by Phil Rowe
In the Summer and early Fall of l952 I was in Basic Training at Parks AFB, California (not far from Oakland) as a new recruit. This indoctrination into the Air Force followed my enlistment in Los Angeles and an overnight bus ride along with a number of other new Air Force personnel.
We arrived at Parks AFB in the early morning, around four, and were greeted by several Sergeants, a Captain and a Major. On the bus with us was a large box containing our initial personnel files (then called '201 files'). In those files was information on each of us, our backgrounds, education and the scores from the various aptitude tests given in the processing center in Los Angeles.
The Major thumbed through the files to find out if any of this new bunch of recruits had any previous military experience or training. A few of the fellows had had prior service. One was a corporal in the Army and I had recently completed two years of ROTC at a military school in Virginia.
The Major called out my name and told me to step out in front of the group of fifty or so fellow recruits. He had noted my ROTC training and decided that I knew enough about marching and troop maneuvers to be of some use.
So, he announced to the entire group that because Parks AFB was short of instructors, Airman Rowe would be temporarily in charge of the busload of trainees. I was surprised, of course, but the former corporal was very angry. He thought that he had more experience, former service and ought to out-rank me. But the Major was insistent.
Basic training lasted thirteen weeks. And that was be a very long time under the intense program laid out for us. We had classes on military organization, procedures, customs, regulations and the various career fields which we might enter. And, of course, we had the constant rigors of physical training, marching, cleanups and inspections, rifle range practice, more aptitude testing and the like.
We were organized into training flights (like large squads in the Army) and assigned to barracks. Each flight would train as a unit. Our flight shared a barracks with another, upervised by a real instructor, a Staff Sergeant. I was told that I should take my lead from him and supervise my own flight through the training program.
Most of my fellow recruits did not object to having me act as their leader, for at least I seemed to know something about marching troops and the general ways of military behavior. But, the former corporal and several of his newly-developed friends were determined to give me trouble at every turn.
One of the few methods I had available to control those reluctant folks was to assign them extra duty when they were especially problematical. A most precious commodity to the dog-weary recruits, after each day's rigorous training, was sleep. To deny them that important relief was usually an effective disciplinary tool. It was common practice among the 'real' instructors to assign difficult recruits to all-night guard duty. That would deny the recruit of his precious sleep, really make him weary and less inclined to be a trouble-maker.
What, you ask, could possibly need guarding on a basic training base? There were no airplanes, no sensitive equipment or military secrets there. What would you have them guard? Well, the things that these people were to guard were brooms and mops. For on the back porch of each barracks were the carefully lined up arrays of brooms and mops issued to each flight for use in cleaning their barracks. Without the brooms and mops recruits could not clean their barracks. And dirty barracks would fail inspections, resulting in the loss of what few privileges recruits had. So protecting those mops from others, who might literally steal them, was important. And 'bad boys' got assigned to be Mop Guards. It was a pretty effective method of control.
I had occasion to assign several fellows at various times to Mop Guard duty. They didn't like it one bit, and more than one swore to 'get me' for it. But, I had the backing of the other instructors and the officers in charge of our training, so like it or not some got stuck with that extra duty.
When we completed Basic Training, it was fairly routine that we each got promoted from Airman Basic to Airman Third Class and got to wear our first stripes on the uniform sleeves. We also got a modest pay raise up to the magnificent sum of $72.00 a month. A few fellows, who had been especially difficult or failed to pass some of the academic courses, were not promoted upon completion of basic training.
In the last few weeks of training, most of us learned what our next assignments would be. Some would go to the several Air Force technical schools to become radio technicians, cooks, engine mechanics, clerks or other specialists. I discovered that they planned to keep me there to become a Drill Instructor (DI) to train recruits. That didn't appeal to me one bit. I was even called before the Major and told that if I would accept the assignment as DI I would be immediately promoted to Staff Sergeant. Yet despite how appealing the promotion appeared, I did not want to spend the next several years training recruits.
So, I went back to the testing and screening center, where administrative and clerical people processed recruits for assignment to technical schools. And quite by chance, I met a Sergeant whom I had known a couple of years earlier at college. We talked about my pending assignment as an instructor and what, if any, other options I might have. Well, since no written orders had been issued yet on the DI assignment, it was possible for my Sergeant-friend to help. He added my name to a roster of graduating recruits headed for Keesler AFB, Mississippi to undergo Control Tower Operator training. I was delighted. My friend was surprised that I would turn down a guaranteed promotion of three grades, but he agreed to help.
After graduation ceremonies the Major called me to his office to discuss my change of assignment from DI to technical school. He was not pleased, but said that he would not stand in my way. And then he told me that though I might not make Staff Sergeant right away by going to school, he asked if I would accept being a "half-sergeant" for a while.
"What's a half-sergeant?", I mused. Well, he handed me an armband to wear on one sleeve. Upon it were three stripes which made the wearer a half-sergeant. P I was to be in charge of a group of a dozen fellow graduates traveling to Keesler AFB for the Control Tower Training School. We would travel by train and it would be my job to supervise them, take care of their records, handle their tickets and see to it that they all made it from California to Mississippi by the specified date. I was now an acting, temporary Half Sergeant. How about that? Oh, by the way, there would be no extra pay with the promotion, and upon arrival at Keesler AFB I would be demoted back to Airman Third Class.
We were bussed from Parks AFB to the train station in nearby Oakland. There we were to start our journey to Mississippi. I was given a wrapped box containing all of the personnel folders for my fellow travelers, an envelope containing railroad tickets, meal tickets and some vouchers to be used to cover other expenses. And, I was given a long printed list of instructions describing what I was to do at each leg of the journey.
From Oakland to Bakersfield, California we were assigned to a separate railroad car (coach) attached to an Army troop train bringing recently returned Korean veterans from Camp Stoneman to their next assignment. These were combat experienced troops with whom we had nothing in common. We were 'green' airmen, fresh out of basic training. And here were these hundreds of rowdy, older and tougher Army troops. It could have been the formula for disaster.
Fortunately, for us, the Army troops kept pretty much to themselves and didn't really bother us. We were the butt of some snide remarks, some minor jokes and typical rivalry between the services. But, for the most part we were treated with proper disdain stemming from the age and experience differences. Only on rare occasion did I have to intervene when some of my boys felt that they had to defend the Air Force against the taunting remarks of the Army. And my interventions were only with my own people.
Only two times during the trip did I think that I might lose some of my 'charges'. The first time was in Belen, New Mexico, a sleepy railway town where we were left on a remote siding, without warning by the railroad workers. It was a very hot day in September when we awoke there to find our railroad car sitting, unattached some two miles from downtown Belen. We not only hadn't been told that we would be left there, we had no idea how long we would be stuck (without power or any services) at that remote siding. We looked all around and saw no one whom we could ask.
By mid-morning, with no breakfast, we decided to walk towards town and a little railway building on the way to inquire. We certainly didn't look very respectable as representatives of the Air Force. Our uniforms were wrinkled from being slept in, we were unable to clean up because the water was gone, and most of all we were hungry. So we straggled across the railroad tracks and down to the building for some answers. We were told by railroad workers that we would be in Belen until 6:00 p.m. and another train would take us on to New Orleans. We would have to fend for ourselves until then.
We continued toward town, some of us trying to straighten ourselves up a bit and appear presentable, while looking for a restaurant. We were fortunate to find one that would accept the Government meal vouchers and feed us. But, we still had half of a day to kill while waiting for the train to come for us. The railroad official had told me that we had better be on the train by 5:30 p.m. or we might get left. Well, I was sure that I would lose some of my group, but somehow I didn't.
The second, and perhaps most likely, chance for me to lose some of my group was in New Orleans. We arrived around 10:30 p.m. on second the day from Belen. But, we not only had to change trains there, we had to change stations. We had to go across town to catch the L&N Railway to Biloxi, Mississippi. And that meant getting three taxicabs loaded with us and all of our gear. If it had not been for the fact that I was the one with the vouchers, and the taxi drivers not wanting to lose me to be sure they got paid, I probably would have lost several of my group to a night on the town in New Orleans. But the convoy of three taxicabs all made it to the other station and all were present to board the next train. By then it was after midnight.
The remainder of the trip, some seventy miles, to Biloxi and nearby Keesler AFB was pretty uneventful. One other interesting thing I remember was hearing reports along the way that our train was literally burning the bridges behind us as we crossed the swamps and bayou's along the Gulf Coast. It seems our coal-burning engine was dropping hot cinders upon the wooden bridge trestles and they were catching fire behind us.
At last, my term as a 'Half Sergeant' was over.