Memories of 87 years by Bob

  COLORADO 1961 to 1971 I started my job as technical writer in June of 1961 at Stearns Rogers. One of the main reasons I was hired was due to my experience with the Atlas F missile. The reasoning was faulty because Stearns Rogers was a mechanical engineering and construction firm  so they designed the framework to hold the missile and had nothing to do with the missile as such. All of my experience was on the missile. I knew nothing about the structure holding the missile. Oh well, we were writing for 6th grade education. I realized when I started this was a short term job but I was grateful to be working and the pay was not bad. I was considered salaried but was paid overtime if I received any. We found an apartment close to University Hospital on Cherry Street. It was small for the 4 of us and as luck would have it, we fell into an opportunity just built for us. A couple of artists were going to Mexico for 18 months to study and needed someone to care for their place south ...

 FLORIDA The four of us arrived in Florida somewhere around April Fool's day 1960, which seems appropriate. We moved in with my mother and my siblings. There were still 3 of them at home, Kenny and the twins, Paul and Pat. With us in the house that made 8 (see how good I am at math?). Renee was still battling her cholic or whatever was making her sick. Of course, we had no job and no where else to stay. My mother was battling her own demons; remember she married my dad when she was 15. I had never heard of a recession until I started looking for work but I am pretty sure 1960 was a recession year. I applied at what is commonly called a "job-shop". In other words I technically worked for them but actually worked for whatever company would hire me. I was hired right away by Radiation Inc, a down-range company (Cape Canaveral). The only problem was the distance, 85 miles one way! I was required to work 10 hour days a lot of the time, which made the paychecks good. I found a ...

  EDWARDS AFTER CHRIS BIRTH Sometime after Chris was born we found a 2 bedroom apartment in Boron, California. The fellow who owned the apartments, last name Bell, was a school teacher and supplemented his income with the apartments. To help offset part of our rent, I helped him put roofs on 2 other apartments he was building. Let me say hot tar roofs in that heat are intimidating. I'm not sure what kind of discount we received but it wasn't enough!! About that time I decided to take instructions in the Catholic Church in Mojave. There was a church in Boron but the priest came from Mojave. The priest was a Monsignor, originally from Spain by the name of Sylvano Bacadono (sp). He and I hit it off from the start. I questioned everything and he had what I thought were good answers. It helped that we often met at Reno's restaurant over wine to discuss things. One time we met at his place and he provided Flamenco dancers for entertainment! He was a good friend and my idea of wha...

ANOTHER SIDE OF EDWARDS AFB When our landlady Lucille found out Ellen was pregnant, she graciously moved us downstairs to a 1 bedroom apartment. Our garage apartment was a studio type, too small with a new baby coming. In addition there were no stairs to climb at the new apartment, good for a young pregnant girl trying to get groceries upstairs. We still had no auto so one of my friends drove us to Bakersfield to shop for a replacement. That was a drive of about 70 or so miles so I was trying to do only one trip over the Tehachapi mountains. After a day of shopping I found a 1951 Dodge slushamatic in our price range  and that could be financed. We drove it around for an hour or so and it seemed OK. I should have known better based on the auto we had during WWII but, oh no, not with my auto experience. So, we made a deal and headed back to Mojave in our newly acquired auto. It was a 4 door ugly green and the engine blew up before we got out of the mountains,. It sprayed oil and resi...

 EDWARDS AFB (continued) Ellen and I settled in at our apartment in Mojave, carless but not homeless. As I said the Riccominis were very kind to us (maybe out of pity). All was not doom and glum. We made quite a few friends who shared our situation. I settled into my new job at the missile test center. It turned out that most of the people who worked there were civilians. The two missiles being tested were designed by Convair and McDonald Douglas. The Atlas missile was designed as an ICBM (long range) and the Thor was an IRBM (intermediate range). Our job was to test them under simulated flight conditions. This was accomplished by placing them tied down in a metal structure with a gimbal at the top so the missiles thought they were in the air without leaving the tower. My title was Missile Airman, the first so designated. None of the "training" I received at Lowry was of any use so I had to learn "on the job" (OJT). I spent a lot of my early time gluing a device cal...

EDWARDS AFB AFFTC Ellen Buchanan and I were married February 9, 1957. My last day at Lowry AFB was the 12th of February . I took what is called a "delay in route" to drive to Florida so Ellen could meet my family. We only lost the wheel bearing once, someplace in Texas on the way to California! Let me say, it is a long way across Texas and a great deal of the country is prairie. I should have suspected then what awaited us. I don't recall where we stayed on the way but it was 4 days of driving. Then, when arriving, it is desolate country where nothing grows except Joshua trees. No self respecting cactus can live on the Mojave desert. We arrived at Edwards AFB expecting to find housing on base. That was a joke unless you happened to be a senior officer. We are 50 miles from any town with no place to live! As it turned out I wasn't even to work at the base but 30 miles toward Barstow California at a destination called Leuhman Ridge where missiles were statically tested....