casey jones
Charter Member
On April 1, 1941, Capt Clare Chennault, Mr William Pawley, Col Chow of the Chinese Air Force, and Mr T.V. Soong ambassador for China met on the tarmac at Bolling Field Washington to look over the Curtiss Hawk P-40B. Lt John Alison was there that morining to fly a demostration flight for them. He had them climb up on the wing and explained to them the controls, power settings, then he climbed into the cockpit went through his checklists, switched on the magnitors, primed the engine and the Allison 1,500 hp engine roared into life with that he taxied out onto the runway, stood on the brakes and applied full power, with clearance from the tower he took off then climbed the fighter up into the April sunlight, then he dived and roared across the field at 300 mph, Col Chow and T.V. Soong jumped up and down and cheered and clapped gleefully. Landing Lt Alison taxied over to the happy men, Capt Chennault was silent but he looked at Alison and smiled, William Pawley said we must have a 100 of these airplanes. The rest is history.
Cheers Gung Ho!!
Casey
Cheers Gung Ho!!
Casey
