic training at Parris Island and was well liked. He was not in my squadron but I ran into him several times. And, uh, he got to go into China when the war was over, some of the planes were going over there, and he got to go cause of who he was, but he was, he was well liked. [coughs] Excuse me. INT: Do you have any particular individual memories of missions that you flew? GK: There is one of the important ones, I went to Peleliu Islands, which is, not well known at the time [coughs] Excuse me. Let's call a halt. INT: OK. We'll get started again. SON: [?] GK: I'm not ready yet. SON: . . . get into some bad weather, and Dad had to take the controls from the first, . . . GK: First pilot. SON: Yeah. GK: Yeah. That's one I'll never forget. We had been home, had arrived after flying back, I believe it's three thousand miles, and we had to fly from, I forget, San Diego or El Centro , or one of the fields, in the airplane. And we, uh, got into a storm _____ front, which is when two fronts run together, and really bad weather. And, uh, we were in between these two high mountains near the short of California, and the storm got worse and our lights went out and, uh, we all of a sudden discovered we were lost. We had, had not been on instruments, or at least we couldn't determine where we were, and in that short of distance we could have run into one of the mountains real quick. So, uh, it was scary for a while, I'm sure it wasn't more than a few minutes, but it seemed like an hour. I remember one of the crew saying—I told them if they wanted to, they could jump, we were in a pretty bad spot, and one of ‘em said, “No, no, lieutenant, we'll stay with y'all, with you.” And fortunately we did see, I did see a break. For a while there in flying a twin engine and both of us were wrestling with it. But anyway I saw a bright spot in the sky below me and we went down and landed at Baker's Field, I'll never forget that. So, a little scary toward the, toward the end. INT: What was the morale like among all the men? GK: Great. The war was in some sense, as people would call it, a good war if there is such a thing because simply we were all in, everybody was in it, there wasn't any, uh, attempt to make it a half-war like some of the others have been since. As a result everybody was involved, including the civilians, and very, morale was very high in spirit and camaraderie and whatever you call it, very high. And it was a real privilege and an honor to serve. And the uniform was highly respected and officers got special treatment and I was lucky in that sense. And, uh, it was an experience I'll never forget because number one, I was young and adventuresome, and life was before you and you had great dreams and expectations. And you were, everybody was friendly, and everybody was respectful of each other, and took time to be friendly, and it was, it was a great experience. INT: Did you have much contact with the people who lived on Guam, the natives? GK: A few, a few times we went to one of those religious ceremonies, I think, I forget where it was, but, the main one I guess was the guy that cut our hair [laughs], and, uh, I forget what we called ‘em. But anyway Guam and people in the islands, most of the islanders spoke English and they were more educated than the others because the Navy for years had been in there, and a lot of them had served as cooks and so forth for the Navy. So it was, it was more civilized than most of the other islands. The other islands, one place called Ulithi, which has not received a lot of publicity, but it was a, a natural base for the Navy operations and closer to the front. And so Halsey kept his fleet and then we'd move ‘em in, in and out, but use the same airplanes. And the Japs thought we had more, a bigger force than we did, because of that reason. The only strip, landing strip there was very, another reason I remember it, because it was very short, I don't remember the figures, but I remember we, we, we took off, we gave it all, all we had with the brakes, and then let loose, and hope we got, got there before we got to the end of the, the end of the little strip. INT: What were your quarters like? GK: Well, they were called Follies. The squadron there before had them. And some French had them. There was a, well it had a dark wood floor and sides up about waist high, and then a tent. And, when we took over we were told by the guys that went home that the plumbing, which was a sink, was going to cost us three hundred and fifty dollars, which we thought was ridiculous but we were glad to pay it. To have in-house plumbing. Of course, we had an out, that wasn't true of all our needs, we had an out-house which was, which we called ______. INT: How many people did . . .? GK: ….. We had the officers'____, I mean the officers' mess, which _____, liquor was rationed, we got about a fifth a month as I remember. And it's interesting that the Seabees were contractors, so they got wind of this ration coming in before we did. They were down trying to buy it from us less than fifty dollars a bottle. And they wouldn't sell it for much less. They'd sell us, wanted to sell us Japanese cigars, some of the officers, but you could probably make Jeep springs with it [laughter]. But we had powdered eggs and the food was pretty good but the Navy, of course, I wasn't in the ground Marines and I don't want to take away from them. They're a little different breed of cats. INT: How did people entertain themselves when you were . . . GK: Well, time was the biggest _____ and ____ parts of it was ______ [inaudible portion] especially when you didn't have anything to do. I read a lot, when I could get my hands on ‘em. And, uh, had movies every night, some of them they'd seen two or three times. But, it seemed like . . . INT: How many people were there? GK: . . . some of them played cards all night [?], gambling. In my squadron? INT: Um-hmm. GK: I guess a couple of hundred. INT: And how did you stay in touch with your family? GK: Just with writing. I wrote my wife practically every night, and my father every month, every couple of weeks. And we had V-mail and we, it was supposed to be censored, and so we were in there and they, we were, one of our jobs we detested, we had to censor the enlisted men's mail. And, and it was kind of pitiful to hear some of their tales [?]. And, uh, they would get, they would thank ‘em for sending some letters and things with perfume in ‘em. INT: What were your instructions on censoring the mail? GK: Well, just scratch out anything that might give information, maybe where we were, where the mail's coming from. We were there _____, I didn't read half of ‘em. By the time I got there, I thought it was pretty ridiculous. I suppose had I been in the front lines it would have been important to talk about it, to write about it, but where I was, I didn't think it was that important. We did have, another experience was a monsoon hurricane typhoon. We happened to be in Iwo Jima. This was when I was going from Guam. I didn't fly from Guam to Japan. We went up there after the war was over. We had no idea, no one did, how we were going to be treated. And MacArthur did a good job of arranging for us to go there peacefully because of our mission with the atomic bomb later. But I went from Guam to Japan on a liberty ship, some of us went up with some of the equipment instead of flying. And this liberty ship was in the little harbor there in Iwo Jima, and a typhoon came up, and of course you don't want any ships near land when a typhoon could blow you into the shore. So, we, uh, but two ships there took to sea, and I've never since in weather experienced the waves that we went, and all the dishes and everything . . . we went, some of the old time seamen, veteran Marines, on this ship, said they'd never had anything like it. And then they get off two or three ships with a lot of mail aboard which got a lot of bad publicity. Speaking of that, those who think that we should never have dropped the atomic bomb, I, for one, am glad we did. The Japanese were not about to give up as people say, just look at the, look at the kamikazes at Okinawa at the end. And they were blind when it came to loyalty and they would have fought and it would have cost the Americans, some estimates are above a hundred thousand people, soldiers, to take those islands. And I'm glad we used it, and I, we were prepared to help in the invasion of, I understand the plans were made, and my own personal view I'm glad we did it. It could have been an awful massacre if we had taken those islands. They were right there, [they] were not going to give any time soon as some people guessed. INT: Were you over there when they dropped the bomb? GK: Yes, we didn't know anymore about it than anybody else, except that it was a massive thing, and that something would come from it, something big. I remember Roosevelt's death was like that, of course, we knew that right away. He was, he was the president all my grown life, and it was, he was quite, well, he was worshipped by most Americans at the time. There were some who hated him, but he was very popular. INT: Were the folks in the military, were you concerned when he died? GK: Yes, we were. Well, I suppose it's hard to, to replace a commanding president, the only one you knew in my case. And, Harry Truman was unheard of except he had headed up the investigation into war profiteering and done a good job. But the contrast of his background and his manner and his speeches was quite a blow. But we soon learned and subsequently learned that he made a good president anyway. And I liked him from the beginning after, after the blow [?] came. INT: Did you get any leave while you were overseas? GK: No, I wasn't considered, and also I was not in combat. Had I been in combat I'm sure I probably would have. Although I think some of them did not. ______ The thing lasted longer than anybody expected, and there were a lot more casualties and deaths than people expected. There was a lot of casualties as any war has, and _____ how bad it is. And I don't mean to glamorize it or glorify it in any way. But it seems like to me since the beginning of time they've, they've had ‘em, and there are times when you have, you have to use force. INT: What do you think was the most dangerous thing that you were involved with? GK: That I was involved with? Not really, I was lucky again. I guess training was, we lost some guys in training. And, in my case, I was lucky. INT: How did you lose some in training? GK: Just accidents, flying accidents on the ____. It's _____ great duty there. The Navy had very fine facilities and the officers' club, drinks at the bar about fifty cents, and you flew half the day and played golf the other half. [laughter] It was good duty. INT: Do you remember the day that your service ended, overseas? GK: Overseas? INT: Um-hmm. GK: No, I wasn't overseas, we flew the planes, some of the planes back, and I wish I'd loaded up with some things. I did get two rifle, what do you call it, what did they give you? SON: M-1 carbines. GK: Carbines. I, I was afraid when I got back to the states and got home that the planes would be inspected for any contraband or whatever. But we, I saw, I saw a Quonset hut that was full of nothing but carbines, just thousands of ‘em. There were probably just laying around like the airplanes were. INT: When you returned to the states, what happened then? GK: Uh…. SON: You went to Japan first. GK: Well, yeah, uh, yeah……when it was over and they found out that they weren't going to shoot us, they sent our squadron up just in case and I was there a couple of weeks, and went ashore, it was a liberty ship, and went ashore as much as I could. It was very interesting, we knew very little about Japan and there was one book on ship that we all read. And it's a very mountainous country. And food was very scarce, flat land wouldn't grow anything. And they had no meat. And went to one of the big resorts there at the base of Mount Fujiyama. And, pretty country, but I still don't, I still don't trust them. INT: How were you treated by the Japanese when you were there? GK: Very nice, and bowing, and, that's what I say, you can't, but you couldn't, you couldn't trust ‘em. Since just in recent months the, some of the atrocities that they pulled on some of the pilots, there's a new book out, it's called Fly Boys and it goes into the, the ones that were captured, the men that were captured. President Bush, he was lucky, he was picked up by a submarine, but the rest of ‘em, were sent to one of those islands and beheaded and tortured. . . I have not read it all yet. INT: Did you leave the service when you returned to the states or were you still in the service? GK: Well, I got out, couldn't wait, I was not the type. It takes a certain type of man to be a career military, you know, your life is not your own and there's a big class distinction [or system?] which there has to be. And there's no room for discussion, like business where you have a voice if you have anything to say. It's a different world. At any rate, I got out. I think I was in the reserves for several years. And was afraid of being called up for Korea but I wasn't, fortunately. INT: What did you do after you left the service? GK: I went back to school and got my, was very fortunate, with the GI Bill. And they, they funded millions of us education. INT: Where did you go? GK: University of Florida. Did not graduate. I went to work instead. INT: What kind of work have you done in your life? GK: Mostly real estate, done a little bit of everything, appraising primarily. I was in the Appraisal Institute. And, uh, was with Adams Cates doing five years of leasing. Then I was with a public real estate company and managed some thousand apartments. And that was my management. Then I went with the bank for fifteen years, to SunTrust, Trust Company of Georgia, now SunTrust, head of the trust real estate division in the Trust Department. INT: How did you end up in Atlanta? GK: When I first got out I went to work for my father-in-law, who was in the real estate appraisal business. He appraised for tax purposes, and we got a big job in Atlanta, and I came up here and liked it, and wanted to stay. INT: . . . wife's name? GK: Mam? INT: Your wife's name? GK: Louise Hunnicutt [sp?] was my wife, first wife. INT: OK. GK: And then I have, she died of cancer a year, at age fifty . . . SON: Fifty-two. GK: Fifty-eight. SON: [unclear] GK: And I had one marriage that didn't work in between and now I'm happily married to a local girl. INT: Do you have any children other than George, Junior? GK: I have a daughter. She was, she was fifty-eight. SON: Courtney, Courtney was forty-eight. GK: Forty-eight. SON: And mother was fifty-two. GK: OK. SON: Courtney never even made it to . . . GK: She had cancer, too, and died. INT: Oh, I'm so sorry. GK: She never married. George, Junior, has two grown sons, doing real well. INT: When you were in the reserves, was that here in Atlanta? GK: In the military reserves? No, they did carry me in the reserves for a few years after World War II. And I was never called up, and the issue [?] was just dropped. I did not participate . . . some of the guys stayed in the reserves. And I was traveling at the time and I didn't want to spend weekends sitting in an airfield. INT: Have you maintained any friendships or connections with those you served with in the military? GK: There were a few that I thought we would be, as you do when you're, you're closely, . . . close. We thought we'd all see each other, but we haven't. I have heard from one of my roommates who stayed in the reserves, and he ended up a major, and we've corresponded a couple of times, but that was about it. Your interests change and your life changes after something like that, and I . . . I haven't seen, I don't guess any of ‘em. We like to talk about it, though, at the drop of a hat, we'll, we'll talk about it. Cause it makes us feel young again. [laughter] INT: Did you join any of the veterans' organizations? GK: Not really, no. INT: And, so you haven't attended any reunions, or . . . GK: No. INT: Anything else you'd like to add? GK: I think I've touched on . . . Thank you. SG: Mr. Kennedy, . . . just to return briefly, tell us a little bit about the planes that you actually flew, and how big the crews were, and that kind of information. You know, just some of the technical aspects of flying. GK: I'm not technically minded but I'll give you that from a pilot's standpoint. We, the first plane I flew was—am I on the camera still? SG: Yes, sir. GK: [laugh] First plane was a civilian pilot program at Georgia Military College, and that was a, what we called a Rotor Chief [?], it looked like a Taylor Craft [?], which everybody was familiar with. Uh, you'd take eight hours, then you soloed, and then you, we took a dove [?] hop from Milledgeville to Savannah and back, big deal. Mostly followed the railroad, or the highways. Then . . . SG: This was a single, just one person in this . . . GK: Two. SG: One was the instructor? GK: Yeah. Then basic training was ___'s famous all-Army ____ , baby, and the pilots trained in Stillmans. And bi-wing, acrobatics, and it was a great trainer, and everybody, all military flyers have great memories of the Stillmans. We called it, they were called the Yellow Peril, they were all painted yellow. That was to be easy recognized because we were students in ‘em. [laughter] . . . . [inaudible] GK: Flying by instruments, . . . that's another reason you always had a co-pilot . . . Then that was the second one. And I got . . . SON: You went up in one of those rec – a couple of years ago. GK: Yeah, my instrument training, the late trainer in Pensacola where I was a cadet, they put you there and you're supposed to fly from New York to Atlanta, Pensacola, New York or something. It was a trainer. Then they put the wind on you and change it and so forth. And, uh, I got out as chief who was the manipulator for the thing. ________ Another time I was taking some refresher on instruments before I went overseas I was in California for a couple of months. And when you fly the plane they'd put a cloth over your side so you can't see where you are, how to do any dead reckoning, which is looking at the ground, or horizon. And here, I was supposed to fly somewhere. Anyway, so then, _____ where we are, and I was an officer then, and he says, “We've been over Mexico for at least an hour and a half.” So, that's why I always wanted a co-pilot. Also, navigation's not easy for Navy pilots, most of ‘em, the single aircraft, do their own navigation. So that was ______ and then ____ PBI [PB-Patrol Bomber] because that was my, I sat in for half a day every day for a year, and it became part of me and I, it was, as it took off, they flew and landed, it was not much speed but it served a good purpose. And, we practiced landings, all afternoon or all morning. [unclear question] GK: Training, bomber, I don't know, anyway, first they did some bombing of submarines during the war, most of it was scouting. I went and sighted the Japs in Midway and also one of us British found the Bismarck. But, mostly observation, you could go out for half a day if you had enough gasoline. LL: Was there one plane that was yours? GK: No. LL: So you just rotated, whichever plane was available. GK: ____ and everyday ____ SG: With a different group… GK: We had a different crew. I suppose, overseas, well, we didn't, maybe they did with small squadrons and, and, we didn't. I think fighter pilots were, probably had the same crew when they came back, and looked after. Same thing with a carrier. But for ours I don't think so. LL: What do you remember of your commanders, the people that were over you when you were overseas? GK: Well, with one or two exceptions, they were quite vigorous, they'd weed out the weak. And you don't find many high ranking officers of any ______ you had to go through the program. There were some “90-day wonders” that we'd call them _____ fliers, had some flight training, ____ but very few. Most of them were high class and qualified. It's true in most businesses. You know, you don't find any presidents of corporations ______ SG: After the PBI you flew what? GK: Well, the DC-3, cargo. I flew a R5D with Curtis Commander. Those two were the transport planes. SG: How big was the crew? GK: Crew, three or four. _______, the radio man, and the two _____. You had a navigator. SG: Were the planes easy to fly? GK: Yes. Easy to fly, you say? SG: Yes, sir. I mean, _____ GK: Oh, yes. ________ some of the, somebody ___ you've got to go home, if you have so many children, or, we joked about how we made all these medics in the hospitals, made them into mechanics, so didn't have much faith in what they were doing, they weren't qualified. All the qualified ones went home LL: Did you do any flying once you returned to the states? GK: No, it was expensive, and it took time, and I was never that crazy about it, I mean I enjoyed it. It's not cheap. And ___ so much, you forget. And rather than take chances on the weather, it's serious, it's sort of a serious business to fly, like this young Kennedy. He had no business in a fairly unfamiliar airplane, fast, hot airplane, and no real time in it, and then he went into, took off in bad weather, and he didn't know anything about instruments. _____ because, you just, what do you call it? LL: Turned upside down? GK: Yeah, don't know where you are. SG: Disoriented? GK: What? SG: Disoriented? GK: No, there's another word for it. Well, anyway, you have to believe your instruments. And if you don't, you get in trouble. LL: It sounds like you got good training, though. GK: We did. I mean, all, I, the Navy gave you good training. I can't speak for the Army. I'm sure they did. That was one thing that the high ranked people sending people over to combat, they lost a lot of people, ground forces, and I don't know about flying then, but there wasn't much to it. But there were some training people in the battle, and I think it was, proved to be a wise move. LL: When you were overseas, other than letters from family, how did you learn about what was going on? GK: Well, mostly radio and the Yankee Magazine, the Army magazine was available, they had ____ and I've given y'all, by the way, Time Magazine and Newsweek, a reduced copy, a victory issue of Time Magazine. LL: How often were the magazines published? GK: That was scarce, everybody was scarce, I didn't see but half of one magazine the whole time I was over there. We _____ wished the war was over so we could go home, like all soldiers. LL: If you were going to summarize your war experiences in a few sentences, what would you say today? GK: My war experiences. For the most part, it was an exciting time, and people were interesting to know, and it was a good experience for me. I'm sure it matured, helped me through the wild age and got me down to earth. My experiences, I was fortunate not to have been a combat soldier and it was very pleasant for the most part, very exciting however. LL: Anything else you'd like to add? GK: No, I think we've covered it all. Wasn't much to it. It was my pleasure. LL: Well, we really appreciate your coming in and sharing, and your son being here with you. GK: Thank you. LL: Thanks so much, Mr. Kennedy. GK: Thank you.
External Identifiers:
Metadata URL:: http://album.atlantahistorycenter.com/cdm/ref/collection/VHPohr/id/233
Additional Rights Information:: This material is protected by copyright law. (Title 17, U.S. Code) Permission for use must be cleared through the Kenan Research Center at the Atlanta History Center. Licensing agreement may be required.
Extent:: 48:19
Original Collection:: Veterans History Project oral history recordings
Veterans History Project collection, MSS 1010, Kenan Research Center, Atlanta History Center
Holding Institution:: Atlanta History Center
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