3 minute read
Highland Lakes Squadron Air Show
By Judith Shabram
The defining moments in our lives are those that forever characterize who we are, and how we respond to them will define who we become in our families, communities, and nation. One of those defining periods was World War II, which brought nations together and divided countries as people sought to make sense of the violence, the irrational destruction of entire cities, and the wanton loss of life that accompanied this unchecked anger and desire for power.
When America entered the war, it would take the commitment of a group of young people, many of whom were barely old enough to be drafted, to come together in unity in an attempt to preserve a way of life that some would not live to enjoy. The Highland Lakes Squadron of the Commemorative Air Force is an organization of men and women who take seriously the responsibility to keep our history alive by preserving the planes from World War II that shaped the people who flew them helped turn the tide of the war. Even though the CAF members live all across the United States, the bulk of them are in Texas, which is where this labor of love began when former U.S. Army Air Force Instructor Pilot Lloyd Nolan and some of his friends, and later Lefty Gardner, decided that these old planes deserved better than the scrap heap and that the pilots who flew them needed to be remembered and honored as the heroes that they were. The effort became a tribute to keep our history alive and allow the next generation to enjoy the exhilaration of flying in these remarkable aircraft and learn something of the people who flew them in defense of our nation.
Many of those coming back from World War II were from the Rio Grande Valley in Texas, and because jobs were scarce, many of them became
Photo by David Matney/ Contributing photographer crop dusters doing what they loved to do and what they knew how to do, which was flying. Lloyd Nolan is credited for getting it all started when he discovered that many old WW II planes were in junkyards. Lloyd would realize, however, that buying them was the easy part. According to Sonny Croom, Adjutant at the Highland Lakes Squadron, “the junkyards were selling the planes so cheap that sometimes the gas in the aircraft was worth more than the plane.” The other source for these old planes was the military from their reclamation system that had stockpiled the aircraft. However, due to an aluminum shortage after the war, many old planes were sold quickly as scrap and sent to the smelters since there was value in the metal, but some were sold to private individuals. One of these was the Texas Zephyr, later owned by Karl Ritter, who loved to fly and was a big fan of this aircraft affectionally labeled the “gooney bird” because it appeared so cumbersome in its takeoff yet so Squadron continued on page 56
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