Pat and I married and when our first baby was born I had to drop out after my second year to earn some money. My GI bill had started at $90 per month. Out of that I paid tuition and books and living expenses. Prices were lower then, but not that much lower. When we married it went up to $110 a month, same as I made in basic training in the Air Force. After a year of working I still hadn’t saved any money but we decided it was now or never and went back to school. With one child, my GI bill monthly check jumped to $135. I always had a job in Gainesville or on campus. No one could live on $135 a month. A new wrinkle, I enrolled in ROTC. I still wanted to fly although I was fast approaching old age for an Air Force beginning pilot. I learned more in ROTC classes than I thought possible and loved it. In my final year I went to 6-weeks summer camp at MacDill AFB in Tampa. What an experience. Went through high altitude flight simulator training, flew out over the Gulf of Mexico at night in a KC-97 tanker to refuel a B-47 Stratofortress, and got to ride backseat in a T-33 jet trainer.

View from a tanker refueling B-47

KC-97 tankers and B-47 bombers at MacDill, 1957

At MacDill, I got the bad news I would not be flying in the USAF. I failed my eye exam. I challenged the results and got an appointment with the Flight Surgeon for a second opinion. He gave me a thorough exam with the same results. I accepted a commission in the active reserve and that was the end of my hopes to fly for the AF.

My baby, but it was not to be.