Scott, Ralph Gordon, MSgt

PLEASE DESCRIBE WHO OR WHAT INFLUENCED YOUR DECISION TO JOIN THE AIR FORCE.
I thought soldiers were big strong men. I was six feet tall but only weighed about 125 pounds. Friends teased me and said I had to stand in the same place twice to make a shadow. I didn't think the Army would accept me!
At Fort Dix, New Jersey it was apparent that many others were no better physical specimens than I. A recruiting officer told us that if we enlisted for a three year hitch we could choose the branch of the Army and with a few limitations we could pick the place we wanted to go. The officer pointed out that we had to do the first year in any case and it would be the hardest. If we enlisted in the Regular Army for three years we would not have to worry about ten years of more training. Several of us decided to enlist. It was July, 1941. There was fighting going on in Europe but those countries had been at odds with each other for centuries. There was a three thousand mile ocean between them and us. There was no way we were going to be involved! I must say that many Americans felt that way.
I opted for the Army Air Corps and said I'd like to go to Maine. My first choice had been the Signal Corps in Alaska because that was where my brother was at the time. But General Bruckner in Alaska didn't want recruits in his forces.
A week later I was in Savannah, Georgia trying to learn how to march in step with others. The temperature was close to 100 degrees and the sweat poured off us all day. We had blue denim work uniforms. No one had told me to wash mine first. At the end of that first day of marching in the hot sun I was blue from neck to my shoes!
I cursed that officer who had lied to me about sending me to Maine!
But I was soon given orders to go to Langley Field, Virginia and there I was told I was now in the 43rd Heavy Bombardment Group, headed for Bangor, Maine. My faith in the Army was restored!

WHETHER YOU WERE IN THE SERVICE FOR SEVERAL YEARS OR AS A CAREER, PLEASE DESCRIBE THE DIRECTION OR PATH YOU TOOK. WHERE DID YOU GO TO BASIC TRAINING AND WHAT UNITS, BASES, OR SQUADRONS WERE YOU ASSIGNED TO? WHAT WAS YOUR REASON FOR LEAVING?
My name was on the bulletin board with a notice that a few of us were going to Scott Field Radio School (in Illinois) on Monday. Others were going to army schools at Maxwell Field, Alabama and Chanute Field, in Illinois for gunnery instruction and as aviation mechanics. The peace time radio course was six months long and graduates would be both mechanics and radio operators, using Morse code. Later the course was shortened and graduates became either operators or radio mechanics.
We ended up in a little place in South Carolina called Congaree named for a small river nearby. There was a small airstrip (which I never saw), and lots of pine and pecan trees. We lived in cabins that had been built for the CCC in pre-war days. The Civil Conservation Corps had been a "make-work" program in the "depression" years. There was a railroad siding for loading cotton bales into box cars. We were on the "Fort Jackson highway" about 16 miles out of Columbia.
Our C.O. sent for me. He wanted to know if I could operate a telephone switchboard. I had done it at the News-Journal Company when I was an office boy so I just said "Yes, sir"!
He gave me his jeep and told me to take some men with me. He said there was a telephone switchboard somewhere on the Base. I should relieve the man who was there and take over the board. I selected Tubby and Al and added a young private named Archie Wasden. He was a Mormon, from Utah, and was in the radio section.
Only a few phones had been connected to the switchboard since we were the first unit to arrive. I was soon able to teach my little bunch how to operate the board. We provided telephone service to places off the base, especially to Columbia, the nearest city.
It was a 24 hours duty assignment. I asked the supply sergeant for a cot. The others brought food for me. The C.O. arranged for us to have a jeep to get back and forth and we were in business. As soon as the other three could handle the board alone I set up a rotation schedule of eight hours on duty and 24 off. The C.O. issued us special passes that allowed us to go to town when we were not on duty. There was a Message Center next door to the telephone building. I helped them one day with a problem involving teletype machines. (My civilian experiences frequently paid off while I was in the Army).
A civilian telephone lineman, Danny Mann, was installing phones for each unit and connecting them all to our board. He and I were immediate friends. He took me to town in his telephone truck, dropped me off on a corner to wait for him. (He was not supposed to have riders on his truck).

Not long after, we were taken to a huge American air base called Base Air Depot #2. It was August 1943. For many soldiers, this was to be home for the next two years.
When America entered World War II we only had one model of four engine bombers, the B-17 built by Boeing. General H.H. "Hap" Arnold thought we should have another.. The Consolidated B-24 was selected. The Ford Company told him they could build four engine bombers faster than anyone else thought it could be done. They would build them on assembly lines as they had built automobiles. However, the Ford Company told him, "We can't do it if we have to stop the line every time you want to make a modification".
"Hap" Arnold said "?You build them and I'll have any necessary modifications done over seas".
To that end, he established three "Base Air Depots", two in Lancashire England and one in Northern Ireland.
Our new home was a huge Air Depot where every kind of modification or repair could be done.

FROM YOUR ENTIRE MILITARY SERVICE, DESCRIBE ANY MEMORIES YOU STILL REFLECT BACK ON TO THIS DAY.
The Crash at Freckleton

On August 23, 1944 we had two B-24 aircraft in the air on test flights. The Control Tower received a phone call from Brigadier General "Ike" Ott's office at BAD 1. Ott was the general in command over the three depots. The caller announced that a bad storm was going to hit us and we should recall any aircraft that were flying.
The Post Commander and Col. Jackson, Chief of Maintenance were both off the Base. Col. Britton (who was not a pilot) was serving as temporary Commanding Officer.
The Warton control tower, code named "Farum", contacted the two B-24 pilots. They answered "Roger, Farum" and started landing procedures. Both pilots flew out over the Irish Sea and turned to line up with our longest runway. As they came in over the coast, the storm caught up to them. Lt. Pete Manassero lost sight of the bomber in front of him that was flown by Lt. Johnny Bloemendal. Pete called Johnny on his radio and suggested they had better get out of the storm and head north toward Scotland. Johnny agreed. As both pilots turned left, Pete edged farther out to the right to be sure he would not catch up to the unseen aircraft he knew was ahead of him. I should explain that since there were only about ten test pilots on the field, with thousands of bombers to be tested, sergeants always flew as co-pilots and aerial engineers on test flights.
They had lowered the landing gear in preparation for setting down, and now Pete had his co-pilot, Sgt. Pew, retract theirs. The aircraft bounced and shuddered in the winds which were like that of a Florida tropical storm. There had never been a storm that bad in England before. Visibility was zero in any direction except straight down. Pete motioned to the sergeant that the altimeter showed 500 feet. But Pew looked out his bubble window and saw trees just below them! Johnny came on the radio and shouted "My instruments are going crazy! My compasses are spinning! I can't tell if I'm right side up or inverted!" Pete hauled back on the control yoke with all his strength. Pew had his feet against the instrument panel and was adding his muscle to help make the B-24 get off the trees. But the big aircraft just could not climb. Pete said later that he flew nearly ten miles on the tree tops before he regained control of his aircraft.
Witnesses on the ground saw lightning strike Bloemendal's plane and pieces of it come off. The B-24, loaded with 2700 gallons of high octane aviation gasoline crashed into the nursery class room of Holy Trinity Church School in Freckleton. Part of the plane went across Lytham Road and set fire to a snack bar. Almost everyone inside the cafe died. Blazing gasoline was flowing down Lytham Road. Soldiers pulled five children from the burning school. Two of them died in our Base Hospital The other three, Ruby Mae Whittle, George Carey and David Madden, were severely burned and spent two years in hospitals having skin grafts and treatments for their burns. Older students ran out into the rain from their class rooms and were taken into homes by villagers. Ten year old Harry Latham was in so much hurry he forgot his coat. He worried all the way home that his foster parents would be angry. Clothes were hard to get because one needed clothing ration coupons. He had been orphaned early in the War and was now living with two sisters, who adopted him. Ruby Mae and George were Freckleton children. David's father was a sergeant in the RAF and was stationed at Squires Gate, a nearby village. Their home was near London and David's dad had moved his mother and him to Freckleton so he wouldn't have to make along trips to London to see them�?�and Freckleton was a lot safer than London in those days!
We lost 38 five year old children in the accident.
Two families wanted their children interred elsewhere. We buried the other 36 little five year old tots and their two teachers together in the cemetery of Holy Trinity Church.
It would have been understandable had the villagers blamed the Americans for what had happened. But, as some of them said "If that man Hitler had not started a war, there wouldn't have been any American planes there!"
On the day of the funeral, American airmen carried little caskets to the grave site. Two men carried each casket on their shoulders except for Warrant Officer Painter Alexander. He was several inches taller than six feet and he carried one by himself. The Commanding Officer suggested that he should offer any help that might be needed to the family of the little girl he carried that day. The child's father had been on duty in Europe with the British Army and had been killed almost at the same time the little girl died. The local constable received word of the soldier's death and it was decided not to tell the little girl's Mother right away that her husband had also died. W.O. Alexander went to the girl's family and offered to be of whatever assistance he could be. Her Dad
suggested that he take the girl's Mother away from the village for a few days.
The couple fell in love and was married. After the War they lived in the United States and Cicily Jane Alexander became a member of the BAD2 Association. .
The three children, Ruby, George and David were to spend most of the next two years in hospitals having burn treatments and skin grafts.
When George returned to school in first grade he was two years older than his new classmates. They teased him so much that he quit school and never learned to read nor write. Ruby Mae later married Brian Currell and for a time they lived on the Isle of Wight. (Virginia and I visited them there). Afterward they moved back to Ruby's village, Freckleton.
David Madden couldn't run and play games with other boys due to the burn damage on his legs. He became a civil engineer, and worked for a time in Sri Lanka. He now is married and lives in Swinden, west of London.
All three children were made honorary members of BAD 2 Association when we found them some sixty years after the War.
During all of the BAD 2 Reunions we have held in England, we have always visited the grave site and the Village of Freckleton.
On the grounds of the 8th Air Force Heritage Museum in Georgia we have a special memorial in honor of the little ones who died in the crash. There is a marble slab with all the names engraved on it and bronze plaques tell the story to those who come to visit.
Ruby and her husband Brian have been there as well. Cicily Jane Alexander's son, Dr. Jim Alexander once visited the Georgia memorial to attend a special service there.

CAN YOU RECOUNT A PARTICULAR INCIDENT FROM YOUR SERVICE, WHICH MAY OR MAY NOT HAVE BEEN FUNNY AT THE TIME, BUT STILL MAKES YOU LAUGH?
I was assigned to BAD2 at Warton. As a radio man, I was put into the Communications squadron and lived on Site 10. We were billeted in Nissan huts, usually 12 men to a hut. We had a sheet metal stove in the middle of the hut for heat. The Nissan huts had curved sides that became the roof, with a door and windows at each end.
Two Signal Corps officers, Captain Patton and Lt .Baird, were in charge of the radio section operations.
I had not been given any special duty. A sergeant named John McClure was replacing British communications equipment in an A-20 light bomber. (It had originally been lent to the RAF, who had returned it to us when they no longer needed ii). Sgt. McClure was working alone on what should have been a two man job. The plane was outdoors which made for a cold, uncomfortable job. I offered to lend him a hand and he gratefully explained he was about to install a radio compass unit. The plug was too big to go through the firewall and Johnny didn't want to make the hole bigger. I crawled into the plane with an extension cord, string light and soldering iron and began connecting the 14 wires to the proper pins of the plug while Johnny worked on something else in the plane. It was slow, tedious work. When I finished, Johnny pulled me back out of the plane and helped me up. Some kind soul came along ad handed me a cup of coffee and a scone. About that time Lt. Baird showed up and demanded to know why I wasn't doing anything. I told him I'd been helping Sgt McClure but the lieutenant announced he was taking me to Capt. Patton.
In the captain's office Baird told the C.O. he'd "caught"? me malingering.
Patton asked me what I'd been doing and I told him that I'd been helping Sgt. McClure.
"Since when do Tech/Sergeants help three stripe sergeants?" Baird wanted to know.
I said I thought we were all in the same Army!
At that point the captain told me to go back to what I'd been doing and I left his office.
This was my first experience with Signal Corps officers who all seemed to be more interested in protocol than in getting a job done.
Most of the modifications we were ordered to do involved the Inter-Com systems on four engine bombers. The intercom systems on the first few planes that were so modified didn't function after the "mods" were done. Captain Patton was about to send word to 8th Air Force Service Command that the modifications couldn't be done.
Tech/Sergeant Broyles (an Air Corps soldier) and I took a wiring diagram out of a bomber, laid it out on a table and went over the instructions for doing the modifications. We could see that there needed to be another wire added to the inter-com cable that ran from the nose to the tail of a plane.
I suggested to the captain that if he would assign a plane to us, we could wire it and the inter-com would work. He couldn't believe that we (as mere Air Corps men) could do something that his Signal Corps men had been unable to do. We pointed out to him that he didn'thave anything to lose and everything to gain if he let us try.
When Broyles and I were finished, ours was the only plane with a working inter-com system.
We re-wrote the "tech order" for the modification. After that, when someone put a wire in the wrong place or dropped a bit of solder where it didn't belong, Tech/Sergeant Broyles or I was sent to diagnose and fix the problem.
Every plane that was worked on had to be test flown before it was sent to a combat unit. There weren't enough officers who could qualify as test pilots, so the co-pilot was always a sergeant. I went along on test flights when I didn't have other duties. I flew with Lt. Jack Knight and Lt. Johnny Bloemendal usually. Both of them were exceptionally good pilots.
On one occasion we taxied out to the long runway but the fog was so thick that the pilots couldn't see more than a few feet. A Jeep was sent down the runway to make certain it was clear. The driver radioed the Control Tower and the Tower gave Jack Knight clearance to take off. He roared down the runway and gently lifted the B-17 into the air. In a few minutes we were above the fog, in bright sunshine. I checked the radios, and the "trailing wire" antenna. Another sergeant had to check out the ball turret. He showed me how to manually raise it up again so he could get out of it, in the event something was wrong with it. After awhile it was time to land again. Lt. Knight had the co-pilot lower the landing gear and extend the flaps. I looked out the window by my head and couldn't see anything but fog! Then I felt the gear hit the runway and the pilot applied brakes. We followed the Jeep again to a parking spot. When we were out of the B-17 I asked the pilot how he could find the runway. I knew he couldn't see any more than I could.
Lt. Knight reminded me that in the nearby city of Blackpool there was a tower that stuck up nearly 600 feet in the air. On a clear day he had flown past it, and checking his watch, flew out over the Irish Sea for a few seconds, made a pair of timed 90 degree turns, and he said "If I did it all right I'd be lined up with the runway!"
On another time, there was a shortage of spark plugs at BAD 2. Jack Knight took a B-17 to BAD 3 at Langford Lodge. I went along with a couple other sergeants. We loaded boxes of spark plugs into the bomber and went "home". It was the only time I ever set foot on Irish soil.
The RAF had installed a new system of landing lights for use at night to aid pilots returning from a night mission. Our Base Commander, Col. Moore wanted to see what the RAF had done. He had previously been in an 8th Air Force Bomb Group and had an interest in the new idea. Earlier Lt. Knight had asked me to go along and monitor his radio while we would be in flight. That night I stood behind him in the B-24 with a head set plugged into the "jack box" near his shoulder. I was listening on his command radio frequency when I heard a high frequency squeal in the radio. I nudged his shoulder and told him to listen. He recognized the sound as a warning that we were approaching barrage balloons! He immediately started a hard right turn, muttering to himself about how hard the Liberator bomber was to turn around. ( B-17 aircraft had power assisted controls but in a B-24 a pilot had to use brute strength to make quick turns).
In early 1944 we went to two shifts. No one told us that we were gearing up for the invasion of Europe but we were getting a lot more than the usual numbers of planes to work on. I opted for night shift. I knew Sergeant Broyles was engaged to a local girl and I also knew that the Signal Corps officers would take the day shift. I didn't want to be around either of them any more than necessary.
One night, as the Invasion was in the offing, we finished all the work we had to do before it was time to climb aboard trucks for the ride back to the Mess Hall. A few of us went to the boiler room where it was much more comfortable. Another sergeant started to sing an old pre-war song and of course I chimed in. Then it became a sort of game. "Do you remember this one"? The next night one of the men who had been in the boiler room said: "Sarge, you and that other guy sang last night for a couple hours, and you never once sang a song I ever heard before!"

WHAT PROFESSION DID YOU FOLLOW AFTER YOUR MILITARY SERVICE AND WHAT ARE YOU DOING NOW? IF YOU ARE CURRENTLY SERVING, WHAT IS YOUR PRESENT OCCUPATIONAL SPECIALTY?
I returned to Wilmington, Delaware, to the News Journal Company where I had worked before going into the service. They were glad to have me back, and was assigned to be my dad's assistant, and to become an electrician.

44 years later I retired from the News Journal Company, as their Plant Engineer.

WHAT MILITARY ASSOCIATIONS ARE YOU A MEMBER OF, IF ANY? WHAT SPECIFIC BENEFITS DO YOU DERIVE FROM YOUR MEMBERSHIPS?
I was a 62 year member of the American Legion (life member)
a life member of the V.F.W.
8th Air Force Historical Association, in Savannah, GA.
I was a Senior Member of the "Friends of the Air Force Museum"

IN WHAT WAYS HAS SERVING IN THE MILITARY INFLUENCED THE WAY YOU HAVE APPROACHED YOUR LIFE AND YOUR CAREER? WHAT DO YOU MISS MOST ABOUT YOUR TIME IN THE SERVICE?
(Written posthumously by Ralph Scott's daughter):

Dad's prevailing attitude throughout life was, "it can be done". He never turned away from something just because no one had done it before, or he didn't know how. He always stated that his years in the service were the most important ones of his lifetime. He believed every man should have had a military experience.