Roadrunners

Wings of Gold, Summer 2004 by Peterson, Bernard "Pete"

In May the Roadrunner Squadron of Phoenix, Arizona featured Lee Owens of the famed Tuskegee Airman who will fly his three-quarter scale model of the P-51 Mustang around the world. He flew 6,500 hours in the Ait Force, as a commercial pilot and as an instructor at the Glendale, Arizona airport. Some of the original Tuskegee Airmen will follow Lee in various commercial airliners and join him at a number of countries where these pilots flws during WWII, shooting down a dozen German aircraft and never having lost a bomber they were assigned to protect.

Betty Blake, one of the original 23 WASPs during WWII also spoke at the meeting. The WASps were trained at various U.S. locations, starting in Philadelphia. There were over a 1,000 WASps by war's end. From Honolulu, Betty trained in a J3, earning free flight time by working at a local airport and later, flying tourists around the islands in open cockpit planes. She once met Amelia Earhart in Honolulu and had a long discussion with her, a highlight of her life. She described her reactions to the Japanese attack on December 7th , 1941. She married an ensign stationed aboard the battleship California which was sunk at Pearl Harbor. The two returned to the states where she served in the Ferry Command, operating everything form L5s to B-17s and B-24s. Her favorite plane was the P-51, anumber of which she ferried to Alaska for Russian pilots who few them to Russia for the fight against the Germans.

In June, Dean Beaumont, son of renowned artist Arthur Beaumont, returned. Dean's father was appointed Artist Laureate of the Navy by then CNO, ADM William Leahy, a position he served with distinction for 45 years. Dean described his service in the Merchant Marines as the youngest officer of the 260,000 Merchant Mariners to serve in WWlI. Their cargoes consisted of bombs, torpedoes, trucks, jeeps and airplanes transported to three theaters of operations. Dean noted there was heavy losses of life, ships and cargo, not generally known to the public and not recognized by the government as far as benefits are concerned. In 1989 congress, with help from President George H.W. Bush, passed legislation permitting certain disability payments to be made to deserving merchant mariners, a recognition long overdue.

The Squadron was exceptionally impressed with CDR Lawrence E. Scheer, USN (Ret.), speaker at a recent meeting. Following an engineering course in the V12 program in 1945 he earned a Reserve commission as an aeronautical engineer. He was in charge of 450 fighters coming out of production at war's end at NAjS South Weymouth, Massachusetts. He became" regular Navy," earned wings and flew P2Vs with VP-2 out of Kodiak Alaska and Naha, Okinawa, tracking Russian subs. He had duty in BuAer's western district and was a production acceptance test pilot flying F3Ds and the P2Vs. He later flew the F3H, F4H, F9F and F3D tor missile testing. I

He transitioned to the helicopter world and received the first helicopter instrument rating in the Navy. He was an instructor flying H-34s and H-3s. He was involved in Sparrow III flight testing at NAS Point Mugu, California and was test coordinator for all missile systems for the Naval Missile enter. He later served in VRF-32 and was a safety officer investigating numerous serious accidents. He was air operations officer on USS Yorktown (CV-K)) and was a command duty officer when the ship served on Yankee Station during the Vietnam War.

In retirement he worked for Garrett AiResearch (Allied Signal, now Honeywell). Always active, CDR Scheer is involved a volunteer work and served as commander of a local Civil Air Patrol unit. (Bernard "Pete" Peterson)