CHAPTER NINE

The Gospel According to Aunt Lucy

Rear Adm. F. Brooks Upham, Commandant of the Naval Air Station, Pensacola, reached across his flat-topped desk for my formal orders. Behind him through the window, the sun glinted on the leaves of ancient live oaks, and filtered through shreds of gently swaying Spanish moss. The rattle of aircraft engines disturbed the still morning, a signal that flying was being resumed after the September hurricane that had seriously damaged this ancient Civil War navy yard. The admiral welcomed me with a friendly smile.

“I’ve had a note about you from Moffett,” he volunteered. “So,” he added, “it’s the old story of old dogs and new tricks. Having now reached the ripe old age of thirty-nine,” he went on, “you’re dead but won’t lie down. If you ask me, it’s a lot of bunk.”

“The Regulations,” I reminded him, “set twenty-eight as the maximum age limit for flight training.” The admiral reached for the top drawer of his antique desk. A warm breeze floated in from across the Gulf of Mexico. Beyond the signal tower, across the blue harbor, the white sands of Santa Rosa Island gleamed in the sunlight. Still farther out glittered the quiet waters of the Gulf.

The commandant handed me a sheet of paper. I recognized it at once as a few lines of doggerel I had written one wintry December night while the old seaplane tender and kite-balloon ship _Wright_ had lain in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. We had been working all day on a miserably cold job of ballasting the _Old Hooker_ and had turned the duty over to the aviators as a part of their instruction. Then suddenly someone of them had discovered that none of them had qualified as yet for their 50 per cent increase for “flight pay” and that unless they corrected this fault immediately they would lose the allowance. They had all laid down their tools, both the lighter-than-air and the heavier-than-air pilots, and had rushed over to the Naval Air Station at Lakehurst to ride up and down ten times in a kite-balloon attached to a winch in a warm hangar, leaving the ballasting to the mercies of the ship’s company, the so-called “thicker-than-mud.” Now I read the verses.

The lighter-than-air are jolly boys, Who float on wings of gas, Like helium or hydrogen And some hot air, alas! They float about in kite-balloons A blimp or even a zep. And draw their extra fifty per cent, With promptitude and pep.

The heavier-than-air boys zoom about, And make a lot of fuss, In F-5-L’s and NC boats And other kinds of bus. It takes a sort of superman To learn the air’s queer feel— And draw that extra fifty per cent, With such consuming zeal.

And then there is another crew, A silly sort of dud, It does the heavy dirty work, The poor old thicker-than-mud. If one of these guys rams a rock, Or on a reef gets wrecked, He never gets his pay increased; Most likely he’ll be checked.

And so we sail the briny deep, Two live ones and a dud, The lighter-than-air, the heavier-than-air— And the poor old thicker-than-mud.

I glanced up to find a smile on the commandant’s lips.

“I found it in the desk here,” he said, “after I had taken over from Christy.”

We had visited the _Wright_ in the summer of 1922 after ferrying some F-5-L’s down from Philadelphia and someone must have lifted the masterpiece from the bulletin board.

“I had hardly expected to find the author of that among the candidates for flight training,” Brooks Upham went on, “but since you are here I’ll do my best for you. My aide, young Jimmy Lowry, will take you out for a flight check and if he rates you ‘promising material,’ I’ll see that planes are put at your disposal at any time you may want them. No need for you to fool around with the regular schedule for ground school; you know all that. It’s simply a question of nervous and physical endurance whether you can complete the entire course in the two months.” He reached for a push button.

“By the way,” he added, “my lady asked me to invite you to dine with us this evening—seven o’clock—service uniform.”

Within a half hour, Jimmy Lowry and I were down at Squadron Six Beach warming up an N-9 seaplane. The Consolidated NY’s had gone into service for land-plane training but the N-9’s still survived for work on floats. Jimmy, after a few words of instruction, motioned me into the rear seat and took his instructor’s position in front. Then signaling to the “boots” to cast us off, he opened the throttle and taxied out into the stream where he cut the gun and let the little plane idle up into the wind.

He gave her the gun and as the engine took hold we skittered smoothly over the surface and into the air to sail out over the landlocked bay. Below us, the old town of Pensacola nestled among live oaks and Spanish moss now devastated by the hurricane. While I had taken the controls now and then, flying as a passenger, I had never presumed to land or take off and had had no other instruction than the few orders Jimmy Lowry had given me back there at the Beach. Now he shook the controls as a signal for me to take over and, as I did so, held both hands aloft to signal that I had charge.

Jimmy Lowry now put me through all the “checks” in accordance with what I learned later was a well-established routine. He sent me flying over the land at an altitude of about fifty feet and, after we had proceeded too far to permit turning back for a water landing in case of engine failure, he cut the gun and watched my reaction. The only thing I could see to do was to land straight ahead into the palmetto swamp, and this, I learned later, was considered to be good “reaction in emergency.” Jimmy opened the throttle again before we tangled with the palm fronds, and then waved me back to Squadron Six Beach. He said nothing as we walked up the ramp and, at the entrance to Bachelor Officer Quarters, simply saluted and walked off toward the commandant’s office. Still in the dark as to my future, I hunted up my room in “BOQ” and found my baggage already in it. A colored maid was making up the bed.

She had a wrinkled, light-chocolate old face, framed by kinky white hair held in a tight knot at the back of her neck. Though she was said to have been born into slavery, her erect, almost haughty carriage seemed to deny the story. She turned to bow to me in a curtsy that was dignified and respectful.

“Mawnin’, sah!” she said. Her soft voice had the resonance of a singer of Negro spirituals. “Ah’s Aunt Lucy,” she added. “I takes keer o’ dis room for de gempmens what has it. Ah unpacks yo satchel, too, if you likes.”

“I’m not sure I’ll stay, Aunt Lucy,” I replied. “We won’t unpack until I hear from Lieutenant Lowry.” Aunt Lucy bowed her head as she moved off to dust the window sills. She had that air of quiet dignity, that sense of being wholly at peace with the world, that had characterized the old-time darkies I had known as a midshipman back at little Annapolis. A leader among her people, a deaconess in the church, no doubt, Aunt Lucy seemed a woman distinguished by deep religious faith. I had unbelted my sword after leaving the commandant’s office and, after my check flight, had carried it to BOQ in my hand. Now as I laid it on the table Aunt Lucy glanced at it and began humming an old spiritual:

“I’se goin’ to lay down my sword and shield. Down by de riverside, Down by de riverside, Down by de riverside. I’se goin’ to lay down my sword and shield, Down by de riverside I ain’t goin’ to study war no mo’.”

As she drifted out of the door the telephone rang. It was the commandant. As I reached for the receiver, I could feel a flush creeping up the back of my neck and knew for the first time just how much I wanted a favorable report. Well, I’d soon know, now.

“Lowry has passed your check,” Brooks Upham was saying. “He considers you ‘good pilot material.’ See you for dinner!” I hung up and called down the corridor to old Aunt Lucy.

“I guess you can unpack the satchel,” I said.

The Uphams were distinctly Old Navy, part of a small coterie of distinguished senior officers and their wives who had served the Navy through the lean years, on duty that had either taken them to distant foreign stations together or forced long separations. They were men and women who had stood for all that was best in loyalty to their country, their service, and to one another, and who supported the fine traditions of the earlier days. Poor in worldly goods, yet they were rich in experience, having traveled widely and lived close to the people of foreign lands. Money had meant little to them; they had found ample compensation in their knowledge of a public service faithfully performed. Evenings at the commandant’s quarters were to prove important events in my training as a naval aviator; and old Aunt Lucy was to leave her mark, too.

For flying was still a hazardous business back in the middle twenties, and tragedy cast its shadow all too often over the little station at Pensacola. Perhaps it was this that focused people’s thoughts on things far removed from “pounds per horsepower.” After dinner that evening, the commandant and his lady sat with me around the fire that provided the only warmth against the evening chill, and discussed books they had just finished reading.

The commandant had been deep in a treatise on nuclear theory as discussed in a book called _The New Knowledge_. It had been written in a popular and entertaining vein by a scientific author whose name I don’t now recall and, besides setting forth clearly the new idea as to the structure of the atom and a theory of electronics, it had developed an absorbing spiritual theme. The author, recognizing the resemblance between the laws controlling the actions of electrons within the atom and those that controlled the astronomy of the universe, had emphasized his own conviction that no conflict existed between religion and science. On the contrary, the more a scientific mind studied the revelations concerning the physical world, the stronger became his convictions as to the existence of an infinite God.

The commandant’s lady fingered a book she had just finished but seemed to hesitate about opening a discussion of it.

“If you are like the rest of the students,” she smiled, “you’ll have your nose buried so deeply in that precious _Flight Manual_, that you’ll have no time for anything else.”

The commandant was rather proud of that _Flight Manual_. It was the book of instruction for the flight-training course that had been evolved out of long experience with many students. It had been compiled by one of his instructors, Lt. Barrett Studley, who was also writing a book on the subject. Every detail was so well covered in it that it had become a veritable “student’s bible.” No matter how often he read it and reread it or practiced the maneuvers described in it, every new reading revealed something there he had not previously absorbed. Even the instructors boned the manual—and found new inspiration in doing so.

As Mrs. Upham talked, the commandant stirred the fire until it burned brightly, shining on his wife’s serene features.

“My book,” she said, “bears on the same theme as the one developed by _The New Knowledge_ but approaches it from a wholly different point of view.”

She went on to point out that its author, whose name I have forgotten along with the title of the book, had been a successful minister—at least one might judge him so by usual standards. He had managed a large New York congregation, kept the church in repair, and collected substantial sums of money for worthy causes. But after his retirement he had reached the conclusion that his ministry had been a complete failure. Lacking faith in religion, because he had not been able to reconcile the Christian Gospel with his reasoned analysis of it, he had failed in his spiritual leadership.

Deep concern over this had caused him to restudy the Gospels and especially the history of their composition; and he had concluded that in the interim between the death of the Apostles and the compilation of the Gospels, numerous additions might have been made and certain beliefs carried over from earlier faiths might have been interlarded into the basic concept of the Christian idea. He had therefore set about to delete from the Gospels, as recorded, all the inconsistencies with the Gospel as he thought it must have been preached, and had emerged with a kernel so dazzling and completely credible to the rational mind that he had become convinced that it must have been divinely inspired.

For no one man nor group of men could possibly have conceived a faith so wholly consistent and so inspiring as had Jesus Christ himself. The very idea of individual dignity had brought men conviction that they were not meant to be slaves but responsible children of God. With that conviction, human liberty was born. And human liberty was not just a pleasant material situation but the world’s most vital, dynamic, and constructive spiritual force. To cast off the rule of tyrants men must only be governed by God.

As the commandant’s lady finished her review, she handed her book over to me.

“Since we’ve been on duty down here,” she said simply, “we’ve come to sense the semireligious fervor with which the lads approach their flying. The hazards seem but to lift up their spirits, for while physically the airplane is mechanical, yet the art of flying has the flavor of high destiny.” She paused and glanced quickly at her husband as if for support.

“We haven’t succeeded in crystallizing the idea,” said the admiral, “but even as professional military people we keep groping for the philosophical import of this new device. The thing is potentially so destructive that unless we find some way, through the spirit, to adapt it to constructive uses, it will surely destroy us.”

For a while we three sat silent before the fire. Brooks Upham had expressed the unease that lies heavy on the hearts of military men; they dislike the business of destruction.

When, next morning, I arrived at Squadron Six Beach, my instructor was waiting for me with orders to disregard the routine and feed the subject to me just as fast as I could take it. I had, however, been assigned to Class Twenty-six—youngsters, for the most part, two to three years out of Annapolis. Included in the class, however, were a handful of seniors like “Baldy” Pownall, “Woody” Thomas, Harry Bogusch, and Freddie Kauffman. For Admiral Moffett, having felt the need of a little seasoning in the aeronautic organization, had accepted applications from a selected group of more experienced line officers. Among them were former submarine officers who, thinking that duty a little too hazardous to health, had transferred to the comparative safety of flying.

And thus began a most delightful experience. For the first time in many moons, my responsibilities were reduced to the lowest possible terms. All I now had to do was to maneuver a nice little airplane, one that seemed to sense my intentions and even anticipate them, and to execute turns, glides, and landings smoothly and competently and—to my surprise—without dunking me in the drink. The pullings and haulings of BUAERO, the plot and counterplot of politics, now faded into the limbo. And in their places came the thrill of facing hazards—and overcoming them. Raised as I had been in an era when men had not asked extra compensation for extra hazard in the line of duty, I held a secret hunch that a man should be glad to pay something extra for the privilege of enjoying such a happy and uncomplicated routine. Naturally I did not voice this mutiny to my instructors.

With my solo safely behind me, I moved ahead with renewed confidence and from that day forward averaged nearly five hours solo almost every working day, passing one check after the other and moving steadily along on schedule. Meanwhile an unexpected influence had entered into my training, insinuating itself in a delicate sort of way; it was old Aunt Lucy.

It had started one sunny morning when, standing in front of the mirror to tie my black four-in-hand tie, I had, in sheer exuberance, burst out singing “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot.” Aunt Lucy, who seemed to be forever dusting the furniture when I was in the room, and who was always fingering my dress sword, as if fascinated by it, now interrupted my music.

“Oh, no sah!” she protested. “Not dataway! Not dataway!”

And then with one foot tapping and her gay turbaned old head bobbing to the rhythm, Aunt Lucy proceeded to swing that old chariot so low it got dizzy. The song ended, she cackled and waddled off down the corridor, but in response to my vociferous applause she was soon back again, dustcloth in hand, flicking specks off the battered furniture of the bare room.

From that moment, Lucy took my Bible instruction in hand and carried it out through a series of Negro spirituals, with a technique that would have impressed Lt. Barrett Studley, the author of the _Flight Manual_. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in the fiery furnace vied with Joshua, as he fit de Battle uv Jericho, to bring me up to date on “de ole time religion.” Then one Sunday morning old Aunt Lucy invited me to witness a baptizin’ in a nearby bayou where a white-robed, black-faced preacherman, knee deep on a convenient sand bar, ducked his shouting converts. Next morning I noticed her flitting around my sword, where it stood in the corner, and heard her humming the second verse of the first song she had sung to me.

“I’se goin’ to try on my long white robe, Down by the riverside; down by the riverside; down by the riverside. I’se goin’ to try on my long white robe, Down by de riverside— I ain’t a goin’ t’ study wah no moh!”

Of an original class of some thirty students, only about twenty survived the rigorous course. The others either lacked the natural coordination essential to instinctive flying or failed on that other important requirement “correct reaction in emergency.” The first could be acquired by early athletic instruction, but the second seemed to be innate in some, wholly lacking in others. It was the unpleasant duty of the check instructor to detect the lack of that attribute before it could produce fatal results. But to men who had natural aptitude in the basic requirements, flying had an extraordinary appeal. There was all the intense satisfaction to be experienced through skill in any art, such as the smooth stroking of a tennis ball, the rhythmic swing of a golf club, or the exquisitely precise casting of a feathered salmon fly—all these were experienced by the student pilot, but with the added thrill that a mistake invited disaster.

During the month of November I graduated from the seaplane beach and moved over into landplanes. My classmates, following the more leisurely normal course, remained behind. In landplanes, we used the new Consolidate NY’s and, while they had few of the pleasant flying qualities of the little N-9’s, they didn’t kill students in crack-ups.

Finally came November 30, 1926, and with it my final check. “Dixie” Ketcham, my check instructor, put me through the paces and then waved me back toward Old Corry Field. I was sitting there calmly enjoying the scenery below, but with one eye, as always, roving about in search of a place to land in case of engine failure, when the engine stopped. Below me lay a tiny cow pasture, the spot in which, no doubt, I was supposed to land. But it was so tiny I felt certain that Dixie would open the throttle again after I had demonstrated the required approach technique. And so I settled down to the “normal approach”: a left turn to get downwind, a glide over the tops of the jack pine, a slip to lose altitude, a sunfish to kill extra speed, stick-back to break the glide—but the throttle didn’t open and we went on in a nice landing.

As we reached the end of the run, just short of the edge of the field—we had no brakes then, nor did we use flaps—Dixie waved a hand as the signal to go home.

“If you can get into a pasture like that,” he said, “you can get in anywhere!”

Back at my quarters in BOQ I walked on air. Aunt Lucy with her everlasting dustcloth fiddled around the gilt sword knot of the class of 1871 prize sword. And as she dusted it, she hummed the final verse of the spiritual she had sung so often for me.

“I’se goin’ to lay down my burden— Down by the riverside, down by the riverside, down by the riverside. I’se goin’ to lay down my burden, Down by the riverside. I ain’t a goin’ to study wah no moh!”

Tossing my helmet and goggles onto the bed and reaching for my suitcase, I began packing my duffel for the return trip to Washington. Aunt Lucy was folding my best blue blouse with its shiny three stripes and, best of all, my new gold wings pinned on its breast. Under her breath she kept humming.

“I ain’t a goin’ to study wah no mo!” I stopped to look at her.

“Aunt Lucy,” I demanded, “is it by accident or design that you keep singing that song at me?” Aunt Lucy chuckled.

“Well, sah,” she replied in her deep contralto, “ah thought maybe now you done learned to fly like de angels, you might like to think a little about peace.”

“Why,” I retorted, “that’s just what a navy is for—to keep peace.”

“Yassah, yassah,” Aunt Lucy persisted, fingering the gold pin on my best blouse, “but it jes’ seem to Aunt Lucy dat, now de Lord done gib yo’ wings, maybe yo’ might find better use for dem dan jes fightin’.”

* * * * *

The telephone jingled. Western Union had a wire for me. My wife was thrilled by the news of my gold wings; she had left for Washington to reopen the apartment.