Classmate Update—The host and the hostess with the mostest!

Dean & Debbie Tuggle

My wife, Michele, and I just had a delightful visit with Dean Tuggle and his wife, Debbie, who operate a Bed and Breakfast on the banks of the Ohio River in Aurora, Indiana. Tuggles’ Folly, is a beautiful Victorian home that sits high on a hilltop overlooking the river.

Tuggles' Folly

Dean and Debbie have filled their B&B with treasured antiques and handcrafted furniture and fixtures. What a fascinating and comfortably warm accommodation it is—second only to the warm hospitality of our gregarious hosts. Dean is still the wonderful story-teller and outgoing friend-maker we all knew in preflight. Navy man Dean commands his own armada consisting of a 43 foot motor yacht and a swift (fastest on the Ohio, they say) power boat. Our first night was spent cruising up the Ohio to a lovely dockside restaurant for dinner.

As fast as an airplane---and just as expensive!

If ever in the Ohio River Valley, you must check out our classmate at TugglesFolly.com. Dean has been dealing with some health issues this past winter and is midway through his treatments. He looks great, feels great and has become our first official “sign up” for the preflight reunion this October.

Preflight Memories from Dean Tuggle

There are lots of memories from preflight, some are more worthwhile to remember than others. Here are a few of mine. It was either the second or third day; we were on a run, which was never my strong suit. I was rapidly falling behind and two guys came along side of me, each one grabbed an arm and said that I would finish that run. I had decided that I would flunk the physical and not put up with the horseshit. I was so impressed with the spirit of team work that I stayed with the program.

By being in the band, I got out of some of the drilling, which wasn't a bad deal. But when the band went to the Texas State Fair, in the admiral's plane, I might add, made for a great memory. The first weekend that we got free, I and two other guys went to Bob Stoddard's folks place over in Alabama and water skied. We're out skiing in this swamp, me on the skies, when the boat starts to slow down. I'm eating line like mad to stay up; and Bob points to what seemed like a thirty foot alligator! As soon as he saw that I noticed it he grinned and speeded up again.

Another that has stayed with me was when we got back from survival. I am sure everybody remembers that the bus was late and the mess hall was closed. We were beyond curfew. I told everybody to get cleaned up and head for the burger joint and I would take the heat. I truly wasn't looking forward to the next day and sure enough the call was made bright and early for me to get to the sergeant's office on the double. I was asked in no uncertain terms why our class was out so late. Standing there scared to death, I told the good sergeant the story. It was a great relief when he said "good decision" now "Get out of here!"

I am really looking forward to our get together this fall and sincerely hope that everybody can make it to Pensacola.

Dean

Prefilght Memory by Bob Stoddard

MOVE, HERD!

Sergeant Hoffman did not deign to address us as a platoon, or a company, or with any other accepted military term. We were a herd, in our varying civilian attire. College boys. Know-nothings. Bootcamp babies with no earthly value to man or beast. Bewildered, intimidated, secretly amused, we were herded down a street that in no way resembled the shady lanes of our hometowns or the storied campuses from which we had so recently departed.

In our disarray, we were silently awed by the sight of other formations underway on that hot July morning. Some were under the watchful eye of other sergeants, marginally less disdainful, markedly more martial. They seemed to be in step, and their uniforms were uniformly spotless. Other groups were being marched by members of their own kind! They strode along confidently, and in their casualness they displayed more competence than we believed we would ever achieve.

We were taking our first steps (literally) toward becoming what the Navy, through its Marine Corps drill sergeants, wished us to become. A single-minded, squared-away, gig-line centered, ramrod straight cadet. Ready in all respects for sea duty. Finely-honed to be trusted with the most complex and expensive machinery our mid-twentieth-century Navy could produce. Trained to fly against the military might of the Soviet Union, braving all "though moonlit cloud or sunlit sky"! That was what motivated us to endure this demeaning and exhausting trial, and to hide our underlying amusement at the simplistic world into which we had been thrown. Being yelled at and instructed in the most basic way by men whose educational level was on a par with the janitors who swept the halls of our universities was so bizarre as to be comical; but only in the privacy of our conversations, far from the listening ears of sergeants.

Not that we didn't jump when they barked! Humiliation, physical pain, and exhaustion are stimulants to produce a strong sense of attention to duty. The threat of being singled out, made an example of, "sweated down to a puddle of piss" were ample incentive for complying with whatever unlikely or outlandish command came forth from the distended mouth of Sergeant Hoffman.

Later, though, when we had endured his tongue-lashings and sweated his rightful puddle of piss on the grinder or the obstacle course; later, when we would be yelled at by guys with golden wings on their shirts who knew how to fly while we did not; later, our incentive would shift somewhat. The immediate shame of being the direct object of Sergeant Hoffman's insults would metamorphose into the deeper, longer lasting fear of failing to get a set of those wings for yourself. No dread of bounced landings or missed approaches or "bad headwork" downs, not to even mention the fear of dying in a fiery crash, could hold a candle to the ultimate fear of going back home to announce that you just couldn't hack the program. That would be the ultimate shame, the penultimate failure, not to be contemplated. No amount of pain or numbers of sleepless nights or hours of numbing class work were enough to make us consider such a fate.

When have we faced such a daunting challenge in our lives since those days?

Preflight Memories by Bob Stoddard

As far as I know, only there is only one member of Pre-flight class 28-62 whose name appears on the Viet Nam Veterans Wall in Washington, DC. That classmate is John Abrams, killed while flying for HAL-3 in the Mekong Delta. John was also a squadron mate of mine in HS-7 in Norfolk from 1964-1966. I met John for the first time after lights-out on our very first night in Pensacola, in that crowded bunk room where about sixty of us huddled in nervous anticipation of the next encounter with our drill sergeant.

My roommate from college, Ed Higginbotham, had entered the program several weeks ahead of me, and he advised me sternly NOT to show up at Pre-flight early on the first day. I arrived around five PM, and had enough time to get the full brief about the Quarterdeck (which I traversed without the proper acknowledgement), the position of attention (which I had already memorized, thanks to Ed), and when to assume that position (whenever Sgt. Hoffman entered the massive bunk room).

I was also made aware, at the top of Sgt. Hoffman's lungs, what was expected of me (of all of us) at reveille the next morning. To wit: be standing at attention beside your bunk, with a sheet in each hand and the pillowcase over your head. Seemed a bit extreme to me, but I was prepared to do whatever the Sergeant wanted, if it meant I escaped his undivided attention.

We had turned in at taps, after a pointed lecture on how to make up a bunk with hospital corners, with the top sheet turned down so that a dollar bill fit precisely across it. About an hour later (I was not asleep, and I doubt many of us were) in comes our last arrival, John Abrams. The bunk above me was one of the only ones left, and John struggled into it with many questions, which I and those around me tried desperately to hush up.

Of course John wanted to know what the straight skinny was; and although it seemed to me that I was risking some sort of hideous torture from the sergeant, I got him somewhat quieted down and then informed him of the next morning's drill. "When the lights go on tomorrow at 5 AM, be standing beside your bunk with one sheet in each hand and your pillowcase over your head"!

"You gotta be shitting me"!!

Naturally, John was skeptical. He had not yet experienced Sgt. Hoffman's cold stare or apoplectic screams. He would soon get more of them than any of us ever wanted, when we were being outfitted with uniforms and such a few days later. That's another story.

"Listen, Buddy", I said, "I don't care if you believe me or not; but when the Sergeant flips on those lights in the morning, you DO NOT want to be the only sad sack in this room without a sheet in each hand and a pillowcase over your head! Now hush the hell up and let's get at least a little sleep"!

I don't remember who else I met on that first day. It was a shocking day, even allowing for the good advice I got from Ed Higginbotham. Was it on that first day that we learned how to enter the sergeant's office? ... Step smartly to the brass plate in the middle of the double door. Right face. Position of attention. With right hand, slam the metal-trimmed entrance as hard as you possibly can, bruising your thumb painfully in the process. Sergeant doesn't look up. Slam again, even harder. Sergeant asks the private if he hears some kind of pitiful tapping. Slam until the walls shake.

"What the hell do you want, lowlife"?

"Sir! Cadet Stoddard to see the Drill Sergeant, Sir!"

"Stoddard, why is your OD jacket over your head"?

Sir! My OD jacet was unbuttoned during RLPI, Sir"!

"Unbuttoned? You worthless puke! Assume the position! Give me thirty pushups"!

Thirty quick pushups.

"Stoddard! Who is that outside my door"?

"That's my roommate, Cadet Stark, Sir"!

"Why is he here"?

"His OD jacket was unbuttoned as well, Sir"!

"Stark! Give me thirty pushups"!

"Stoddard"!

"Sir"!

"Are you going to let your roommate do his pushups all by himself"?

"No sir, sergeant"!

Thirty more....

Preflight Memories by Ron Wilson

Prior to the Navy, the closest this Kansas farm boy had ever been to an airplane was when I was plowing and a plane flew overhead at 30,000. Because the Army was threatening, my college roommate, John Chapman, and I found ourselves checking into Pensacola. Within minutes, I was saying, “What the hell did I get myself into?” Ever since I was 12-years-old, I had made my own decisions, now, after being told how to polish shoes and bounce a quarter off a sheet, I was trying to figure out how to get back to the farm. I ended up in class 28-62, only because I had failed a math test and was put into a special week-long school. During that week, we had math class all day long. We wore poopy suits, every day—for class, chow and marching. We were outcasts. When we went to church, we smelled so bad they put us up in the balcony away from the rest of the cadets. At the end of a week, I passed the math test and joined preflight class 28-62. What an experience!

Lessons Learned in Preflight by Mike Matyas

Meaning of Stupidity: Arriving at NAS Pensacola carrying a typewriter.

Don’t drop your guard: That first day walking onto the base, meeting a guy driving a military car with a gorgeous wife, who stopped and gave Lawson and I directions, and as he pulled away saying “I’ll be seeing you.” We later learned he was the base commander.

Suffering doubt and uncertainty: Laying in the rack that first night saying to myself “What the hell have you gotten yourself into now?”

Best bluff ever witnessed: Hearing John Abrams’ gridiron answer of “Admiral Agamemnon, Sir!!” to Sgt. Hoffman’s question “Who is NAVCOMALANTICFLEET dah dah dah?” (Agamemnon was a character in Greek mythology.)

Meaning of Sheer Guts: Believing that I was as good as the guys standing next to me, and betting that they can’t kick all of us out of the program (I hoped).

Accepting the Truth: Realizing that I had found something that I was truly mediocre at (at best).

S. Mike Matyas, Jr.

Preflight Memories...by Jim Stark

Prefight was a rude awaking for this cocky college kid. The day I walked into that indoctrination battalion, I honestly thought I had mistakenly entered a POW compound. Man, what a shock that was! And when Sgt Hoffman told us that getting a sunburn was a court martial offense, I believed him.

Therefore, this memory has stuck with me all these years. Several of us—and I can’t remember who else was involved—went to the beach on one of those rare free afternoons. We knew not to stay long because of the dreaded sunburn threat, but we all rolled around in the sand at the water’s edge, enjoying the cooling waters. Then someone noticed that we were all covered with black oil stains, spilled by the Gulf tankers.

We all hurried back to the barracks and jumped into the shower. Soap didn’t remove the oil, so we used lighter fluid and stiff brushes. Our skin was raw, probably worse than getting a sunburn, but I don’t think there were any repercussions from our day at the beach. Now, who was with me? Was it you Bob Stoddard, Gordy Meyer, and Mike Sanjenis…or others? I’d like to hear from you.