McGowan, Samuel, Jr., TSgt

PLEASE DESCRIBE WHO OR WHAT INFLUENCED YOUR DECISION TO JOIN THE AIR FORCE.

Fourth Grade, Lavinia School 1955 - 1956.

My father was in the Air Corps during WWII and my uncle was an Air Force pilot. I had an interest in the Air Force from an early age.

Another factor was watching B-47s and B-52s fly low over our house when SAC placed a radar bomb scoring train in the nearby Milan Army Ammunition about 10 miles west of our house in West Tennessee when I was in the eighth grade. They started coming over at about 9;00 PM and continued until about 10:00 AM at 10-15 minute intervals.

Years later I would drop bombs in Vietnam using the same radar.

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?
I was nominated for the Academy but lost the competition so I decided to enlist. After Basic, I went to Amarillo for Jet Mechanic training, then to Pope where I worked on the flight line on the post dock crew.

In early 1964 a call went out for men to

Naha Flightline

cross-train to the Loadmaster field. There were so many applicants at Pope the applications never left the base. Later that year I was on KP with my buddy Paul Thompson when he got a call from someone in personnel asking if he still wanted to cross-train.

I called the same guy to see if I was on the list and he said I was. We were working pots and pans and had an hour or so to kill. We ran across the street to our barracks and changed into 505s and headed for personnel to sign the paperwork. We finished our 2-week stint on KP and was only on the flight line for one day before we processed out of OMS and into our new squadron.

I was reassigned to the 779th Troop Carrier Squadron and went to a special FTD course on base. After FTD, we went through the Crew Training Section on base and were qualified as combat-ready C-130 aircrew members. Right after I started flying, one of our crews crashed in France and everyone on board was killed. It was a sobering experience but they were just the first of many I knew who died. After a year as a combat-ready TAC-Trained Killer, I got orders to Naha AB, Okinawa where I got into all kinds of things - dropping leaflets over North Vietnam and off of N. Korea, dropping flares over Laos and North Vietnam, and flying missions I never flew as well as "routine" airlift missions in S. Vietnam and Thailand.

I reenlisted and went to C-141s in MAC at Robins but they didn't let me stay there long. It was back to the C-130s in PACAF and back into the war. When I left Clark in the summer of 1970 I went to Charleston to C-5s.

I got tired of the post-Vietnam BS that was taking over the Air Force. It was no longer a combat organization dedicated to the defense of the nation but had become an instrument for social change. I had married a WAF and she worked for a time in social actions. She got out first, then when my third enlistment was up, I said sayonara.

IF YOU PARTICIPATED IN ANY MILITARY OPERATIONS, INCLUDING COMBAT, HUMANITARIAN AND PEACEKEEPING OPERATIONS, PLEASE DESCRIBE THOSE WHICH MADE A LASTING IMPACT ON YOU AND, IF LIFE-CHANGING, IN WHAT WAY?
After starting out in Aircraft Maintenance, I cross-trained to the Aircraft Loadmaster field and went on flying status as a combat-ready C-130 Loadmaster in Tactical Air Command. My first taste of combat was flying men and equipment into the Dominican Republic during POWER PACK. After four missions, my crew

Shoot Down Photo at Clark

went to Okinawa then later to Mactan. We flew into forward airfields in South Vietnam in 1965 while TDY to Mactan island. We went into Dong Ha with a load of comm. people who were going in to set up a GCI site (WATERBOY). We were hit by small arms while landing or taking off, I don't know which. I found the hole after we landed at Mactan.

In early 1966 I went PCS to Naha AB, Okinawa to the 35th Troop Carrier Squadron. A few weeks after I got there, I went TDY to Ubon, Thailand for the C-130 FAC/flare mission. We flew missions over North Vietnam and got shot at every time. We also flew over Laos and got shot at less. Our crew was once caught in a flak trap and got out when the pilot did a Split-S. Our crew saw the fires set by Dieter Dengler. The pilot notified Intel but they took no action - they couldn't believe they might have been set by an American. Dengler wrote about finding a parachute from one of our flares and what it meant to him. He used it to signal an A-1E pilot a few weeks later and was rescued.

I spent the rest of my Naha tour flying combat airlift in South Vietnam and logistical missions in Thailand.

My most memorable mission was going into Dong Ha at night in the middle of an attack on the base to pick up wounded. One died on the way back to Da Nang. When we got to Cam Ranh, I had to wash the blood and gore out of the cargo compartment. No one would come back there, it was so bloody. The crew chief stuck his head inside and then turned around and started puking on the ramp. The fireman handed me the hose and left.

I reenlisted then left Naha and went to Robins AFB, Georgia, and into C-141s. We flew in and out of Vietnam but it wasn't the same as going into forward fields and getting shot at. We'd spend no more than an hour on the ground, but still drew combat pay and got the income tax exemption. I thought I had left the war behind but then, lucky me, I got a call one afternoon from my section chief that orders had come in and that I was going back to C-130s, this time at Clark. I had only been back in the States for a year when the orders came down. I was back in combat. We lost four C-130s right after I got there, then things settled down as President Nixon ordered MACV to minimize casualties. I was assigned to COMMANDO VAULT dropping ten and fifteen-thousand-pound bombs. On my first drop, we got a BDA of 100 KIA.

All in all, I flew over 1,200 combat sorties. I was shot at a lot and killed a lot of communists with my left hand. I saw a man die and observed a young loadmaster grieving over his friend, who had been killed earlier that day.

I got a lot of medals, including a DFC, and was told I was being put in for one, a Bronze Star, I didn't get. Yes, it made an impression on me. No, I don't suffer from PTSD but I saw a lot of stuff that could have given it to me. Still, it was fun. After all, combat is what the military is all about. In the '70s there were signs on Air Force bases that said - "Our mission is to fly and fight - and don't YOU forget it!' I flew and I fought and I haven't forgotten it.

DID YOU ENCOUNTER A SITUATION DURING YOUR MILITARY SERVICE WHEN YOU BELIEVED THERE WAS A POSSIBILITY YOU MIGHT NOT SURVIVE? PLEASE DESCRIBE WHAT HAPPENED AND WHAT WAS THE OUTCOME.
Let me start this by saying that things happen very quickly in the air, much more so than on the ground.

There was one particular incident when we came close but it happened so fast I didn't have time to think about it. We were over North Vietnam looking for

Boom!

targets when we got too close to a Fire Can and a battery of Triple-A. All of a sudden, we were getting our asses hosed off. The pilot, the late Bob Bartunek, threw the airplane into what can only be described as a Split-S and got us out of it. I was sitting on the cargo door holding four flares in the chute with my feet when it happened. I felt us going over but Bob kept positive Gs on the airplane and I stayed on the door and the flames stayed in the chute.

Our navigator (the novelist, Dick Herman) marked the position and we called in fighters with CBUs. I was off the door and on the long cord and was able to look out the window. I saw the tracers coming up at the fighter then saw the winking lights as hundreds of tiny bomblets covered the gun site and the firing stopped. It was a good feeling to watch those SOBs who had tried to kill us die.

There was another incident, or perhaps a non-incident, a couple of years later when I was at Clark. My crew went into Bien Hoa to pick up a load of cargo for Katum, a real hot spot on the Cambodian border where several airplanes had been shot up and shot down. I wondered if this was my day, and what would happen if I died. Then I remembered that I had trusted Christ as my savior at age nine in the Baptist church I attended growing up. I've never worried about dying since.

OF ALL YOUR DUTY STATIONS OR ASSIGNMENTS, WHICH ONE DO YOU HAVE FONDEST MEMORIES OF AND WHY? WHICH WAS YOUR LEAST FAVORITE?

Dong Ha

They were all okay. My favorite squadron was the 29th Tactical Airlift Squadron at Clark, perhaps because I was crewed with the legendary Major Howie Seaboldt and we were the best crew in the wing.

My favorite station was Charleston AFB, South Carolina although I wasn't that fond of my assignment as a C-5 loadmaster. After a second combat tour, MAC flying was kinda tame.

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

Bomb on target!

Oh, I don't know. The night of the air evac to Dong Ha is one I'll never forget, but there were others, such as the day we were getting ready to go into Katum, where several airplanes had been shot down, and I wondered if I would see the end of the day.

There was another time when our crew was told to take another mission at the end of a long day and the AC refused because we were tired. Another inexperienced, crew was ordered to make the mission and they were shot down and killed.

For years, I blanked out the memory that we were supposed to go in there and couldn't remember the face of the loadmaster who died. I don't know if we would have been shot down if we had taken the mission or not. Who knows?

WHAT PROFESSIONAL ACHIEVEMENTS ARE YOU MOST PROUD OF FROM YOUR MILITARY CAREER?

Me and the Bomb

I got a Distinguished Flying Cross and the Air Medal with 12 oak leaf clusters (or maybe 11.) As we said in those days, I could have taken them to the BX and got a cup of coffee for a dime. At least they gave me WAPS points when the Air Force came out with the Weighted Airman Promotion System program. I was promoted to Tech the first time I was eligible.

The one thing I am most proud of was the compliment an Air Transport Officer, a Major Cuomo, with experience dating back to Burma, paid me at the end of an operation. He said my crew played the major part. He told me he was putting me in for a Bronze Star. If he did, I never got it.

OF ALL THE MEDALS, AWARDS, FORMAL PRESENTATIONS AND QUALIFICATION BADGES YOU RECEIVED, OR OTHER MEMORABILIA, WHICH ONE IS THE MOST MEANINGFUL TO YOU AND WHY?

DFC

I got a DFC but the circumstances weren't really that distinguished. I flew other missions for which it would have been appropriate but wasn't recommended for them.

WHICH INDIVIDUAL(S) FROM YOUR TIME IN THE MILITARY STAND OUT AS HAVING THE MOST POSITIVE IMPACT ON YOU AND WHY?

Howie Seaboldt

Howie Seaboldt, my AC at Clark, made the most impression on me. A former enlisted man, Howie went to cadets and flew F-84s, B-47s, and B-52s in SAC before he went to C-130s at Clark and found his calling. He gave me advice on how to deal with air traffic control, command centers, etc. I have never forgotten. He said to never ask permission but to tell them what you're going to do. If they don't like it, they'll tell you but 90% of the time they'll go along with what you tell them.

LIST THE NAMES OF OLD FRIENDS YOU SERVED WITH, AT WHICH LOCATIONS, AND RECOUNT WHAT YOU REMEMBER MOST ABOUT THEM. INDICATE THOSE YOU ARE ALREADY IN TOUCH WITH AND THOSE YOU WOULD LIKE TO MAKE CONTACT WITH.

On the Beach at Mactan

Many of my friends are dead and more seem to be dying almost every month. I'm in touch with some. Some of us are members of the Troop Carrier/Tactical Airlift Association. I was in contact with Tom Stalvey, who was my trailer mate in the 29th TAS at Clark for a few months, and Stoney Burke, with whom I have an association going back to 1965 when he rode on my airplane to his duty station at Evreux, France. (Sadly, Stoney died as a result of injuries suffered in a motorcycle accident in early December 2017. Tom died a few weeks ago from medical issues related to herbicide exposure.)

I also talk to Dalton Horne, my roommate in an off-base apartment at Charleston when we were in the 3rd MAS. Warren Saha, who was also in the 3rd MAS, lives near me here in Texas and we get together occasionally for lunch.

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?

C-141 awaiting patients at Da Nang, 1967

There were several but I can't think of a particular one. Oh yes, I can!

When I was at Robins, one of our crews went off the end of the runway at Munich. The crew got out of the airplane and were standing around the nose when a young Army MP drove up in a jeep. He had asked someone how to investigate the incident and was told: "just like a vehicle accident." He got out of his jeep and came over and asked "Who is the pilot? The pilot identified himself and he said "Sir, may I see your pilot's license?" (For you ground grippers, there is no such thing as a military pilot's license.) The Loadmaster, a TSgt from Alabama named John Dale, said: "What the fuck are you gonna do boy, give him a ticket for parking on the grass?"

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?
After obtaining my private pilot's license, I enrolled in advanced flying training using my GI bill benefits. By the time I up for my third reenlistment, I had my commercial pilot's licenses with instrument and multi-engine ratings and my flight instructor certificate. I was unhappy with the way the military

C-130A at Pima Air Museum

was changing after we withdrew from Vietnam so I decided not to reenlist even though I had 12 years in service.

I went into aviation, first as a flight instructor and charter pilot then was hired as a corporate pilot by a major corporation (Ashland Oil.) I flew corporate from 1984 to 2000 then flew as contract pilot until 2010 when I was placed on medication for nerve pain caused by Type II diabetes that the FAA does not approve.

Since I quit flying, I have spent my time writing. I've authored several books, some of which are Air Force related. They can be seen at www.sammcgowan.com/books.html or on Amazon. I had intended to finish out my 20 years in the Reserves or guard but when I went for my physical, I learned I was just over the enlistment weight. I never joined either the Reserves or Guard.

I am currently rated 80% disabled and unemployable by the VA due to Type II diabetes and complications caused by exposure to Agent Orange.

WHAT MILITARY ASSOCIATIONS ARE YOU A MEMBER OF, IF ANY? WHAT SPECIFIC BENEFITS DO YOU DERIVE FROM YOUR MEMBERSHIPS?

TC/TAA Cap

I am a founder and previous secretary of the Troop Carrier/Tactical Airlift Association. At present, it is the only veteran's organization of which I am a member. The TCTAA placed a memorial to tactical airlift at the USAF Museum in October 2018.

I joined the Disabled American Veterans because I am disabled.

The TC/TAA allows me to make and stay in contact with fellow tactical airlift veterans. Our website is www.troopcarrier.org.

I was also a member of the Professional Loadmasters Association, Alamo Chapter. (The PLA is not a veteran organization, it's a professional organization.) However, I am no longer a member because their aims do not fit my personal goals and life.

I recently rejoined the Air Force Association. (Several of my articles have been published in AIR FORCE so I figured I should).

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?

Recife, Brazil 1965

I literally grew up in the cargo compartment of a C-130.

BASED ON YOUR OWN EXPERIENCES, WHAT ADVICE WOULD YOU GIVE TO THOSE WHO HAVE RECENTLY JOINED THE AIR FORCE?
Make the best of it and continue your education so you'll be able to return to civilian life and become productive.

IN WHAT WAYS HAS TOGETHERWESERVED.COM HELPED YOU REMEMBER YOUR MILITARY SERVICE AND THE FRIENDS YOU SERVED WITH.

TWS and the US Air Force

I have made contact with people I knew when I was in service.

KC 4.5.21