Once They Were Eagles (25 page)

“I worked there for 15 years, learned the business thoroughly, and struck out on my own, starting small and gradually expanding. We did about $2 million gross last year.

“In the past couple of years, I've backed off and worked my son into the business.

“Looking back, I'd say that if I hadn't been part of the Black Sheep
Squadron, my life would have been only partially fulfilled. There was camaraderie other squadrons didn't have. Tears come to my eyes now when I hear the Black Sheep song. All the ditties—Fisher, Bragdon, Bolt, Sims, and all of us singing together—nothing like it. Like that song: ‘If you lose your airspeed now you'll come down from forty thou, and you'll wind up in a rowboat at Rabaul.' Paul Mullen's contribution.

“It really came back to me, Frank, at the reunion, how much you had done to help us put our squadron in the forefront—unbeknownst to us at the time because we were all playing with our airplanes. Pappy did a hell of a job; between you and Pappy and the rest, that's why people will remember the Black Sheep.

“If I should die tomorrow, I've lived a great life.”

William D. “Junior” Heier commenced his wartime service with the RCAF because he had only a high school education, and the U.S. required two years college for its airmen.

Junior retired from the U.S. Marine Corps 20 years later as a Lieutenant Colonel with a master's degree in accounting controllership. Eighteen months after that, he had his doctorate in management. Now he is a professor of management at Arizona State University in Tempe, a pleasant city of about 100,000.

Two and a half hours after I left Chicago's four-degree weather, he picked me up at the sunny Phoenix airport and drove me to his delightful home in a quiet residential area near the university. Oranges, grapefruit, and tangelos grew profusely in his back yard.

His office/den walls were covered with Black Sheep mementos. I asked why he'd joined up. “It was a matter of patriotism,” he said. “My dad and mother agreed we would eventually be in the war, and I was concerned about how the British were doing, all by themselves, so I thought I'd help them, since I already had my civilian pilot's license.

“After Pearl Harbor a bunch of us Americans asked to be transferred back. After Navy training, I was introduced to the Corsair on Espiritu Santo.

“I think everybody was nervous. You'd have to be stupid not to be afraid of the unknown, but we were eager to get at them, to test our skills. I was comfortable in that Corsair, never afraid of going into a fight because it was a tremendous airplane.

“When the squadron broke up, I went to Green Island; later, I came home but stayed in as a regular, got married, was transferred to helicopters, and went to Korea. I finished out the Korean War in jets. Back in the States I had a series of varied assignments: CO of a jet squadron; TAC Squadron Commander at Cherry Point. In 1959, I went to Washington and stayed until I retired in 1962.

“I started night school when I was in Quantico in 1949—averaging four nights a week, year after year, taking six units every semester—planning my career in accounting.

“Frankly, once you get your 20 years in and are eligible to retire, you're working for half pay, because you could get the other half even if you're not there. Besides, I was coming up a colonel, and under the rule at the time, if you made colonel, you had to stay another five years. I'd have been 47 by then. It's not easy to get a teaching job at a big school at that age, even with a Ph.D. So I got out and started my second career.

“Now, I'm debating about retiring here. I've been chairman and general manager of our credit union for over 16 years, and I was chairman of the Arizona State Credit Union Board for six years. I could take over and administer one of those organizations. I've been offered a sabbatical proposal to study the shift from government financing of pension plans back to the private sector. If I did that, it would mean a year in foreign countries studying what's been done there, but I'd have to stay at least another year at the university after I came back. I'd sort of considered retiring in 1983 at age 62.

‘Incidentally, you're responsible for one of my goals, Frank. Years ago, you told me you were saving $1,000 a month. That's what I chuck into deferred tax income.”

“Fine, but one of these days you've got to plan how to spend it so you don't end up leaving a million dollars.”

“For the kids? Forget it, Frank. Our ideal has been to spend the last nickel and drop dead.”

Tall, slender, energetic Jim Hill drove over from his home in Skokie to meet me at the hotel at Chicago's O'Hare Airport. Other than a slight graying at the temples, he didn't look a whole lot different from before.

“I'd originally intended to make a career of the Marine Corps. But then the war was over; I'd been overseas for a year, back in the States for six months, and back out again for another six. They were talking about adding another year to that if I became a regular. I figured that was too long to be away from my new bride.”

Released from active duty, Jim went to work selling fire and safety equipment for a distributor. He is now regional sales manager for a six-state area.

“I got into aviation because my best friend was a Marine pilot. He was killed at Guadalcanal about two months before I got out to the South Pacific. I had about ten hours in the Corsair before our first combat tour. We were all charged up—scared, but looking forward to it with a certain amount of excitement.

“I saw my first Zero in my rear view mirror, and he was shooting at me. I rolled over and dove out, just as I was told to do. Coming back from my first combat hop, my engine kept cutting out. When it got so bad that I was down to 1,500 feet, I decided to bail out. I got out of my harness and had one foot up on the canopy when the engine cut back in and I stepped back into the plane.

“One time, flying cover for B-24s over Rabaul, the P-38s never showed, leaving eight Corsairs for 25 bombers. It was like a movie: some B-24s going down, guys bailing out, us spotting the nearest Zero and attempting to head it off. One B-24, one or two motors out, hit the trees on his final approach coming home.

“The Black Sheep made all the difference in the world. We got along well. Maybe it was the excitement, or being there at the right time with plenty of action. We became very close in a very short time. But we lost a lot of fellows. Like Bob Alexander—we roomed together when we first got out there, and he impressed me. I mean, he could do more things with that Corsair than I've seen anybody do. I couldn't believe we'd lost him that day.

“After the Black Sheep, I went to Green Island, then home. I took a lot of pride in the Marine Corps. I look back on those four active years,
and really, with that background, any problems that I faced later in life, I thought, ‘Man, this is nothing compared to what it was like in World War II.' I can remember those years and the things that happened very vividly, whereas, gee, a ten-year span after that really wasn't very interesting.”

“Yes, after Guadalcanal and Munda and Bougainville and Rabaul—things get pretty dull, talking about changing the baby's diapers,” I said.

“I'll never forget those days.” Jim nodded as he spoke.

Henry Bourgeois met me at Newark Airport.

Hank could not only fly like an eagle; he had the eyes of an eagle. The rest of the squadron acknowledged that he could spot enemy planes many seconds before anyone else did. That capability undoubtedly saved a lot of lives, giving his flight that slight position advantage so vital in aerial combat.

His eagle eyes have dimmed now, but he is still alert and energetic, very much the business executive as Director of Business Planning for Kearfott Division of the Singer Corporation. “I'm also a farmer now,” he said. “We bought 90 acres in Maryland, including a 200-year-old house and 1,800 feet of waterfront. We've planted most of it in grapes and hope to have a vineyard by the time I retire, which will be before long.”

Hank was apparently born to do everything early: a flight at age seven; first plane crash at eleven; soloing at thirteen; youngest in the Navy V-5 program; and at 20 years and nine months, the youngest Marine officer ever commissioned.

“I sailed from San Diego on the
Lurline
with Pappy Boyington and six or seven other pilots as replacements. I went on up to Guadalcanal and then back to Santo, checked out in Corsairs, and went back to Guadalcanal for my second combat tour. I was more scared after it was over than before, but I got more confidence as time went on and became more cautious the more men we lost. I began to see there was more to it than adventure.