Old Haunts Revisited, 2

Biloxi (not) Blues

Neil Simon had it wrong!

Well, for us, it was partially wrong.

We have many happy memories of our days living in Biloxi. 

 We added our wonderful son, Ryan, to our family.

Roger had some high adventure, at times, teaching the South Vietnamese how to fly, 
when most of them, when they arrived for training, had only ridden a bicycle!

We formed special friendships with other military families and members of our little ward.

But, we were amazed at the changes in 40 years. 

 With the ravages of Hurricane Katrina, the drive along the coast to Biloxi from Gulfport and over to Ocean Springs, where we lived for a couple of months before we could get into base housing, is hauntingly different.

Now there are open, grassy lots where grand homes and hotels once stood.

 Keesler Air Force Base, while having a vaguely familiar, overall impression, is very different. 
Wherry Housing (where we lived before we could get into the nicer Capehart Housing) is no more.
(Yes, we moved three times in the two and a half years in Biloxi!)

Capehart Housing is no more.

The Air Training Command no longer teaches at Keesler.

Now C-130s fly out of there.

Our LDS Church which we helped build (Roger helped roof it and I helped stain the pulpit and the wood interiors) is sold to a different church.

But the not blues part of it is we saw some changes for the good. 

 White sand, where there used to be rocky, dirty shore, lines the beaches. New commercial buildings, hotels and restaurants are starting to fill in the coastline. The grand homes that withstood the hurricane are refurbished.

Lovely, new homes stand where the military Capehart homes once were.  A park will soon be built where the Wherry Housing was.

A wonderful, new LDS Stake Center has been built for the LDS faithful.

But, I get ahead of myself.

After our delicious lunch in New Orleans, we drove over Lake Pontchartrain and east to Biloxi. 

First order of business was to meet Glen Bremmenkamp,
 a check pilot who was on the flight line when Roger was. 

In St. George, Roger had called Bob Rashka, who we have kept in touch with for years.  He was one of Roger's commanders and he and his wife, Judy, were our bowling partners in our pilot bowling league. He was going to be out of town the day we were to be at Keesler and in the present day tight security on air force bases, 
you must have a sponsor to get on base.
  

So Bob had called Glen, and he met us at the gate and got permission for us to enter.

Here is Roger in his Air Force uniform, 41 years ago!

Below is the hospital where Ryan was born.

 It is also where I frantically drove him, after going down a one-way, winding road the wrong way, around the golf course to the hospital, honking my horn repeatedly, because he drank turpentine. I had been working on an art project at the kitchen table when he came in, hot and thirsty from playing outdoors, saw the liquid in a clear cup, and took a gulp.

Yikes - one of my mommy-horror moments!

They basically just kept him overnight for observation, but it took some definite days off of my life.

There are added-on wings and remodeling now, but it was a familiar sight.

Here is the street sign for Kensington Drive, the street where we lived in the Wherry Housing.

Wherry homes were taken out by Hurricane Katrina. The hospital is in the background.

The fenced in area where all of those homes stood will be made into a park.

This deserted road with the grass growing up in the cracks 

and the rusted, crooked street sign seem to speak of our past 

and symbolize our present.

 We are a little more crooked now and our joints are getting "rusty."

But they say a rolling stone gathers no moss, so we'll keep on rolling! 

Roger is standing in front of the flight line, where he spent two and one half years instructing the South Vietnamese in the T-28.

Here is how it looked, 40 years ago.

Now C-130's (in the background) fly missions out of Keesler.

There is no more flight instruction here.

C-130s provide multiple missions, including prime transport for paradropping troops and equipment in hostile areas and they move cargo to natural disaster sites and humanitarian missions.
They also do weather reconnaissance.

The T-28

 Roger is flying one of these T-28s in the pic in formation.

Roger flew one of these to the Air Force "Bone Yard" at Davis-Motham in Arizona 
when they retired T-28s from the fleet.

As you can read on this plaque, the last training done in them was in 1973,
 and Roger was in that last training class.

Roger has many stories to tell of experiences teaching the South Vietnamese how to fly 

during the Vietnamese War. 

Roger pinning the wings on one of his students.

One of his students he trained received the Outstanding Student Award in the squadron. 

He is holding the silver cup he was awarded.

As was custom, all of the graduating students and their instructors gathered in a large circle after the Wing Ceremony to honor the Outstanding Pilot.  The cup was filled with champagne, then it was passed around and, as each pilot received it, he took a sip from it.

As the cup drew nearer to Roger, he thought,

"How can I be a part of this ceremony to honor my student, 

yet not take a sip?"  

We are LDS, and do not drink.

When the cup came to Roger, he took hold of it, ceremoniously turned himself completely around in a circle, 
then passed it to his student.

The student knew he didn't drink, but asked him,

"But sir, why you not take sip. 

One sip not hurt you!"

Roger replied,

But it is the principle of it."

A light went on in his student's eyes.

He got it.

He nodded and said, "Ah."

 Many students were not so good, and some of the not so great memories were of being put in scary spins and of many losing their cookies in the barf bags while he was teaching them maneuvers.

One of the graduating South Vietnamese classes

 It was oppressively hot in the summer, and he remembers sweat trickling down his back and being wet all over on the flight line and in the hot cockpits with his bag (flight uniform), helmet and the other equipment on.
(This photo was taken in the winter)

The T-28 in the photo below actually was ditched into the back bay by a member of Roger's squadron, and was brought up and refurbished as a memorial to the program at Keesler.

Roger with his boys on the wing of the T-28B model.

I found a page from Rick's baby book of our little family in Biloxi.
In the bottom two pics, we are in front of our home in Wherry housing. In the top two, we are standing in Capehart housing.

We drove to the other side of the flight line to watch four big C-130s take off.

Roger got some great shots.

A huge memory came to mind.
Just outside the east gate, a new chain had just come to town and it created a big sensation with the servicemen and their families - 
BURGER KING!
It was usually so crowded, 'specially on weekends, that you had to wait to get seated or you couldn't even get in.

Having a whopper at Burger King was a big Saturday highlight for us!

Now, I won't go near a Whopper!  I don't know if I had so many and got whoppered out then, or if they just aren't as good anymore.
Roger still loves them.  It's kind of our running joke.

"Do you want to go get a Whopper?"
"Are you kidding?"
"But you used to love them!"

Roger never gives up, hoping someday I will say yes.

He asked when he drove us to the new version of the Burger King, standing in the exact location.

"How about a Whopper for old time's sake?"

When there is seafood on the table?

Seriously.

 Back at the motel, after such a big day, the kids were kind of wiped out, 
so Mindy ordered pizza next door for them. 
 When she opened our motel room door, 
carrying the pizza box, 
Addie and Jack yelled excitedly in unison,
"Pizza!"

So Roger and I googled this place just off the beach.
We really wanted to have oysters on the half shell, 
which we had for the first time on the Gulf Coast so many years ago.

Roger in front of the two-story restaurant

We also shared a local fish platter, and you can tell,
we didn't like it at all!

Next morning, we drove along the coast to Gulfport, then back over to Ocean Springs.
We wanted to find the church we had attended and helped build.

Roger's directional instincts always amaze me!
We googled the LDS Church, then drove to the only one listed.

 But all of the way there, Roger kept saying, 

"This won't be the church we went to.  It doesn't feel right,"

Sure enough, it turned out to be an almost brand new, lovely Stake Center.

Then he said, "I think I can find it."

Off we went, through highways and byways, and 
he drove us right to it!

We were kind of sad to see that it wasn't an LDS church anymore, but we were thrilled to find it and it brought back so many, many memories! Roger served as Executive Secretary to Bishop Max Bushey here and I taught Junior Sunday School music and taught Cultural Refinement in Relief Society.

Then it was off through Mobile, Alabama,
 to the beaches of Florida!