Intro New Subscriber: Mike Moldeven mikemldvn@aol.com
Mike Moldeven (MikeMldvn@AOL.COM)
Fri, 24 Jan 1997 17:09:08 -0500
Hello,
I'm a new member here, and an introduction is in order. I'm 79 years old
and reside in the home of my son in Del Mar, just north of San Diego,
California.
Using names of places as they applied in the early 1940s, I was a civilian
employee of the Army Air Force for about 34 years, starting in 1941. When
the U.S. entered the war in December 1941 I transferred from Patterson Field,
near Dayton, Ohio, to Hickam Field on Oahu in the Hawaiian Islands. What was
the Army Air Force is now the United States Air Force; Patterson Field and
adjoining Wright Field were consolidated and renamed Wright-Patterson Air
Force Base, and Hickam Field was redesignated Hickam Air Force Base. Oahu is
still Oahu, but the Hawaiian Islands, a Territory, is the State of Hawaii.
My job, from 1941 to about 1946, was to inspect, service, and pack cargo
and personnel parachutes, life rafts, life preservers, survival kits, and
other emergency gear. In 1946, I was assigned to investigate technical
deficiencies in Air Force equipment at Hickam and to write reports to higher
headquarters with sufficient detail to help engineers and technicians
understand the problems and, we hoped, solve them.
After several years at Hickam, I returned to Wright-Patterson and, from
there to Nouasseur Air Base in, what was then, French Morocco. My wife and
two children accompanied me and we had an apartment in beautiful downtown
Casablanca. The base was about 20 miles south of the city. At Nouasseur I
was a logistics planner and wrote support plans for emergency repairs of
Strategic Air Command aircraft returning from missions they were committed to
in the event the *cold* war got *hot*.
Following a couple of years at Nouasseur, I transferred to McClellan Air
Force Base, near Sacramento, California. My last job at McClellan was
civilian deputy to the Inspector General, and I retired in 1974.
I would be pleased to answer questions.
Mike Moldeven