The Bomber Boys (3 page)

From that day, Tony’s imagination became fixed on airplanes and flying. Much of his chore money was converted into model airplane kits, which, once constructed, were hung with string from the rafters of his attic hideout. His model planes shared the attic with Tony’s other hobby, homing pigeons.

The pigeons were both entertaining and frustrating for young Tony. Purchased from an older neighborhood kid, the birds flew right back to their original residence when they were first released. Tony had to buy them back more than once before the pigeons finally adjusted to their new digs.

Pigeons were only part of Tony’s childhood menagerie, which on occasion included a fox and a troublesome snake. Actually it was young Tony who caused the trouble when he released the harmless serpent on a crowded school bus. The bus driver, who had to stop and evacuate dozens of hysterical children, was not amused.

Tony meant no harm—he just loved animals, and he loved to have a good time. As a teenager, he worked at a local stable and earned enough money to purchase a horse. The animal had previously been owned by a traveling circus, and Tony discovered that his new horse was extremely well trained, not only for riding but for doing tricks. Soon Tony was entertaining the
neighborhood, racing up the street on the back of his circus horse, stopping now and then to allow the spirited animal to do a spin or rear up on its hind legs.

Even with schoolwork, his part-time job and his pets, Tony still had plenty of energy to devote to his interest in aviation. By the time he was in high school, he was writing letters to a Missouri flying college for course information and reading any available books or articles about flying. When American bombers began flying missions into German territory in 1943, Tony was only seventeen years old, but he was already certain what branch of the service he would volunteer for, when he came of age.

His parents knew their son would have to go to war, but they were less than enthusiastic about Tony’s preference for the Air Corps. A letter from a young relative helped to change their minds. Tony had a cousin who was already experiencing the trials of life in the infantry. His letter advised Tony: “Go into the Navy or the Air Corps. Anywhere but the Infantry.”

Tony made sure his mother read the soldier’s words. “At least in the Navy or Air Corps, you’ll be sleeping in a bed at night.” The Tetas relented, and at the age of seventeen and a half Tony signed up to join the Army and volunteered for Air Corps service. He turned eighteen in May of 1943, and it was official. Tony, just a month shy of high school graduation, was on his way to basic training.

After basic, it was off to Maxwell Air Base in Alabama, where three weeks of testing would determine if he was qualified to fly. The IQ marks were extremely high. Failure at Maxwell spelled the end to many a young serviceman’s dream of flying for the Army Air Corps. Test applicants were rated for qualification as pilots, navigators or bombardiers. Tony scored high and qualified for all three positions. Flooded with a wave of young patriots wanting to be pilots, the Air Corps found itself with more qualified candidates than airplanes. The officer in charge
was impressed with young Teta’s math scores and recommended, “You should consider going into navigation. It is a tough school, but I’m sure you would not wash out.”

“Will I get to fly?” Tony asked.

The officer smiled and replied, “You’ll fly plenty.”

Tony signed up. Soon he was on his way to Pennsylvania and enrollment at Clarion State Teachers College. There was math and more math. Competing with other candidates who had two to three years of college proved to be a challenge to Tony, but he compensated by studying late into the night, long after lights-out.

Life at Clarion was not all work though, since the young navigation students were housed on the first floor of a coed dormitory. Many of Clarion’s female students occupied the second floor. Tony soon grew friendly with an attractive coed who coincidentally lived in the room directly above his. The college’s administrators did what they could to “protect” their female charges, including enforcement of a strict curfew. By the time Tony finished his required study time, the women’s dorm floor was sealed up tight. With no telephone communication available, Tony and his new girlfriend worked out a simple solution.

Tony had noticed that a pair of steam pipes ran from his room through the ceiling. Guessing that the pipes also ran through the room above, the couple soon developed a “tapping code” that served them well. Late in the evening, Tony would often tap out a request for the young lady to sneak out of the building and meet him outside. A single affirmative tap on the pipe from above was music to his ears.

Not all of the Clarion courses were as mundane as math. Despite their designation as navigation candidates, the young men were given flying lessons at a nearby airfield. Tony finally had a chance to realize his dream. The training plane was only a small two-seater, but the instructor put it through a series of
spins, stalls and dives that were designed to weed out the faint of heart. After ground school and ten hours of flight time, it was time to solo. The day he sat alone in the pilot’s seat of that little airplane as it lifted off the runway was Tony’s best day since the barnstormers had visited Hamden.

The eight months at Clarion flew by, and Tony advanced on to the next phase of navigation training at the University of Miami. Pan American Airways provided the airplanes and instructors, and gave the cadets their first real in-flight navigation experience aboard huge “Flying Boats.” Tony scored high marks and received a certificate that was redeemable for a job with Pan Am after the war. It was an exciting prospect at the time. The possibility that he might not survive the war never crossed his mind—at least not until much later.

Next up was gunnery school at Fort Meyers, Florida. It was fast paced. There was a little in-flight practice with .50 caliber machine guns, but mostly the cadets honed their shooting skills by firing at targets while riding in the back of a bouncing truck.

The final piece of the training puzzle was in Lincoln, Nebraska. The men who had spent the past year learning their specific military skills—the pilots, navigators, bombardiers, flight engineers, radiomen and gunners—were brought together to form what was then the most educated, best trained and best prepared fighting unit ever assembled: the B-17 bomber flight crew.

Tony’s crew, like most, was young and eager. They looked even younger. Lieutenant Jerome Chart from Wisconsin, at twenty-one, was the oldest and would be their pilot and crew commander. A solid chin and determined eyes gave Chart a look of confidence. Tony liked that in a pilot, although he realized Chart had no more real experience as a bomber pilot than he did as a navigator.

During their first few days together, the officers and enlisted men on the crew addressed their new pilot as Lieutenant Chart. As they began to bond during the many hours of training flights, the men relaxed under Chart’s easygoing leadership, and soon he was simply “Skipper” or “Jerry,” except when there were higher-ranking brass around.

In fact, it seemed as if, in no time at all, everyone was on a first-name basis and most had acquired nicknames. Their copilot, Flight Officer George Wisniewski, was “Ski.” The clean-cut bombardier, Flight Officer Glenn B. Kelly, liked to be called by his given name. Tony Teta, by then a second lieutenant and navigator, was “Short Round.” The radioman, Corporal Kenneth Hall, from West Virginia, answered to “Ken” or “Kenny.”

Tony quickly became good friends with the flight engineer, a Texan named Carl Robinson. Sergeant Robinson had a dependable face and a receding hairline, and he did not take offense when the men nicknamed him “Baldy.” Corporal William Goetz hailed from Chicago. Because his descent into his ball turret reminded everyone of a crab disappearing into its shell, he became known as “Hermit.”

Corporal Thomas Christenson of Michigan was of Swedish heritage and had the rugged look of a college quarterback. He was “Big Swede.” Corporal John Stiles, whom everyone called “Jack,” was the right waist gunner and would later become the crew’s toggler. (Once the Eighth Air Force started the system of “lead” bombers, the “lead bombardier” decided when the group or squadron should drop bombs. The bombardier position aboard most bombers was later eliminated—replaced by a toggler, who required much less training.)

Wiry John Cuffman also became one of Tony’s closest pals. The little tail gunner from Tennessee somehow attained the handle of “Snuffy.” This was the crew (with the exception of
Glenn Kelly) that Tony would soon rely on for survival during air combat in the sky over Germany—the crew that would also rely on him.

At Lincoln, Tony became acquainted with the Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress bomber for which he would soon develop a lasting respect and admiration. Designed in the mid-thirties, the B-17 had been continually improved since America’s entry into the war in Europe. The model that served as a training aircraft for Lieutenant Jerome Chart and his crew was the B-17G. The most technologically advanced bomber of its day, the Boeing B-17G heavy bomber was an awesome sight to both the men who flew her and the men who fought against her.

Tony was indoctrinated in every detail of the B-17G. She weighed in at 44,560 pounds, was seventy-four feet and nine inches long, with a wingspan stretching just over 103 feet, tip to tip. She could fly high, fast and far—having been tested at an altitude of more than thirty-five thousand feet and at a top speed of 302 miles per hour, with a maximum range of eighteen hundred miles. There was little doubt how she had acquired the name Flying Fortress. The first things Tony or anyone else noticed on first sight were the thirteen .50 caliber machine guns poking out of the bomber’s nose, top, bottom, sides and tail. To lift its own considerable heft and a seven-thousand-pound bomb load, the B-17G was powered by four formidable Wright engines.

Despite how large the B-17 appeared on the outside, Chart’s new crew soon learned that the aircraft was not exactly roomy on the inside. Most available space was occupied by necessary flight equipment and armament. The nose section, with its clear Plexiglas cone, provided just enough space for the bombardier and navigator and their equipment, as long as neither man attempted to stand upright. Two single-barrel machine guns and the firing controls for the front chin twin-gun turret were also housed in the aircraft’s nose.

Above and just aft of the nose section was the bomber’s cockpit, which provided just enough room for the pilot’s and copilot’s seats amid a seemingly endless array of switches, dials, gauges and flight controls.

Directly behind the pilot and copilot was a small space that was really part of the cockpit area. Here the airplane’s flight engineer was stationed to react to any emergency situation and to serve as the top turret gunner. Moving aft from the flight engineer’s space, one came to the bomb bay, with its bomb racks to either side of a small walk space and a base just a few inches wide. Anyone passing through would have to turn sideways to keep from bumping into the racks of bombs, and if the bay doors were open during flight, there would be little but sky between him and the ground.

Continuing rearward past the bomb bay, the next small compartment was the radio room, where the crew’s radioman maintained and operated all outside communication equipment. When necessary, he manned a single .50 caliber machine gun which was fired through an open ceiling hatch.

Protruding out of the fuselage deck, just aft of the radio room, was the top portion and door of the Sperry ball turret. A few feet past the ball turret were the B-17’s side windows, left and right, with a single-barrel .50 caliber machine gun extending from each. The windows were staggered so the left and right waist gunners would not bump into one another during combat, at least in theory.

There was a small escape door to the rear of the right waist gunner’s position, and beyond that a tunnel-like entrance, which the tail gunner would have to crawl through to reach his position—the most confining on the bomber with the exception of the ball turret.

Lieutenant Jerome Chart’s B-17 crew flew one training mission after another, day and night, out of their Lincoln base. With each mission Tony could tell that their Skipper was becoming a
better pilot. Takeoffs were crisper, landings were smoother and their scores on the practice bombing runs were going up.

In turn, Chart was noticing his crew was starting to operate as a skilled unit. His copilot, George Wisniewski, seemed comfortable handling the aircraft when he got his opportunities to take control. Kelly was getting used to the Norden bombsight. Robinson was using every available free moment to cram his brain full of information on how to keep a B-17 flying in emergency situations.

It was more difficult to analyze the performance of the gunners. They seemed to be learning the use and care of their lethal equipment, but unfortunately the Army Air Force provided little in-flight target practice. Still, while they were in the air, Chart had his gunners tracking everything in sight—other airplanes, cars and even houses.

As commander of his aircraft, Chart knew there was no crew position more important to him than that of the navigator. Navigation of a combat aircraft in 1944 was a complicated job. The navigation methods used involved “pilotage” (the use of visual ground references), “dead reckoning” (computing ETAs to various points ahead), “radio” and “celestial navigation.” The pilot and the navigator worked closely during the flight, because any change in altitude, airspeed or direction could affect the navigator’s calculations. The success of the mission and—more important to the pilot—his crew’s survival depended on the navigator doing his job well.

The B-17 pilot training manual pinpointed the navigator’s heavy responsibility: “The navigator’s job is to direct your flight from departure to destination and return. He must know the exact position of the aircraft at all times.”