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>> This is a living history interview with Howard here in the class of 961 conducted by Marilyn Somers on March the night the year 2004 we are at his offices in Peachtree City Georgia and the subject of our interview today his life in general his experiences at Georgia Tech Mr Here is it's a pleasure to be here thank you so much here we are it is a busy time in executive offices and you've given us some of your precious time and we're very grateful to you but August stories have to start to be getting and I'm really interested in you know where you were born and when Let's begin there was do this crime chick Well 1st of all welcome to Peachtree say Honey the World Airways and I'm pleased that you've taken the time to come down and visit with us and I'll try to go back and put it in chronological order obviously so you just start with where I was born right and I was born in a mill village and Carrollton Georgia was in the mill village as a cotton male textile mill and my folks had my parents had moved my dad had moved there from a farm near that here Peachtree City many many years ago and he moved to Carrollton Georgia and met my mother there and they both worked in this cotton Mayo we lived in I Milhouse.

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And we had no running water or indoor plumbing until I was about 6 I used outdoor plumbing. And but I was very happy as a kid I didn't know that we really were from the poor side of the tracks so to speak and back of our we had a carrier in the back of our house where we.

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We had our garden and then back of the barn which was furnished by the mill and a house was rented to the family by the mail on or. Back of the Barnett the House really had a big cotton feel and during cotton pickin season sometimes we'd even get out of school and order to pick cotton how many of there were you did your brothers I asked how I had one brother I have one brother he lives here in Peachtree City younger or older he's 2 years younger than me and so you were the big boy 1st I was the big brother and I actually I was the black sheep of the family he was a good guy it's like now when Dad was born you said nearby here Tyrone civically right right how far is it from Tyrone Carroll It's about 40 miles so would that have been a pretty good trick for him to have left home and go that way for well his by his parents went also and his parents also went to work in a mill What was the name of the mill they worked its man double male male if and at that time in Georgia that was the way of life it was a big way of life I graded to where they could get income where they could get income and then the mill provided.

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The housing unit for us well they rented them but they provided late Bill from and it was a male house unless you probably saying that in history about the textile industry Right right right so you were actually a part of that growing up both your parents worked in the militia both of them both of them did so your mom had to raise you.

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Young women work and my mother's parents live next door to us they did not work in the mill but they did live next door to where we live so my grandmother kept the kids while my mother and that it worked as a family right there we were close.

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That is a. Poor way of growing up but if you said it was a happy leave everybody you list the shoot with was in the same boat you were in air all of our friends were in the same boat and we we felt like as long as we had food and clothes and we had things that we could play with a lot of my homemade toys as we were very pleased with our lifestyle and and I and we didn't know that we were behind the curve of space you were born Ian Wright 1931 of the work for the depression had already happened heard it was beginning to look back on the depression was started starting but obviously as a kid I didn't know you were I didn't know there was a fish thing as a Depression you had a lot of company in bad times because it's that Years went by your growing up during the South with getting poor before the depression greater effect that's correct when it came time for you to start school did you go to a middle school.

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Or town I went to a city screw it was not the mill did not have school Ok so I went to one screw in the 1st and 2nd grade and then I had to commute across the little city of Carrollton which then was only about 3 or 4000 people and when the 2nd grader across town came back to the 1st to the 3rd grade and 4th and then and then then we moved off of the mill village when I crossed town Carrollton and I started to screw it what they call a 2nd Street screw and a College Street screw and that's where we lived on that side of town then so I stayed there until I graduated from what then was grammar school which went up through the 7th grade and how then that middle spooks and went to high school and that was for grades so high school.

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8 through 11 Right that's correct because it changed while I was in scuba I only went to the 11th grade in high school I mean I graduated from 11th grade which is very typical right now did your dad continue to work the mills although not all the time when we moved from one side of off the mill village to the other side of the town Carolyn.

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He quit work in the mill village and went to work in a department store. But I tell yellow incident thing about when I was growing up my 1st job. What my grandfather had a little store in his house arse he so. Cricket medicines and things like that he would go buy it bring it there people and people would come there but he always so used me as a street salesman I would take a little basket up when I was 5 years old and go over work 2 or 3 streets within a.

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Walking distance of the house and so what kids let him out and things like that $0.25 a bottle if it was and it was very safe for you to do it granted he trusted you with getting the right amount of money to bring in the back and we learn early you learn very early and I remember one time you know trying to get a little extra money.

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I would collect scrap iron and sell it to the scrap dealers. And this was actually before the war so it was a unique thing then but I was always looking to our little money and help my mother and daddy Is that what you were doing with the money you give me back they'd let me keep part of it but I wouldn't let a youngster do with money.

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You have to go to. There were moving but my mother and father were very strict Christian people and my father's My grandfather was a minister he started off as a farmer on a railroad my grandfather and grandfather here Grandfather Harris and then he was on a farm to nest My dad worked on a farm Planum you near here near Tyrone Georgia before they moved to Carrollton Georgia and but they you like sense that they knew what hard work they knew what a simple law style was but they also were hard core Christians and.

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That was that set the pattern for our life really. And the reason I'm telling you this you ask about the movies they did not believe in us going to and what was your in your came and what was your reason for saving money say we we were so poor that it was to get some a little extra simple things in life even like candy and fruit and then not until I was about 7.

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Did I have a bias on the I think is the lesson to be learned for youngsters today who have so much they really think about. If they work hard line pleasures to actually have fruit which would be something you would think you'd be entitled to that you were happy to have it does give a couple of hardscrabble friends right but you know that's that's one lesson I learned as a result of that if you want to fast forward to when I started work and I came out of the military and so forth then I had a little money I probably traded my children to well I did make sure I didn't make it hard enough on them but God had it happen I didn't know it was that hard when I was very young black Priscu and elementary school.

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But in looking back I said you know we weren't we didn't have the things that a lot of our a lot of other people had the average citizen maybe not average but the maybe a little bit above average person had it that part of the time in the United States history and but I didn't want my children I have to go through that so I was more benevolent then I should have been there Obama has to say.

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But I tried to be strict on them as far as discipline and what they were allowed to do. Let's go back to you in school were you a good student like. I like screw and I think I was classified as a as a good student. Your mom and daddy instill in you the thought that the getting the education.

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They did yes. Generally they certainly intended all along for me to go to through high school. I think they were thinking that possibly I couldn't go to college we didn't talk about it much because they didn't happen they didn't have they didn't have the money but as I got in high school I started thinking Wait I could go to college and so I say I was having and especially in elementary school in high school who was having an easy time let's go to work and made good grades.

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And when I was in the 7th grade to start the 7th grade I had a tonsillectomy and it led to a blood disease they've George a Baptist Hospital here in Atlanta they brought me here out of Carlton. It was a big deal because they couldn't handle that the doctors in Carroll County sent me to that and I was 11 when I was one and I think and so they mediately are almost brought up front diagnosed me as having leukemia but because.

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I got well our God well licked that disease. They changed the prognosis are that not correct the diagnosis to staphylococcus septicemia but looking back and looking back I know it was leukemia but they just said nobody knows how to get to cure leukemia or you but you must not ahead but they gave me the are now about 4 months I stayed door to address.

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They gave me over a 100 friends blood transfusions and about $450.00 penicillin shot you. But the reason I got well you may feel the pinnacle. But I got well because. The big position up and you really believe that my father who had. Been working in the mill didn't move to the department store.

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He felt the call to be a minister during the during that time and he got to praying that if God would let me live he'd be a minister. He kept his word and he had not finished high school. Before that time that was that awesome promise to me so he went to Google and Bremen Georgia and got his Ged What is the called a ged today then he went on to Emory and then he went to seminary and became a minister in the north Georgia Methodist Conference.

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And pretend he was he was still preaching when he died at 86. But he was there he was only slightly more flexible about what we were allowed to do that my mother but my mother didn't want us to go swim and my brother and I got sick but we drowned and I didn't want to go to movies and she was afraid that she was very much a homebody my mother great lady you know I'm not saying anything negative but she felt like that we had to be protected and that that sought our hell my brother or me back from some things that are friends special we got to high school and I moved to another part of town to do some of the things that my friends were doing we were not allowed to do like.

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My mother did not want me to play football and the only thing I really was good at was baseball and I did that coach lived a couple of miles up the street and he encouraged me he was our football coach and baseball coach. And so I started out to play baseball that never worked out but over her protests I did start playing baseball even practiced.

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You know. She was just very kind of exercise working. Guy. Thing but one thing about go to school ing when I recovered from the disease when I only started back to screw in February but aggression a question of whether or not I can make it I made. Good grades all the way through the rest of that year and my scuba mates some of I've gone to school for 4 or 5 years they made a plea to the school system and they let me move on up to high school after only opinion from I think it was February to the in the year.

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But I'd had my grades and then in high school too I was able to out of the 4 years I ended up with. I think it was a 97.5 degree average. But I was the 3rd in the class but I had a lot a lot of chances of friends that were smarter than I And so but we were all between 96 and 97 percent So anyway you you had a significant emotional experience doubt about that going through this sickness and recovering and then seeing your father change his lifestyle because you can't do that motivate you to really put your go to the grindstone really really try hard I don't know that that motivated me any more than I was always motivated but I was very proud of my father to have accomplished that and about the time I graduated high school too he 1st went to West Georgia College and I think before he went to Emory and it was a 2 year screw just anyone you know if you're going to high school you know that the time he got away from that I graduated from high school there was a terrific role model for you when he was reading his artwork or there were to affect your family you know was there any impact.

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On how here is this coming you know up with it Ampad know he was not too well because he was born and 1910 and so you know he was just 30 early thirty's but so he volunteered to go to Brunswick Georgia and work in a shipyard. But they knew then he was drafted and so they brought him to Atlanta to what is now Fort McPherson and gave him a physical and he had wet feet or something like that he never and I didn't take him a lot he was a good strong and healthy guy and otherwise so had a lot of responsibility to children like.

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His sister and her husband had moved down to Brunswick where he her husband his sister's husband had worked in the shipyard that's how my father ended up there and he lived with them and worked in a shipyard for several months and then it was claimed. To flexible. But he was I'll be with his background he didn't have the background from my formal schooling standpoint to to focus on encouraging me to go all the way to university or whatever but he wanted to always better himself.

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And agreed and so he set a great example and he was always supportive of anything I wanted to do and I always wanted to travel and see the world because when I was growing up through grammar school in high school there was no such thing as t.v. and we didn't have the money to travel much we travel we might have drive our old car up in north Georgia and go up on Brasstown Bald Mountain up in north Georgia and that was a big weekend for us to do something like that so he like to travel he's all he'd like to travel for the rest all of his life I mean if at her I got there working for airline or got out of college myself you know if you want to go over here there he was ready to go mediately And so I got him on Simone trip he and I took a couple of trips together like to Jamaica I said in my own trips to he and mother both want to Israel to be in devout Christians I want to go to Israel so you have great memories.

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Of nothing but the best Now if you stay in character with your growing trend how were you even aware there was a world where I read a lot of books. I venture didn't I didn't have much money to do anything else and I didn't go to the movies so I read a lot of books I'd read to things like the old Jack Armstrong books are published somewhere to weapon and see Drew series are for girls and and those boys were always going up into the White Mountains and climb into that mountain so when I got into Boy Scouts I always wanted to go climb go up the Appalachian Trail or go up in the White Mountains and the Boy Scouts was last year they let me go to the boys for camping expectations with them and get a chance but she would let me go to camp but out of the swim and part you know she was still afraid so I had to finally just learn all my own how to swim.

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You want to be. When did you start thinking. Maybe you were going to college me I think that my junior year I knew since I was making good grades and my teachers were encouraging and they were they were pulling me in some directions and because my mother and dad's background and the church I started 1st looking at I had a screw up in North Carolina how Point North Carolina which was the Bob Jones University Church.

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That was what I was thinking and I in fact I even applied and was accepted and then this very close friend of mine a young man and I were in school together we decided that we would go to our. Didn't consider was with Georgia right there yes and most of my classmates went to West Oregon I graduated in 1989 and there were 49 members of our senior graduating class it was a small town it was definitely true in 99 deal with the full effect of coming back to school was affordable for the people.

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It was still a challenge for you for the actually it was and I need to get that my mother and daddy help were able to help maybe because I just didn't that they believed in and that they put out just about all of their saving than me going for one year but back to Auburn because they would we moved off the mill village my father was working in department stores I said and we got to looking at a house then which at that point in time a a 2 bedroom house.

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The dining room kitchen and living room you could buy for about $1300.00. And so they found this house that this builder had built on and a better selection of time and the his wife the builders wife wanted to move back to the country but he built it well and he was a Christian too and so when my at and my brother and I especially I were pushing my mother and dad to buy a house and they found this one and that guy decided if he so if anybody want to sell it to my mom and dad to make a long story short and he did and then when my father started being assigned churches we moved into parsonages furnished by the churches.

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And because of that they sold that house at a what not much money but it was probably $2.00 or 3 times what they gave for and some of that to help me go to school my 1st year it's just an interesting. Courage to. Correct. What we are pursuing now that a freshman.

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You know I was thinking aviation you were already are I think in aviation and I wanted to be an aeronautical engineering but that I would do this coach lived a couple has up the street and he had played football and graduated from Auburn He also had been in the military.

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During World War 2 So he he had come out right after the time the war was ending from 1900 I think he was in 195-4549 when he for 50 I think he came out and and came out well no he came out in 1986 and became a professor and coach at our local high school.

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But he had played ball and he he and he was father I was impressed by him and so he was he encouraged me to go to our 2 or 3 of us out of the class went to our. So you would roll their 1st time away from. Harley but I'll burn in Carrollton now days is about 2 hours' drive I guess but then I would rather some of the guys in town would let me read with them there they were able to afford a car their parents gave them a car and I think there were 5 of us some terrible what's going on there and so then when I got down there because of some time.

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The brother Louis Suggs happened to be in the Sigma confraternity there was a lady Ga for way back in those days Prograf her and her father her family. Where the coaches were in approach shop at the Kelvin country club. Sunset Hills country of course which my family was not able to I'm not able to be a member of but because of that connection with some of those guys this guy sucks his brother invited me and this one other guy to join the Sigma Kaffir turn.

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And we live near the fraternity house about a half a block with this elderly couple and they sort of took an affinity and i gave us a good deal so we boarded there about a half a block off the campus How did you like. Me I love it I love going to college and I go back home sometimes I'd have to do what a lot of people did when it in I would hitchhike now you don't you don't people don't hitch recover the security aspect.

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That I could hitchhike from all over until the grain to Georgia and then go up hitchhike up from the Grange to Carrollton. And sometimes I get there about 9 o'clock am road hitchhiking it now 10 o'clock at night. Disappeared and the question didn't come up and. 949050 I finished my 1st year ad but I was they didn't have an aeronautical engineering degree.

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So I was in and I was in Aviation Administration our management and so I started thinking I really wanted to get in more in engineering and so in thinking about the money I decide well. Cry West Georgia College one year and so I enrolled for my sophomore year and by then one year makes a big difference in my friends with the West already.

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They've established their own patterns and so I was sought or left out and so and I'm my family not having much money I didn't drop that inside I'd go to work. And several of us. Went to we're messing around doing various things and we did one of the one of the gather around around with his brother was working on a pipeline up in Tennessee so about 4 of us went up went to work with a you know you say construction company putting in a pot 30 inch all pipeline from Chattanooga to Nashville.

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And we work work with them as they work that thing over Signal Mountain but say that was in the fall of I went from $49.00 to May 19th to June of 1950 an hour and then that fall of 1950 was when I started I started then quit went to work.

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And while we were up in Tennessee in late fall that year then that's when the Korean War broke out and so. We worked all that job with that particular section of the job was finished and I came back and that's I was still in the back my mind looking for something aviation so I went to work for a Southern Airways in December of 1950.

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Flying and I went to work as an general flunky out in Memphis Tennessee. Just to get into business and I mean I had to load the airplane I loaded the mail and cargo and some time at work. With tickets they had taken regular rego take to get a just sometimes I'd plow an air pocket so you got to do everything you know do you see 3 and we flew out of Memphis down to Vicksburg Mississippi and headed so I was opening up my horizon and there you see and excited and then when the Korean War started really picking up speed that was and Randy Simberg when I went to work there it was I remember by the way backing up a step when I went to work out there we left at Lounge December the 3rd 950 and there we had to wait to d.s. the airplane and a lot of a co that was sleeping.

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And so we flew into Memphis at their bet midnight and we had a place we could stay that night so I worked up there into January and then decided I was about to get drafted and I decided that I would volunteer for the Air Force. I still want to fly I really want to be a pow and I want to be in Iraq I say but I also want to be a pow So I came back home and.

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Because they told me I was when I would go in and and then I just before I went in they froze all of the enlistments in the Air Force. But I was. Lifted to go to go to the well I was going to have to just anything in Air Force and I was going to try to push to get into combat and so anyway they froze enlistments there I was out I left my job went to militarily Vasant with the old Southern Airways and so one day this friend of mine and I were in Atlanta just looking around to see what jobs were available and I guess that that I was.

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18 years of. Maybe getting Come in I was 19 in November of 1900. I was 19 then and we were walking down Spring Street in Atlanta Georgia and we walked by. A Journal Constitution building and they had a sign out there says Uncle Sam wants you we walked in to talk to this military recruiter and I decided I would join in on a civilian component video which meant that once I got a boot camp I could go to All-Stars.

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Do you. Think that was in the Army I was in the Army. And so this boy that was with me. You know I graduated together and so he said he'd go into so why don't you do there and we went back home and told our parents that night that we are leaving tomorrow for the Army so we came to Atlanta both got on a troop train went to Fort Jackson South Carolina your mama his words before he was right he didn't know what.

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But for Jackson he and I were being processed the next day roadtrain o. and I. Processed the next day and this was in February of 1951 and he and I had split up and taken physical one went one way I want to know he end up in Fort Bragg I stayed in Fort Jackson South Carolina for boot camp where had you been.

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That you changed your world dress like that that really changed my whole future because. I was lucky because of my background schooling when I went through and took all the tests at the military gives you I ended up with a high i.q. level in the twenty's and her training regiment so when the rest of my all but 4 of us were shipped out to Korea and I but they had put off I couldn't get into all sorts of they couldn't I mean I they said they needed assistance of like your year of college in effect we had a cot we had a guy a medal and 2 had an r o 2 he got he had been in our d.c. but he came in as a boot camp he was out a civil and he and I both were there and they kept he and I and 2 others as instructors.

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Are all the new trainees coming and that was because I had made a fairly high grade on my i.q. test. Just. Right they are an instructor and they anyway then I did not moan after they started me as an instructor there and I was in it up there about a year or so then they.

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I had and I popped in to go to Fort Benning to go to army officers. And I decided I didn't do I still want to fly so I was looking to get in the to the Engineering Co or into the artillery to flat a little light spotter airplanes since I was an Air Force get in any kind of thing it flew so I eased up before a View panel and one of the guys on the review panel had been called up active duty and he'd been in World War 2 And he was a pilot had and I'd flown with him when I was out in Memphis and from southern Europe and he gave them a good recommendation on what he was on the review panel and he gave me a good recommendation they let me go to Fort Sill Oklahoma and I graduated in officer to the 2nd lieutenant in September 9th 1982 I was pretty and I delivered I went through there 6 months and that and then I was in I don't battery which was class 23 during the Korean War and every other class had been sent to Korea.

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And a lot of a lot of my people in my boot camp got killed in Korea and lot of these guys who were in our terror a few If you think a lieutenant right out of artillery o.c.s. you become a forward observer which means you're on a frontline call in far and I thought that was what I was going to do and instead I got that class we had had 86 people that.

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Went through our club that one class started out in that class at one time or you know only about 43 of us graduated and they called us that one day and I said these these people are going you got man days travel time and 31 days leave 9 days travel time report to Camp Kilmer New Jersey for assignment to Germany that wasn't with you Well I have I had volunteered I had been considered to be a distinguished military graduate and I did even volunteer jumps flights to any everything I just like a ship and a journey.

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With the incomparable mentality. And then there were disappointed because you really wanted to get here. And they were. But while I was home on that leave my life was changed in that. I met the girl that I married and how did that. Welfare to the man. She was she had lived right down the street she was 5 years younger than I and at that time I was 20.

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And she was 15 and they had she had a twin sister and they had lived right down the street from us when we were in the middle of it but we knew they were family but you know it's been 5 years difference and we didn't run around the same group and I was at a house who of course we all got in high school but we knew her family my folks knew her family and so when I came home some of my friends I ended up with some people and she had to be in the crowd and so I thought she was a good looking young girl so I don't think 20 was 20 for a 15 year 0 and so we but we just they wouldn't getting gauged or anything and and so awful I went and we lost touch right we did for a little while and I had given our my class ring out of going to screw which later I ask because I got the dating a guy all over and and in France and Germany and then later in France but.

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Nevertheless when I went over there I landed in Broome or Holland as a 2nd lieutenant on November the 7th 1952 my wife was blown November the 7th 1936 and so I was 21 landowner birthday and here was I We had some 1st lieutenants and captains and. And were coming over with their spouses and so they took the young officers I've been having about traveling with them on this trip ship and so they made me a troop train commander at 2021 to take a whole load of troops out of Rome how in Germany down into France you know so then at 21 I thought I was a mature guy.

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That's you know they all had a 1000000 things to learn. It's funny but at that time you probably thought you were top of the world you were right well you know I'd always want to see the world one of the biggest experience that I had had before when I got out of high school I went to I was talking about going to hop on the line for us to and so forth and we made up our minds to go to Auburn but I was I wanted to work for the summer and my uncle my dad's brother was working for the CIA in Washington so I went up and lived with him 3 or 4 weeks and look for a job in Washington but I just know that I want to work some especially at asylum but I couldn't back and so I was fine with selling.

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Building signing or something like that didn't work out so I used all the money I had left and rode a bus back to Atlanta and ended up going to our room when you think about it that. Was your 1st time in a foreign country. First time out anywhere that summer when I was in Washington and my 1st time plan an airplane cologne took me up to New York one weekend and we flew one of the old Eastern Airline constellations from New York back to Washington I thought I had really got airline have and and so that was my 1st airline trip so let's just get me fired up more to be a flyer.

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And I need to fly or flying isn't funny Heck I'm. Waiting for it to happen right now and how do you know I don't know where. Gone and how do you hope they were going to end up you know then possibly know how long were you in Germany I was in Germany from September of 152 until May 954 so you had good luck to you because the war we went over of the war was going on and when I 1st got to was based in Germany I had to.

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Wear my uniform of duty when I was on the street every place I went because we were still at war in Korea and the Russians still had a Russian and I had Berlin divided and we were running maneuvers and I was assigned to a artillery unit with separate pile Long Tom what are these long range artillery guns and own a tank cestus Now did you get a chance to see any of the countryside or different cities and countries and all during that year yes at the end and it just with your take.

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I love living in Germany and of course being from a small country town I was excited about seeing more of the world and since I was there for almost 2 years the last 2 years I took advantage of every opportunity and those opportunities came when we I made some of those opportunities but after the war was over and travel was a little bit easier to accomplish then I was able to see several countries.

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Certainly France and Austria and Switzerland and Italy and I went to those and some I went on my own and some of them went with some other people I'm going to imagine you. Heard about them and there you were for real that was pretty exciting it was a very exciting and it I couldn't wait there are I couldn't find enough free time to see and do everything that I wanted to do and after the war was over especially my commanding officer he tried to talk me into staying in them and they were going to transfer a bunch of us back to the United States just bad deal department defense orders out of the Pentagon but he said why don't you make a career of it military and he he tried me he tried to talk me into it so I thought Ok if you can get me into flying I will be so but he said he would try.

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And he when I left he had gotten me an appointment at the Pentagon. When I came back to the States and he they were going to talk to me about going down to Fort Rucker Alabama to take flying training. And when I got to New York. I had written to my family and in about a month and I were wondered what the world was happening to me.

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I decided I was coming home and I started thinking about this young girl that. She had written to her and over a year her name is Joyce and. They didn't know where I was and during that time she knew that I had met this girl in France because I'd asked for my ring and but anyway.

[00:42:18]
I got to thinking about home and I got on a plane and went for I didn't stop Washington Pentagon I just kept I flew from New York Atlanta you discharged from the military I know but I had there I had to leave there 30 days of leave time and then and so I might make it was a 30 day total then but I came on to Atlanta and when I had I was supposed to go report from New York to Fort Jackson South Carolina to be discharged so as to appropriate time I went to Fort docs and it was discharged but going home Carol.

[00:42:56]
Yes. Well that's that's going up a little bit so that's another story. And let me let me back up a little bit about the experience and Germany while we were there because I was in a field artillery battalion as I mentioned and became a battery commander and I was always tried to be a hands on leader whatever are doing to.

[00:43:25]
Drive these types as well as my g.p. I had a Jeep and driver assigned all the time and we went home movers every year. Sometimes twice a year. Both years I was there and we would go up near the check most of Aachen border and the Russians were on the other side haven't met maneuvers and some are more Smallman Who were some were big maneuvers where we would have the British Army the Us Army and the French army.

[00:43:57]
Jointly having exercises going pell mell toward the border while the Russians were coming right at us and then I would turn one other way one way we'd go though it. You know that was exciting to me and we would go into the spiel the German people got up upset with us but sometimes we'd be all maneuvers and we would tear up their farmland with the big times but we'd have to.

[00:44:27]
Pay them for the damage so they came out Ok but they did still didn't like us tearing up their farms but I traveled a lot when I was in Germany and down into we all by the way could carry cars over there and one of the guy that goes away most c.s. had bought and brought a new Chevrolet red convertible.

[00:44:51]
Going around. So they are 2 weeks over there all officers coming into the European Command were sent down to me we were at a little place called a biscuit which is about 35 kilometers east of guard and that is over a mountain ridge there between the Autobahn it goes from stood guard to Munich and we could be in Munich in an hour and a half we drove down there I had to go to this week of orientation week of orientation with all these young guys like I there fish with a single guy has never been or inflation in the world before we would sleep in class every day and go out and drink beer night.

[00:45:34]
I don't know but you had plenty of time to mature and see the world. That was in November of 152 not told about landing in Birmingham and on Joyce's birthday you know we're 7 and we were in Munich. On November 25th which is my birthday and we go into this restaurant and we've had a couple beers and we started snowing so we got the top down a convertible and went driving down through my straight into Munich with the top down.

[00:46:09]
Crazy great that's right they did say that but then I later owned I bought a car from someone it was coming back to the States and we'd drive it down into Italy that time they didn't have the bridge through the Brenner Pass and you'd have to climb up through the past and down again I remember getting getting caught speeding by the police and I kept saying no complaint and they finally got that right and I'm away my own I have to be in uniform but also on that one trip I had going 1st to Salzburg and then into Vienna and I had to go through the Russian tone and the Russians own started at Linz and it was about 2 hour drive from Linz to Vienna.

[00:46:59]
And I was by. And I was getting dark and. I was stopped by a Russian patrol. And they try to talk with me a little bit and they let me go on but in the end they I mean we're being in the end of it was divided into American or British or French and Russian and in the middle ring was the international and you could go in there at night and mingle with it with a Russian officer officers in the other motor officers which which was very interesting to me.

[00:47:33]
So then I went on down into Italy and coming out of Rome I had a little insight which had a little you were to it I guess this. Right outside of Rome and I was going to Milan and I was going to turn north and go up into France.

[00:47:54]
To see this family and with this young girl I'd met over there and so I had right outside of Rome. This priest was hitchhiking So I just stopped and picked him up he didn't speak any English I didn't speak any attack and stuff so I was driving pretty fast and he got to cross an ems.

[00:48:20]
But I was doing about 80 or 90 some time and I had a new Studebaker bar Starliner. And we ran out of gas and over there we had to buy a gasoline at certain military stationed to get the kind of gas that would go work in our car yes car but you could get it for $0.15 a gallon but you could also.

[00:48:47]
Put it in these big 5 gallon cans and carry some 3 or 4 cans in your trunk and so I had some back there with fuel so we stopped and but I run it completely out and we put that we put the gasoline in and then it wouldn't pull it up into the engine so this priest he flagged down a truck and I hooked a rope owned by the car and pulled us to get us started if the running.

[00:49:17]
Out of it was that he and I He rode with me all the way up to my land he was read his Bible all the way and but he was very helpful I'll always remember him great great you really really living large this great. Be by yourself and just do your own thing one other and then I started to get to know some people in France and so I'd go over to our way on some time by myself some time to ride a train to Paris and take the train in Paris down to Orlando but.

[00:49:54]
This one lieutenant and I used to run around together and it was the year that Queen Elizabeth was current. And we had these like p.x. patients along the Autobahn run by the us government and we had a script not us money our German my our military but it was it was script military script.

[00:50:21]
And we stopped in the. Stop center where you could get gas and where you had the place to eat and we were we walked in and they were pretty well folks were standing up near the front when this couple walked up to the register to pay to get out and they said they want to pay and British pounds.

[00:50:44]
And they said they were trying to cashier told them we can't accept that so I gave them I said I'll pay for their lunch and they were British and British man his wife and daughter and they want to know our name they want to write us a note but But what they did they sent this other lieutenant and me a a 5 pound carnation medal and I still have it with the treasure.

[00:51:16]
Right it's probably worth. Whatever it's worth I wouldn't get rid of it now but this is a wonderful memory. And well it must've been hard to go back to well when you got to New York you decide you want to go pull which there. Was a poem and I guess the man upstairs was leading me.

[00:51:37]
Out or making me think to write because not only did I come back and when I get. I call my family who lived in lived in Menlo my father was a minister of a church at Menlo in Georgia I call him and ask him could they come to Atlanta and pick me up and.

[00:51:54]
We compromise and I'll ride a bus to I think it was to. Cardinal to someplace and they met me there and so the next day though I want to go to Carolyn and to see if Joyce with exhaustion and I parked the car with my I got there.

[00:52:13]
And one of the old hangouts that the boys used to have a little bitty town was a poodle so I decided and I had on my uniform and I had on some ribbons. And it's I went. I went to this. To all to see who was in there that might be my friends and unfortunately you know which world of change fast in the last 3 or 4 years before that and I didn't see anybody and the people at the man it ran it I knew him and while I was in there this guy was the brother of the guy that was went into the military me he came running up there and he'd been a work the drug store and when I'd been in the drug store and walking around before I went and so this young lady girl friend the Joss's happen to be in a drug store I didn't know her time and so she called off and said yes who had us all.

[00:53:13]
A lot don't tell us she ran out and grabbed her daddy's car and said I'm going to town and she parked it in out in the middle of the square in front of the drug store and ran in and she found this young boy brother of the went on our way and she told him he said you nowhere.

[00:53:33]
And he said I don't go to look and came up in a pool hall and I was up there so I went down and only took a few minutes to find and my father had gone to Carol we had to do some things and. One thing my driver's license had lapse and I had to get a driver's license we had to go to Atlanta on the way the next day went to Atlanta and then down to Carrollton to get me a driver's license because I'd been going to loan you know and so I got my driver's license and and so when I when Joss and I got together.

[00:54:04]
I told dad meet her in the square then I went right right right now and I'm not in her car she and she had a parking ticket. But our dad worked with the city some of them and. You would become the mayor now if she doesn't go but she was a very mature girl for 15.

[00:54:26]
She was $187.00 which you're going to be 89 years she will say that's love it. Like I said I'm going back to mean low tonight why don't you go up there with me and she had a twin sister so this boy that was brother. What went in our military and then he went with her twin sister and and.

[00:54:48]
We went back to middle o. and I dropped my dad off and I went back you started a. Look back I was in May of 1954 and December of 1954 we got engaged and she she graduated in 1985 from high school and we were going to get married in September and she was riding a bus and commuting from Carol and I go to work and land on it at the Southern belle salon and so when I picked her up we went to the Varsity and and I was already going to.

[00:55:30]
Tonight I had gone to work that day. And I was going to not I back up to that but I was going to ask it anyway. We moved our marriage date up to July so she would have to commute Yeah. We got married on your last 30 if that's 1955 now you had moved back to Atlanta to work right.

[00:55:52]
You didn't go back to southern Iraq. Well I did. Southern Airways was headquartered at Atlanta airport and they had a Birmingham office so I went back to them and I wonder my Miller on the military rules they supposed to get back now and I may say well the only place we have the summer job is in Charlotte and I said you know I want to leave Atlanta right then.

[00:56:17]
So I just walked right down the street walked into adult employment office and was hired just like went to work on the ticket counter I guess it just in the door regular whatever was available you were ready Well I But you know I don't think I would have taken just anything but I figured that working on ticket counter would be a good place to start and I had openings write them down to at that time you started work your way through for you.

[00:56:45]
Right here minute and I had already started to do that and Georgia Tech Now let's talk about that you never had even thought about going to join tech and so after that. Well actually even in high school I had because some of the 2 or 3 of the guy that I went to school in fact the guy.

[00:57:04]
One of the person that beat me at had me I mean he graduated ahead of me with a higher grade point average was a close friend of mine and he went to tech so you had already heard back. You know arc teachers told us about and so forth when you started thinking about you're not a career here you know do you like I can I started thinking about tech and I started thinking about or not after I left our so getting a job in a friendly status.

[00:57:33]
So that it just was a natural progression then that you would start back to school. Well I soon as I was I got on the Army in May went to work for Delta in June and I immediately started the plaza applied it developed a plan there and a couple 3 months and I def I applied to go to tech at night and I also had a another a in the g.i. bill that that was applicable then you know and that helped me for sure so I was working and getting the g.i. bill to so you could manage that so I could manage you win over did they accept your 1st year credit for ever Yes they did what I want to they didn't but I had made good grades there so in my ass I made very good grades so you were going to start.

[00:58:21]
Classes Yes. And still do what I had to I one thing I had to do that I didn't pay I had to start over the freshman calculus. But I had always been good at math but I can tell you be an older and working. I had a harder time I'd always been good at math I said I made a 100 on my math course as an Auburn which were not calculus and so I had a an abrupt awakening year when I got hit the catch.

[00:58:52]
Yabbies the wake up conference bye bye shows that. I had one of my senior moments I don't sense that I did not live on campus don't I didn't have some of the good experiences that you have live and I don't count because I I was dating and working and going to screw.

[00:59:15]
I think don't you wonder why. Well but I guess it was pretty tough and it was it was tougher on Joyce really than me did you take a couple classes every semester writer and graduate all 61 and I started 54. And so I finished everything that I needed to graduate but.

[00:59:41]
But but 6064 hours credit hours and I had worked it out with the company and I said Ok and they had moved me around and I'd already gotten a promotion and but they said that if you can put in your 40 hours working on projects it didn't matter when I worked and I was in the engineering if I started off the ticket counter I've gone into the engineering department and I had in the engineering department Gone is the driest and I never did become a draft when I went to mediately before I got my degree at the performance ingenue year.

[01:00:20]
And so. That was working on projects with the new jets coming in and in the late fifty's and early sixty's so they gave you some leeway for. So I was doing my job they said just long as you put in 40 hours and so my senior year I took 2123 and 22 hours and that was the year I had a head to design and Jetfire design a helicopter back then we didn't have computers and we had a we had do a desk calculators and.

[01:00:55]
And sled road. But you were the last of that era of the slapping the side really right right let's let's go back to those days what was it like to go to my school I can't even imagine because I don't actually school you show up after working all day for classes that start with 6 or 630 or something like that when the class 6 or 630 and they were on campus Yes and you took 2 classes usually usually 2 sometimes 3 but that was a question that would be really pushing it and I was taken physics mechanical engineering so you were taking classes from 6 or so in the evening and so for our classrooms plus the very same load of homework as if you think day right so when did you sleep well.

[01:01:45]
I don't remember but it was I realize I was sleeping fast I went but what I did later own so I could go to morning classes and be fresher I went on the night shift on the picket counter our show that you and I could work from 1 30 am to 930 am I could get up and then start Levon o'clock classes I'd be at about 4 and I would I would go home and do some.

[01:02:11]
Homework homework and and then try to sleep for 4 hours and then I'd go to work not wonder isn't it amazing when you think of it how will rest you really were yourself for such a long period but they have this people at. Dr Dutton Nandan was head of there aged 2 when I was there and his brother as a matter of fact Bob was working in the engineering department I don't airlines when I went into the engineering department but all the professors and yeah they had a at that time they had a lot of military guys that were still in the military and some I met out like I know g.i. bill and so they were accustomed to people like us and they really worked to help us and then Dr Arnall do cuff actor Dundon retired doctor Duca became head my senior he was head of the department so you feel like they understood your circumstance where they don't have me but they helped others I mean they encouraged us.

[01:03:12]
And I was then been able to get back into the groove a study a little bit more especially my senior year and I said I can work any time and take these I was going to record a school and I would work at night or on the weekends at the office to get in my 40 hours.

[01:03:29]
And you didn't get to see much of the campus or take part in activities did you get to go to games or any of the things I want to put bug and while we were dating I would take just a football game so that was at least you know my heart that he was there or if he was there and the other jacket and.

[01:03:49]
Tell me that that was what it was right across the street from only from the a building there were no what they've been you unlucky intersect and it's between it was right across straight from the Coca-Cola headquarters Ok but it was I'll let you straight right across from the aeronautical engineering of.

[01:04:09]
Degrading that they're any more now how they fought in our last right but I Cor So then you everybody likes of Arsenal when you went to the yellow jacket it was to eat yes Me Ok you're right it wasn't really a hotel you could feel like there could well it was just an accent called in and it was a yellow jacket restaurant with a restaurant know the signs actually say yellow jacket I Thank you Victor but it was an idiot and the like and I was a lot of students because you get there fast you get on the water you know with the coast especially for all of us working we're working at night and there is a building we can run across street and anything Yes Right on Your Corner there when you think back.

[01:04:50]
When I think back to that time we had already integrated women detected that check for like 8 or 9 years by the time they just come when you started right for did any of them come to my school programs that use these women and there were several in the nice group program and were one or 2 and they are not going to enter into.

[01:05:10]
And I think we only had I think we only had about $100.00 screw together all together all together so it's pretty amazing there actually was somebody in aeronautical engineering. To track that down you know it just goes to show you know a lot of women I had a lot smarter than us when I was guys.

[01:05:34]
It could have gone by in a hurry that was a lot on so it was a long drag especially our kids were born with our graduate which is just amazing not only were you but you were being there in 1950 s. we were married 55 and in August July and August of 56 Trish or Suzanne came along and then in May David came along and then in 1961 the year I graduated in February Geoff came along and before you graduated before I graduated by then I had bought a house out in Tony valley and you know I was I was making when I started out working I don't own to counter and military had 1st lieutenant and on flight day I had a droop flight pay a little because I was trained for emergency landing of these puddle jumpers and they are carry these are still a little single engine airplane and and so I was making about $315.00 I started off at Delta at $235.00 a month you can remember.

[01:06:36]
Money will. But they do yeah they'll help what you have to be great if I got how much I forget how much we received out of it but you might not have even been able to do it I think you would like $89.00 a month and Joyce had her hand raised 3 kids when we 1st got married she was still working on it.

[01:06:56]
And then she when we were the 2nd one was born but then later she moved to work in executive offices at Sears Roebuck. Overhead there are impossibly high and then I had to the 2nd child was born I was like a little bit more money and because I had been I'd moved in engineering in 1956 and 60 we'd moved our engineering department from over on the north side of the airport over to what is now the big technical operations center at Delta over between the runways the 1st phase of those buildings were put in there and so that's we moved the engineering when most was it was a part of the group that moved over to technical operations so I went I was working there when I graduated when you came in to attack and 54 like failure with the president at that time and he was a military man and there were still probably a lot of military people around because of the g.i. bill and the residues of the war there were a lot of going to Korea my coming back for a lot of World War 2 people that were still limping along getting their last degree right in teaching your thing and then then later passed away and Harrison came in eventually I guess acting president and the whole tenor of the school and of Atlanta everything was changing into this progressive community where you know it's Vance grow all that kind of things are happening so with the same thing it appears to me it was happening in the airline industry it was definitely coming into its own as an important part of the economy so you were there building it you were part of that coming up the line stuff yeah I had the opportunity to.

[01:08:45]
Be a part of the transition from jet aircraft and commercial business from my piston are blind to jet and air brined in the commercial airline business and see the whole industry become available to the public where 10 years before very few people ever flew anywhere by 19 mid fifty's people actually were.

[01:09:08]
By coincidence when I graduated from Officer School Fort Sill Oklahoma where I went to Germany I flew Delta when I flew a little small 2 engine airplane from down to Wichita Falls from foresail to Wichita Falls Texas and then then from there to Dallas and picked up Delta and flew Delta on a d.c. 3 with stop in Freeport in Jackson Mississippi in Birmingham over to Atlanta alive but I was excited you know I was right I knew I was going to Germany.

[01:09:43]
And I didn't know was going to have a date with Joyce while I was there but I knew I was excited about seeing the world. But when I got out and got to Delta Yes in 54 when I went to work we were still flying d.c. three's Convair for forty's d.c. 68 just gotten the c. 7 and we had the 7 babies while I was there during the 1st 23 years and Convair 8 eighties matter of fact we had a big crash with a kind Brady I'd been down a tech who let Day is in 1009 $161.00 and we were allowed to git I was miles to git technical operation a jet base we come.

[01:10:26]
And we had a training flight taking off and check pilots Pollie 2 of the engines it was a 4 engine jet and 2 of the you know one side for practice which you had we didn't have a lot of simulators and we did did a lot of the stuff they do and simulators and I actually airplane flying and they pulled those engines and a guy that was flying probably over reacted and rode it the other way and rode it right into the ground.

[01:10:55]
And so that was that was a completely completely new airplane and early it had to be what it was in 1901 we got our 1st jet in $59.00 and a d.c. 8 and we were the 1st one to fly the d.c. 8 our the founder of Delphi Mr c e woman had made a deal with Mr Donald Douglas Sr that we would be 1st to fly though we were relatively small compared to Pan Am then our united our American and Patterson course I Pan Am I had already gotten a 707 some Boeing but and United had gotten d.c. 8 at the same time but missed a woman and Patterson head of United and Douglas were buddies so Mr woman had asked Douglas 1st to let him be the 1st one to fly even though those other guys were bigger but we ended up with both those airplanes taken off on the same day but we took off 1st out of what later then was idle later we came j.f.k..

[01:12:03]
There are memories. I have there I never did work where they want to day to day basis although I was around him. And I but my when I got to look I'd see him some time when I was over to tear out the old coins it had missed the woman I owned it aligns with some investor friend that Louisiana but he was the person posts on a that really made Delphi in.

[01:12:39]
Grow to what it is today because of his passion for flying he was a flower he was a pow but. No I don't think he ever because he was never a pilot he was then they he he was either a culture or add in Louisiana and he got into the business because he needed to dust cotton crops and he made some dusters and so Dale and dusters were the airplanes that he chose and that got him it really into flying and he then just advanced along that line and went into.

[01:13:21]
Blind a mill and then got one of the 1st air mail routes in the United States and that was and that's what I was a key to the spark and then he began in the passenger flying in 1990 and. Find out that early right when you know and yes and he that's when how Coca-Cola and also I came together because the Coca-Cola people in general Louisiana were one of the 1st big investors in Delta Airlines and also in New Orleans because they could see that they could see the future of it and they had the money but you were there really in a very signal time very seminal time I should say of the aviation industry because it was the 1st it was that it was the time it was changing it was going to become more modern it was going to be more available.

[01:14:16]
From the day I started work at Delta we were in a growth mode except for maybe 2 or 3 months period and a couple years we were always and we always use this story that missed a woman would tell about us we just the low country boys from the south would be in these meetings in Washington or New York where the Americans no doubt an open.

[01:14:39]
And don't don't don't treat us bad like that we just a little country boy from the south but we were growing but Mr Wellman was the driving force and he always would come into meetings and he would say just give me one more passenger per flight so that would make a difference and making money and not making money when I joined up.

[01:15:02]
I guess if we were maybe just a few $100000000.00 a year in revenue then I talked to him a couple times that might be of interest to one night I was working to counter and about midnight we had a flight that came in and late and we had a passenger on that flight that missed his connection.

[01:15:30]
To Dallas we had another flight at 4 am to Dallas and so this and I was working the waiting list on the ticket counter we were doing all this man we wrote tickets manually and worked our way unless we didn't have a computer like you do now and so I I was working a waiting list and this guy came up and he said I'm I'm a friend of Mr woman's And I want to be sure you get me to put her to put it out or to put your name on a list but he came back said I'm a friend of his 12 and I'm I'm sure he'd want me to get on this flight and I said Well sir you know we will we will do everything we can to get you on a flight without you calling Mr woman he said I may call him anyway I thought you know a lot of people threaten to call him when I had a problem so out.

[01:16:15]
I was working a counter later that night and I got a call from a kind of control in the control office in the back and Mr won't talk to you and he said. How does these a you get this guy out there says he's a friend of mine and I said Yes or he said Well how do you know I said I know you will try your best to get him owns I don't do anything he would do I have a discount him up there and tell him it Mr Wellman told you to do the best you could and so I did all that we got him on but I just followed through on it and I don't know what I would have done if I found a seat with that break in.

[01:16:57]
But the copilot but but anyway but Mr Wellman since I was still part out of my left that was something special one thing he did special he and the reason he was so successful is that he was a people person I was just going to say to the fact someone could come.

[01:17:14]
In for a favor and he would be. With the people and he hit one of his hobbies was growing orchids and when he was go out on a flight sometimes an hour and then in the general offices he would bring an orchid to the secretary's and sometimes when he was going out on a flight he would bring orchids over to the ticket counter and give him to the agent on to the counter where that's quite an exotic.

[01:17:43]
And so I think my character he he was so focused on his airline. That he obviously ended up with a lot of stock but I have been so that he probably could have managed a little bit better as far as transfer to his children his children were well taken care of but the I think some people think he probably paid a little not plan ahead enough when he was because he's injured word and he would.

[01:18:18]
But he didn't he didn't save enough on taxes at the end of his house his heirs a lot of money in taxes when he died he could have been more conservative I don't know right but he had a happy life and succeeded. Extremely and he was always called in addition to getting that passenger he was very cost conscious way and he always drove that home to all of his management people and everybody service was really important but he started up you know in the Depression air and so he had to pinch every penny and then and he would go around the general office at night and look in trash cans and if he found a gym clip here he would take it out and put it on that person's desk or see that would make you feel.

[01:19:08]
As if you thought I was going through right. Now and in the morning that attention to. The headquarters was right across around from the old cargo buildings that were in the main entrance along the road leading into the my airport this was way back then obviously and we had a cargo building and there was a small one but outside this cargo building and you could see the cargo building from our general office specially he was up on the 2nd floor 3rd floor I guess and he could see things going over on going on over on the ramp and I was in the vast front stations office one morning and he got a call a woman and Mr Lomas up in his office looking across the ramp and he saw about 10 o'clock in the morning somebody still had the light own outside the door to the building so he called Hammer who had a station that call those guys over there and tell them that they ought to turn that light off say money.

[01:20:07]
Money like about it to you look at your video but everybody loved him and he had a great reputation in the industry he was in there with people like Donald Douglas. But they started you know that they helped build in faith like Patterson and united and Smith c.r. Smith one of the real and and then they head of the head of Pan Am You know he knew all those guys and they worked together he was just a look at you boy has already been made love to play that for $960.00 wind you find you finally 7 years you graduated and you had to pass for Science in aeronautical engineering What a relief what a relief how much difference that it makes in your life it.

[01:20:51]
It was like opening a giant door to sunshine and there really was because I had been under a lot of pressure especially with the kids coming along and. The company had kept moving me and not long after I graduated they made me a superintendent an engineering department so it definitely validated it with the chairman at the time called me the day I graduated they're going to call me an engineer when I got back the Monday after I graduated on Saturday I graduated a at the Fox they were tracking yet a new user and one of the guy that that chairman was succeeded by a guy named Dave Garrett I was Tom Beebe to call me Dave Garrett and Tom baby helped me a lot in my career too but they Garrett was more my mentor was Ron Allen's mentor Ok And and then 1987.

[01:21:48]
When they retired at $65.00 and they. Come had dad in the meantime but. The board made Ron chairman and c.e.o. and me president and chief operating officer and put me on the board of directors and Ron was already on the board I own that on that day and your last one to write the ticket and now here you are president and c.e.o. a lot of my friend in blue.

[01:22:17]
That's the basic things you have asked an amazing how many years that you spent. 3636 years well there their patience with you getting your degree with well placed they got there miles out of you say yes and I also got a master's degree from Georgia Tech. I think he graduated from firm and he got a master's and some and he and I some time some of us going to we're going to my scooter we would ride together And I was I was just.

[01:22:51]
Engined just an engineer you know and we'd read 2 or 3 guys go on we'd read they would rabbit with us and he was already moving up the ladder you were moving pretty good company. And he he and I had a tie that that there was an extra relationship and that his wife's mother lived on a farm back of Carrollton Georgia Ok so there was that connection his his mother in law and you all of my in-laws although they they were in the same class financially but things have gotten better for my in-laws but this cop I'm Ok right just my in-laws know everybody in Carroll and I'm paying from Roy Richards loan down in a row I was one of the big guys now I write you probably have you done anything like this for him there you know there's a lot of Georgia Tech press in Cairns and we're very we're not but you know his boys went.

[01:23:48]
Awry junior and I forgot the 2nd one and Richard. There's a. Very strong connection there so you were in just because you're from Carroll I mean you just accept somebody from you're Ok with those happy times for you. Yes I really did enjoy my career there and it was the one make factor of my mentoring by Dave Garrett and he pushed me all the way up to the present he was always backing me and one time I was offered a job in Taiwan Civil Air Transport and he got upset with me because I considered you actually over to visit but I went to my boss and told him that I'd been asked and I was going to consider he was head of engineering art Ford and he told Charlie docent who was Dave your boss at the time Charlie was chairman and.

[01:24:45]
And so he told those they said well you know they're supporting a pretty good guy we don't stand in the way we don't want to leave so that they didn't get mad at me. But but I went to watch them and they got to the point I had the f.b.i. check me doing a background search you know but of course I was going with a foreign national airline and and so then I backed out but they were offering me great things at that time I was making about kind of $11000.00 a year which was pretty good money and they were going to double it hand and for most it was for most of that time not Taiwan and that's called a Nazi and that's right and so they were going to give me furniture have furnished me a house with 3 servant let me come back to the States so many weeks a year and I kind of stuff but you know I finally something led me to start thinking that well if I go over there I'm starting over if I leave there I'm not going to her I'm sure the rest of my life I don't think I would be I have to start over again so I better stay where I am and so I decided to stay out of leave the path that I hope it was I think he was there he stuck with me and.

[01:26:08]
When I owned. A moose or a movie around of the trouble shooter. One time. After I got my degree I was in engineering when I got my degree and then after Delta acquired Northeast Airlines. They called me up one day one of the senior vice president of operations and with a guy named Hoyt venture they was president then and he called haven't said what about to go to dinner one night this week and I said fine and but we don't talk about he just won't talk with you and so what happened then was that they offered me a job in the company as the 1st time I'd ever been offered a job when they just moved me around so I thought and I got my I kept bothering him to let me move over an engineering firm of a ticket counter but.

[01:27:04]
After after that they say you go here you go there were what we were going to discuss. So I and so that's the way I they moved me around and so but they are I left the engineering department to go over and become head of the in-flight service department because we had we had no unions at the pilots and the dispatchers and some of the apology and I hope a Airline Pilots Association both companies were putting together their seniority list and that obviously is a big thing for the politics of that dictates what order they are assigned flying and how much money they make and the flight attendant so we're dealt or we're not union only the dispatchers will be all the smaller you know and so but they had $56.00 units I say it ne but due to the numbers none of them were going to survive the merger except the power lines and other the Railway Labor Act laws so forth I mean that had to be but they did way so we were then trying to integrate the operations in all departments like mechanics and they had been union unit ne these are things people don't think about.

[01:28:13]
So we were integrating that the flight attendants we had about 5 we had 500 flight attendants we had about 2800 this is in 1972 and as I said I was head of engineering for that night port Center when we next to a very nice we whether or not it was we went.

[01:28:32]
Downtown and he said. Our flight attendant have a negotiating committee and we are negotiating with the negotiating committee of Northeast Airlines who represented the union flight attendants there and they've been in Washington go shading for several months. 2 or 3 months and said they are they can't get this thing out of list and they want us to have an integrated Senora list for the flight attendants to fly an integrated flight schedule in December and that at that point it was.

[01:29:07]
About the last week in September of $97.00 to say he said we want you to take over in-flight service you do that and so I thought about it. Not that well if the company wants me to do something you know I'll go so I moved over to head up in flight service and I walked in office on Monday 1st Monday morning in October and the Goetia Asians in Washington on Friday night had gone down the drain so I was starting from scratch but you were going into a new field so I had 0 new ballgame to learn you know and that was really learning by fire to read what I had in the kit and they said get this list integrated by the summer before we go any further I want to go back to 961 when you graduate something just dawned on me and 961 is when the Orly crash occurred.

[01:30:03]
And in a great number of this people and after there's a crash like that everybody just turns to someone to explain how could something like that happen. You must've gone you must of had to field questions like that. What is your recollection that. I didn't have to fail any questions and directly certainly not let me press a friend but just a friend always asked why and we speculated in the engineering department what happened I wondered if that was and it was a it was a d.c. 10 as I recall and the cargo door came open and then I got out and it was either after got an actual final solution but obviously the it was because the door came open that caused them to whatever it did to the some of the structure and they lost control of the airplane next and it crashed but.

[01:30:56]
You know there was I think at the end they said that the door was not properly lock so it was it was a human error that right I think I don't know. But but when something like that happens in the airline industry it doesn't matter what happens to you where you work anywhere cross the industry the facts how everybody functions.

[01:31:18]
And have the. And in every all airlines world really especially with an airplane to be in use around the world like that airplane was by a lot of different airlines people. Will do anything to provide information so they can determine the cause depression so that so they can but prevent it from ever happening again so being an engineering we we would need to nearing department or an airline would be right in the forefront of looking at data and so forth like that and that would repeat itself every time any question.

[01:31:59]
When I was going to take it down or just before I went to work on Delta period I was there were going to come just prior to that time. Delta had had a d.c. 3 crash in 3 port Louisiana it was trying to land during a severe thunderstorm and it was evident I was struck by lightning and it knocked them into such a situation and I crashed and some people were killed.

[01:32:25]
But when I became executive v.p. our senior v.p. of operations in that job I had the pilots of a lot of my stations over with. I am also the point man for accidents and so when I got into that job 1st thing I did is go to our.

[01:32:48]
Training Department send to our records and manuals department and we need to change our standard practice to have the procedure set up with me as the head of operations to so that everybody I want to be sure everybody knows what they have to do in case we have an accident.

[01:33:10]
And so by that time you know I had been about probably. 20 this was in the midst of think that in the mid seventy's our media way it was 2025 years after I went to work and after the other crash and we had not had anything since then and so.

[01:33:35]
Yes we had I had a great record and so we began revising that standard practice for emergency procedures for handling damaged airplane our Christ airplane or whatever when you think of the increase in crime it isn't that over that period of years you were safe to say free.

[01:33:58]
Cancer. That was a good record and the numbers were estimated at the act. In about 5 months I tried became head of operations. We had been they had different apartments you get minus flights in fly so forth that are involved in corporate security communications and so forth and we had the final draft of that standard practice hit my desk on a Friday afternoon.

[01:34:32]
And I just now we're going to dinner someplace and we lived in Peachtree City. And I. Just threw the draft copy in my briefcase and I walked in the house here 1st house we had here in preset a and said hello dos and put my briefcase or only island in the kitchen table and Allan table in the kitchen and I got a telephone call and they said we just lost an airplane Dallas and that was about.

[01:35:06]
630 Eastern Time 7 37 o'clock Eastern time and when we lost 1011. Downburst landing at Dallas Fort Worth So I immediately said I will be at the flight control in 30 minutes so I told Joe as a start packing. Back me some pack me some clothes and so I ended up with a brief made plane reservations told us to meet me at the airport the terminal and I took off for Dallas and by midnight I was on on the scene and I still had not found the crew for instance but that airplane.

[01:35:55]
With a 10 big very safe airplane and that. Down black brought down draft hit them and threw him into the ground and they hit their throttle and you could hear on the plane take off go around they were saying to the Copa Cadmus and the koala flying take all go around power just like it's across they were making an approach at the time and so you could hear the engine speeding up and they bounced the downdraft made a mount and I bounced across this highway and when I did the left engine facing forward hit a car and just shear to top out of the car and pull the engine loose but it bounced high enough to get across the fence into the airport and when it when it did that the left side of the airplane came down in the engine that had been poor Lucy.

[01:36:50]
When it dug into the ground and turned the airplane Otherwise I think that airplane would have made it with a lot less people being hurt but it ended you can hear him on the tape spewing up and it goes crashing into a 404000000 gallon water tank and it was just like instant stop and the tail section broke off and went down parallel to the runway and that there were 20 something people in that that survived and the rest of them were killed instantly I mean that airplane when it hit that it hit that it just it turned it complete was going thought out of my angle and it sort of turned it on over and blew it into the ground so this is.

[01:37:35]
I mean that's the nature of their purpose. Well there are. There might have been something that could have prevented it but it's not reasonable to expect like there was an airplane a I think it was a Lear jet in front of them that got caught in that. 11 updraft he got called an updraft and it.

[01:38:04]
Pitched him away up in the air but he managed to get it on the ground and he was so strong in my opinion he was so scared that he pulled off the runway and I'd just like I would have been had been shoot and tech elect himself before he took over the tower what he went through and before then the tower that made a.

[01:38:26]
I happened to be changing shifts so there was a lady between the time of this transmission and some of the airplanes trailing unpredictable things just again. But after that they probably saved the result of that is that they put in Doppler radar around airports too that can detect that kind of wind shear see something comes.

[01:38:55]
To you right down to 30 here and for me. I guess that. You could sum it up saying ambition I was not unhappy but I by that time had strong desire to be c.e.o.. Dave told me when Ron and I were both promoted our before he said just become they're going to be 2 positions he didn't tell me which was which I thought it should have been me because I was 10 years I thought I should say you know for the last 10 years older than Ron and but anyway the day of the board we both were elected and I was president and I told Dave and Ron that I said loaners I'm at Delta give you a 100 percent.

[01:39:43]
But then some people at industry saw that I was passed over and I had a few inquiries and and then. We. Get it the way it really happened is that aerospace organization out there and we were at a meeting. And friend of mine another friend of mine it was and I were at the same meeting and his friend and well he was a friend of out not an acquaintance of mine but Fred Malek.

[01:40:19]
Had been president. Northwest Airlines and Garrett Wilson and I'll check it put together a team with a clean element had bought Northwest Airlines and Malik all 3 of them at one point had come out of merit Corp Malik was president and he. Went back to Washington and he and this guy.

[01:40:45]
Got Bill Merritt to agree to let them. Set up a by the merit food service company from Merit corporate folktale corporation and. They called the so this guy out about low and Fred Mallett started up an outfit with the with this merit food service company which they grew and called it cater air cater air was a big all of us a big customer a caterer air bread Malik and man were partners then they made him president and his 2 other friends made him president of Northwest Well that was a conflict of interest and Fred I think wanted to go back to Washington where he had been in the forward cabinet and he'd worked with Nixon and he was a Washington guy.

[01:41:32]
And so. Then said to me at this meeting are you interested so I said why not if I knew Fred and then you Gary I didn't know checking at the time but I knew Bill Gates made America well because he's come down Atlanta and we visit because we were a big customer and you know are about the same age in fact we were both within a few days of being assigned and so that sorter established a relationship and but.

[01:42:03]
Because of that I had also been around friend Malik while he worked for our Marriott and I had been over to his place in Hilton Head and we played tennis together a little bit. And so I said let's let's call him so. From this meeting so. He. And I call Fred and so will if you're interesting.

[01:42:28]
Someone will be in touch with you from Heidrick and Struggles which is a search firm and. And right now. He's the chairman. Chairman Emeritus of how they're going to with the one that. Tried to put me in a northwest that didn't work out I won't get into that but that's an interesting story within itself because they decided that I was going to try to make Northwest more too much like the old and I said we've got this opportunity to come up with a new type airline and I was competing with a guy that had been in a food service business.

[01:43:09]
But anyway most Gary and Chad you both said well we made a mistake but then I'd go No and I stayed at Delta 38. And then what it did was put me in touch with Jerry so he said I thought check in Wilson I made a mistake but I don't know where you go in now but I'll get back with if I find something pretty sturdy coude and he said Frank Lorenzo you may know that name in airline business a he said he and S.A.'s and I have another guy and you young Carlson that is say yes they are getting ready S.A.'s to put another 50000000 into.

[01:43:48]
What was Texas they are then but they want to get Lorenzo out Lorenzo is willing to get go out for get so he won't get bought out and so if you're interested I'll see if Lorenzo and yes I want to talk to you. So I said Ok I'll talk to them and in again front window and how to negotiate my contract continent and.

[01:44:17]
It's an interesting story going there because I shook hands with them on the last week in July 1990 and I. Own all of the 2nd 1995 Hussein went down into Kuwait. And on September the 13th I became chairman and c.e.o. of friends that you know kind of lay on and actually 1st is chairman c.e.o. kind of where lines and then I was I was present to you know the holding company which is the old Texas there then it was kind of how and so and by October you it was a dollar 28 cents a gallon when I shook hands with them in July it was 70 it was $0.57 so by October we were blowing another $70000000.00 worth of fuel for the tail pot what it was costing American Delta some of them well over $125000000.00 more but they had the resources to do it when I walked into continental.

[01:45:23]
They can get used in K.'s annual reports they analysts report said that they had $3000000.00 in cash and I don't tell a candidate c.e.o. everything you know when I got in a 2nd day I looked at the financials and I thought I got the finance guy then I said how much cash do we have that we can use and I said Listen 100000000 so you know I became c.e.o. in September and by the year the last half October we knew we run out of cash and we're going to put in bankruptcy.

[01:45:54]
So I had taken a guy with me out there from Delta Margaret and he and I when we said Lamar. We we left we know how to spell but interesting when you think about bankruptcy at Delta Airlines we're not we're not in any way or another time down there by the way we were talking pick up on Wall Street Journal had morning Marci came running I'll say you see this delta is talking to Pan Am Ron talking to Pan Am about buying Pan Am and they were in bankruptcy Pan Am I said Lamar run no it's more about buying growth and united we left out in a way that story ended at Continental when I wanted to bring it I was talking with a billionaire Marvin Davis who is a wildcatter memory had been out and we were in crisis management for that year if you were and but I learned a lot I mean I was learning every day and that helped me later at Air Canada but I was I was out to talk to Marvin Davis and they said they want to put in 500000000 to buy you out of bankruptcy.

[01:47:03]
And. And I said and he said we don't put in 300000000 we'll get one of our partners to put in 200000000 but we want you to run it and we've been talking to him for several weeks about them by and in but not this time. I was talking to his lawyer but this was Lamar and Davis and so.

[01:47:25]
He said We want you to do it so let me tell you. I think we think you have good credentials. Good airline experience and so forth but one thing that we think your weekend and I think what that he said you don't know how to fight dirty yet we don't teach you.

[01:47:45]
He said You gotta learn how to greet by car this is a cut throat business if it comes to that. I mean by Pan Am and Eastern and everybody. On the world and not at all. No time for the country you know I got on a plane that night after talking to Marvin and got to New York executive committee we had invented committee meeting so we went and I said let's we won't talk to you without having all the officers in here and and the story but let me back up a key part of the story and I think it tell you a little bit about what I try to be.

[01:48:23]
When I when I went to Continental and went there Canada and the world the word went along that I claim to be a Christian so. The people at Continental come to me from time to time said Let's pray for our company. In fact when it's big. Black Lady a lot of pent up dressed she always came out she looked like she was dressed up in right out of the fashion magazines she had missed there's you don't know me that I'm here to tell you I'm going to take care of you and Mr Durant he's going to I mean I've made him a big t.v. he said you are Moses you are Moses and he is ironically we going to take here you they still pray for us to live in a prayer group at that that lady is a part of anyway I have to let Marvin they love is that I would always putting a message on the hotline.

[01:49:23]
800 lines of people could call in to give an update on what was going on with least once a week and so when I when I was at the Peninsula centricity and I started out the door I checked that and the bellman the bellman I guess it was came running out said You just got a fax so I went back in and the Martin effect said this morning a group of people led by this young lady had come in and said they want you to ask everybody in your hotline message to pray for Continental just lacked President Bush the 1st President Bush had said you know he cast the country to pray for victory in that shield of the storm in the 1st go war and so I jumped in my car and I read the petition and I got out I was going on American and there in New York and.

[01:50:12]
The American manager knew me knew I was and so it came by asked they help me write I checked in so I said Well I'd like to borrow a phone or something and so I got a phone and I put them on my message and I and it in I said a delegation has been talking to me for several months about having the call in the whole company to prayer and I just had a petition that was presented to Mr Durant this morning and he said they all want me to put it on this voice my o. And so I'm asking you to pray for the success of Continental Airlines just like President Bush I used to President Bush did for praying for our victory in the Go war.

[01:50:57]
Well there are a lot of people don't agree with religion in the boardroom and one is a Renzo and they live by they went got to New York and next morning got to that vector me to me they've been talking all night long the various ones so they exist and about half the borders on my side all the time and others were people that live rent of.

[01:51:21]
And so I don't have any problems any of the board matter fact. I didn't have a problem when the guys didn't do I did whatever I thought was right I didn't do what he did and what he was supposed to get out but the go for change that I mean he when we went bankrupt he couldn't leave the right then the board didn't get in Won't he wouldn't resign and a board didn't couldn't kick him off without having his shareholders meeting certainly don't want to do that when budget cuts and so so he had he was sought in the center of a group that says so and what not executive committee the next morning meeting I said we just want to talk with you alone and I had to lay out to other lawyers there another couple of guys and they said we want you to resign and I said why and they said Well.

[01:52:10]
They are a lawyer tell us not to tell you I said or what I said well we'll have to terminate you I said well you can tell your lawyers that I want to talk to Mahler's too about the kind of thing and you can fire me you know but you can't fire board Cheryl meeting and I just said they went they did when I was a they said let's call a recess.

[01:52:34]
Every 2nd our lawyers I went upstairs and call them are there at this guy that go in there and I told him what situation was he said with you're leaving I'm leaving. We said we said let's talk to our lawyers in Atlanta and so we call this law firm in Atlanta calm old Garfinkel outfit he was allowed for McMartin days been using Marta Marvin day he called Marvin Gaye with Mark Dayton is a tale where step back we'll have a I got to thinking about that and I decide Lamar you don't have to leave it just that they want to leave.

[01:53:13]
And a part of it is on this asking God I mean that frighten them and I said but I don't want to get in a fight like. Like Mark and I said I said we're in my group say 75 percent of our traffic comes from travel agencies and this would meet the news media and said The board is split and they're having a fight and trying to fire Harrison and I've been given a lot of good marks by the media what I was trying to do to her so I said I don't want to hurt cotton the people at Continental so I'm going to go to talk to the chairman of the executive and he will agree to make a deal with us to take care Yumi then then I will accept and so I did the story.

[01:54:02]
You know 3 months later I was and I was when I came back to City Hall in Atlanta I've been Al and the 3rd he'd been out to see me by the way it kind of lighter Eastern went out of business one of the Continental to really that was a big fill in the vacancy that eastern had left and so when I got here he and Frank Skinner Bell South Chairman I was on the aviation committee I think but I think Frank man was chairman of the.

[01:54:34]
Board Chamber of Commerce and I've been a 3rd was head of the Aviation Committee and I said they want to talk to me about starting up an airline here and allowed to compete with model but is that Delta now that we've got to go and talk to them 1st but I don't want to make them my and so we went with then we had a meeting.

[01:54:54]
With the mayor and and so I said I'm not go on but you can go and I talked with the run and what Hawkins. And they they never would say that they would and just trample us but that they quit but they I mean they would say that it's Ok but they said after a while I quit shaking our head and and then became neutral and I said well we'll think about it and when they did the put the cheval in the ground to build a present new international terminal with Hawkins was at the groundbreaking and he said and we welcome competition they told us to listen so that we thought that that was the Ok but if so I was in Europe talking to us or calling Marshall who still chairman of b a and you're going to over who had been a friend.

[01:55:44]
Were at. It we were in Frankfurt and 1st went to London and went to Frankfurt I got a message in Frankfurt that Gerry Roche will meet on so I called him and he said you know I told you when you left continental that. Air Canada was the only people I knew I was looking for a c.e.o. and they want to Canadian but they've been at it for now about a year and they had a guy that they wanted Don Carty who came here when it at American met he had been chairman of Canadian Pacific which he had and he had been he had one time had worked for Canada and he'd been chairman of going to see it which had been voted out by Pacific Western and then that somewhere along the line there he left and went American.

[01:56:30]
So they in fact so they talked to him he turned him down they made him an offer as a matter of fact I was told and then he went back to Bob Carr to Bob Crandall out of American that had a kind of made me an offer and Crandell told him Well look what you've got here he decided that a but he heat the board search committee said he told them with can you beat this offer and I said we're not going to get a bidding war so in a way they call Jerry Roach and Roache call me ran me down in Frankfurt and said the search committee will talk to you at Air Canada will you stop by and talk to me on the way home so I went to the coming straight line I went through with the search committee that was in the summer of 1991.

[01:57:23]
I was hired in January and went up to Air Canada and they were 192 so that's how I got in their account. As well I had a 5 year contract I left a few months before because we've got it turned around and I want to start my own airline out long bit but still I knew I was still on my mind but the interesting part is when they were talking to me they said we are either going to buy all of the international routes of Canadian airlines or we are going to have to buy the whole airline at 9 absence year so that was great because that would give us more international routes and anything all airline in a world Air Canada which had one time been a moment ago but at how they had all those routes and so was it a good sign when I got up there when I walked in the door we were losing a 1000000 and a half a day and they had 3 and you said we're 700 passenger combi sitting in a desert.

[01:58:20]
And I said well you know they're playing and they said well we can't make money with them I say here again make money with them sit in a desert I said just to get my psychology they were paid for as a matter of fact just to get what they cost and put them back up and.

[01:58:37]
We need cash anyway I'd learn to continental that cash is king when you're in trouble so we sold those 3 airplanes to General General Electric g.e. cast capital there a ration services just as we sold it to them provide those 3 for 450000000 and lease them back they are still flat and I get mad at us.

[01:58:58]
And so we had borne $50000000.00 plus some other cash and that gave us something to add to start the restructuring with each. 6. Learn something very valuable for a break when I walked in when I walked and yeah that's right I would I learned a Continental and I didn't have to do a lot of studying and then they'd have to get another one the person that did Air Canada was always big on consultants I kidded with the old chairman one time Mike said well you guys if you want to hire if you want a new position you can you get one consulting group to study and tell you what it is then you get one group to go out and find you somebody then when you hire that person you get another look a compensation group come in and this is a fact they tell you how much they're paying for everything with my contract I mean they just were big on that and so we didn't have time for all that you know so that was where help that I love more my both a learning and we're not soon I let along I went up later one of the guys that had gotten he came back and he was in the group here in Atlanta between you know 3 months between when we were trying to work on an airline Atlanta as they were as a question about the city I set up a group with Joel Cowan the martyr in our graduate another job cat Georgia Tech guy Robert Milton who is now president c.e.o. of the account I took him up there and then we had another Georgia Tech guy said we're going to a doctor's degree in computers we set up a.

[02:00:26]
Air eagle. Consulting the right to build this airline but when I got when I was hired to go to Air Canada what I did was I started bringing in Mon I brought him our own 1st and then I brought Robert Cone then another guy that worked for me at Delta I think him to London to run the European operations and and we had 3 you know what I want in France one in Germany and one in the u.k. and I'd need to somebody else that I knew and talked trusted that.

[02:01:00]
Nobody's going to try to do something behind your back and so Lamar was of their dislike he was down in the line and had Continental he was there in Air Canada and in this Robert Milton I brought him in later as a consultant and brought him online and when I left Lamar became president c.e.o. I had a lot of the pressure the board to do that because they wanted a Canadian and I said you shouldn't do that so they said we want to do a search and I said Do a search but you got to talk to Robert and you got to talk to Lamar and ask Jerry wrote what he think euro says if Allah says no do a search known to him.

[02:01:36]
Because he was he was one of my best friends and supporter and then connections that you make. Some backing it all up made it interesting to me because when I got there in February. Losing a 1000000 a half a day in found that within a couple 3 months we were trying to do the deal can I get Canadian Airlines we knew that wasn't going to happen so I thought we got a lock in this big population base east of the Mississippi.

[02:02:03]
And so I talked to us there then about doing something together and they were talking to be a and so forth so I went to the board I'd been there about 3 months now losing them in half a day and we already knew that without being owned by the government they were fact the whole company they had $3000.00 managers which over 14 months or so wait a minute we cut down to 1450 and then pretty soon I got everybody Cyrus start with mine and we got stock in a company which later everybody recouped what they've given to make up their ceremonies.

[02:02:39]
Tell me. 5 years where I can summarize it as being a very interesting and I'm glad that I had the opportunity because I mentioned when I came in they were losing a 1000000 a half and we did not were not able to put together a deal with the Canadian Airlines and I wanted to get into the.

[02:03:04]
Population base in the United States especially that part east of the Mississippi and therefore I went to the board and I said to them Look. A great airline is down in the United States in bankruptcy and that is Continental they have very low cost they only airline u.s. leads has lower costs and them is Southwest and so I think we ought to think about put together a team and buying them out of bankruptcy and they said Harris we lose a 1000000 half a day and you want to buy a bankrupt airline and that you must be crazy and or they'd laugh and say that but they.

[02:03:47]
Really they obviously had serious concerns and so I said I know they are aligned I know the. Population about the population base and specially with all u.s. Airlines I've studied it for a lot of years and and we can't get a partner let us air their Talking to be a and so forth so I think we ought to go at Continental after 2 or 3 weeks of discussion and they said Ok we ask Him to help us and you feel so strongly Let's go so I then went back to that call that Chairman.

[02:04:26]
Of the executive committee who was still there that I had that when I left Scott left the Continental and said he and I still made friends you know that was just one of those many and so I said we're interested in buying you out of bankruptcy and we've been following it in the paper but in the media because they Several people had tried to make an offer and I've been in bankruptcy now about 4 years so I and I said.

[02:04:53]
We'd like to talk to you and he said Ok so we agreed to meet in New York and we Lehman Brothers. Because of the Lehman Brothers guy was a Canadian and Bob Joe Dick and and then we got David Bonderman who used to do run projects for Bob bass one of the Bob bass rather one of the bass brothers out in Fort Worth Texas both multi-billionaires and so they had come out he had come down and talk to me when I was at Continental and so he knew Continental and we didn't make a day when I left and he still hadn't done anything and so I said let's get my name on it and and his his biker was Merrill Lynch.

[02:05:41]
Kind of like going back to Smith Barney which is now Solomon Smith Barney so for a lot of changes and. All those mergers and so we had a meeting so if we might shorten this a little we bid for Continental and we put in 55000000 for equity and they put in and 55000000 for 5000000 shares and $11.00 each their team in our team and we took the.

[02:06:16]
Debt we went to work to get the debt and we bid $420000000.00. It was enough we're Canada finally agreed to put in another $30000000.00 at 12 percent senior subordinated convertibles for some payment in kind of they got profitable maybe $450000000.00 we bid and got it so because of the 25 percent foreign ownership brew Air Canada could only have voting more than 25 percent so we had $24.00 and a half bottom and a group which is a part of the Texas Pacific Group.

[02:06:52]
Put together called air partners group they were our partner they ended up with 41 percent so that gave us 65 percent voting we together had 58 percent economic control stock and we had a stock and be stuck in the end and anyway we might we have to offer to $450.00 and so we want it and we then we're going to set up a board of 18 board members we get to put owns 6 at Air Canada bottom and crew put on 6 there were 3 from the creditors and 2 from independents and one from the sea for the c.e.o..

[02:07:30]
Then bottom and I made a video that if I said I'll support you to be 9 management chairman if you'll let me have one of your 6 so I had 6 Canadian and then I put my friend here Joe a cow and you came to count a good tech guy came you came back door Callen Parkway he's on the World Airways board and I put him on my continental board.

[02:07:53]
And so we got them out of bankruptcy and we and by no means group went to your electric and get 310000000 and that we were response was 15460 and we brought him out later put him on the stock market stock went to the b. shares went to about $35.00 right all along it finally went up into the fifty's the Burra people shareholders in town were giving me trouble about the shares not going up and why I spend all this money down in the before low the 49th parallel so I talked about I said before I leave we got the company turned around we're making money and what I'd like to do always want to be an investment banker So I want to represent the company as an investment banker and and we'll we'll set up this deal to sell our shares and Continental in 3 Trying to us and they agree to do that and they pay me much as you pay the big big vestment bikers but we did sell our share of the 150 May we put in 55 I mean the 4 of it we put in 55 g.k.s. had the debt and they had 55 and we we had the 30000000 then the bond so we had 85000000 and we sold it for 360 and then 2 years later bought him and his group so they're part 2 Northwest for 500000000 so everybody me you know very well about it came out good and they were near nightly during class you know I said you know you know and.

[02:09:32]
When I was a Delta I. When I moved to Peachtree City being on the air not an engineer I didn't have many financial classes were devoted to. Joel and another one of the people in the early game here Floyd far. And asked me to be on the board of Fayette State Bank.

[02:09:53]
And so I started learning and then I went on advisory board when it was acquired boarders acquired by CNS and went on advisory board C.N.N.'s Ron was on the big board at CNS then when I became president I had been cleansed about being off the board for a while and I went to the Sun Trust Board trust got me a ga board and all of those you learn from and you bring them together the longer you go in the game good each I learn more he learn our work and he's going to play I learned more what was the decision how did you make.

[02:10:25]
Your team well I've been there 5 years and Lamar had been so loyal to me I wanted to make sure he had an opportunity to be c.e.o. and also allowed up so that Robert could maybe when right when the Marv left if he wanted to and the board agreed and we set it up and I left because I was getting some opportunities to start an airline on a west coast in Long Beach it turned out it was when I left it was too close to the time when bad jet had that airplane that crashed in Florida it was and and of course loose Jordan and you know the good tech guy and he is a very good friend of mine and he he is the one I give credit for saving baggage it by going on the talk shows and and being kooky every day.

[02:11:10]
He worked for me at Con now about one but he's a great tech guy right and so I claim him as a friend I will be claiming as a friend I was very well endowed So how did World Com And so when I left and that didn't work out.

[02:11:27]
Since the Cal jet airline we never got enough money at 1st then we got enough money we could get the airplanes I decided to do something else and I came back to Georgia and eventually set up a little company called h l h Corps and I had Joel Cowan with an investor in that list Jordan with an investor and I'm a lot of the Billboard charts a Delta captain and his family and we set out to set up a leasing company while I was at Air Canada I'd worked for by Marty a the outfit that built a lot of things my ski dues and see do but they also built a little 50 seater jet a Canadian regional Canadian regional jet and so I had been when I'd bought some of those when I was at Air Canada and that's what you really think that that was I had bought some Air Canada and therefore I had a relationship with the Mardy a and that was a I talked to them about setting up a leasing company down here with them for any but for anybody in the world but primarily United States well as we were going through that we never did get to the point of implementation I got a call from 2 friends that were on the board of World Airways and I'd known them for many many years one of them was the guy that I was talking to at the meeting before I got started talking to the boys at Northwest and the other guy with the rest right that was then I was about on the other guy with Russ Ray who I've known about going back to his days at Lockheed.

[02:13:00]
And also Eastern Airlines and so they said we know about your turnaround work at Air Canada we had lost money and they had lost money in 1998 if they were look this was early one $999.00 I said we're looking at a business plan for $999.00 which says we are going to lose money.

[02:13:21]
So. We are you interested in coming up and working with. To help us turn the company around and I said Well it sounds interesting but top turned out they brought me aboard as a chairman present c.e.o. and May 1999 we did lose money that year we lost money in 2000 except in 2000 my unit an accounting practice change which showed that we made paper money on paper but you know it wasn't real money but the numbers said we made money but the next year was 2001 and even prior to $911.00 the airline economy especially cargo your ears were going badly and therefore we lost a lot of money especially after $911.00 and we lost about 21000000 in 26000000.

[02:14:16]
But. We were already getting our cost on the Contro and we were getting into the cost of my airplanes were getting our sorrows I think people to give up. Their tips and other Souray for 18 months and for that the board agreed to give them restricted stock and now that we're making money everybody that gave up.

[02:14:39]
Their salary has been able to recoup that and more and I did the same thing in our account at the I did it up there there was talk appreciation right instead of restricted stock Thank you I mean. We we did make money then in 2002 made $2000000.00 for the net and last year we made $1000.00 millionaires and we now are paying taxes because of the years when we were losing money obviously we didn't have any taxes to pay but we.

[02:15:11]
Have some net operating losses Carrefour not much because of a change control back in 2000 from our parent company which was liquidated. World Airways but they had a lot of our stock and when they were liquidated it was considered to be a change of control in the mates and under they you know a loss and counting laws we could take advantage of but we still take in like $300.00 something 1000 a year but last year we made we made $100000000.00 before taxes and then we paid $3000000.00 in time in taxes and so we made 15000000 after taxes.

[02:15:48]
And then in 2019 and 2002001 we. First 2 years we were at 266000000 revenue for 2003 we were at 474000000 revenues. And we have given told the world on a full disclosure we're going to make money in 2004 we've given guidance to the stock over that in the 1st quarter we'll have.

[02:16:20]
And I Last year we gave guidance that said we would we would have an operating income of between $23.28 and we were right at the $28000000.00 and so been given guidance for the 1st quarter this year we said 7 I have to 8 and a half but that'll be a quarter so you know that's that's a good start for the year and we set our revenue would be from between 10120000000 for the 1st quarter now we.

[02:16:47]
We haven't put anything out yet on the 1st quarter but we reported in May. Are you still have. I'm still having fun but. One of the philosophies that I have always had. In any management job is to have somebody that worked for me to be immediately available to take my place if I got run over by a truck so you believe in the heir apparent I believe in giving people prepared because if you can step in a call it is tough years you know you're grooming somebody all the time and I.

[02:17:22]
Recommend that to all the people I work with and also I have the basic philosophy that I always want to hire people working for me and for the company that are smarter than I am and I push them to be smarter than i only a lot I like to get credit for their good idea and I think that's a smart way to go that's right way to go.

[02:17:42]
You're living here in Peachtree City for how many years. 969 and this month it's 35 years so you stay here even though you went to air and you're still here. You're a very integral part of the beginning of this community look at the relationship. Probably Carolyn It probably has a big impact so there were only 600 people when we came here in 169 of course and I went 35000 and Joel was one of the founders and getting in the bank with him and in the church with him we have become friends and that was already done he's done some He's had me in some transactions because he's a money manager no money in a deal maker and you have people and of course he was just Frank heiresses campaign manager and he's been on the board of regents and he was he was he ran Gardner You know the greater regional translation authority by Roy Barnes he's a great guy accept Democrats the Republicans.

[02:18:50]
Are great friends nobody can be perfect to me this is a great place to bring up a family yes it is and I am. Sure. Well I wouldn't I would not be here if it weren't for my family the most important thing that ever happened to me and Mary and Joyce he has always been supportive and the kids have always been supportive and fortunately I had a.

[02:19:20]
Habit of probably putting. My company ahead of my family and a lot of times which penalize them but they were always especially they got all renewal going on and they have very much supported May Joyce and the children had a David and Jeff when I went to Texas and just decided she was going to they were going to live here and we were already having grandchildren and so she.

[02:19:49]
Had a real estate and so just one time I had done a little interior decorating she had trying to become an interior decorator and she'd always decorated the how that we have and so she they came to Houston and help me buy a condominium I bought a condominium at the.

[02:20:09]
Down by the Texas Medical Center in Rush University only about 2 miles from my office and and so Joyce helped me furnish it she got upset me when I had to leave suddenly and ended up going to move back here 1st didn't know I was going to get out of then I just told him to set it with everything and then we took out a few personal thing and let it go which she spent a lot of time and money and furnishing that place but that really helps settle because I hope to get a reward for great work she did great you know she was she the best thing to ever happen to me except the kids.

[02:20:45]
And I wouldn't be here without her because I had to have her support and of course this this is due in a few months we will have been married 49 years. And a bad track record and we've got 3 kids and 4 grandkids Let's talk about. Real estate yes she graduated Georgia Tech and I think it was 1978 degrees and industrial management and she went to work for a start and end up being a wrist chief in far eastern in Boston.

[02:21:19]
And when they when it came in to got into trouble before they went out of business she came back to Atlanta. And got into real estate. With the center 21 and bucket brokers people like that now she has her own home choice for you she and another guy the guy that she worked with both at Eastern and in real estate.

[02:21:41]
Owned the company and I gave him a little push you know it was far so we'll say it's a commercial thing and they are but they put their bill bold billboards up around town 2 and a half years ago and they now have about 20 to 30 agents working for him she's doing very well she's not I got a whole lot of she's my kinda little money and so that's good right by her check it's interesting.

[02:22:07]
In fact for the last 2 years she had advertised on like cups over Georgia Tech for the holiday I had to write and she she's. A part of some of the activities over there pretty savvy she's got a very high i.q. and she and I discuss things a lot for sometimes a heatedly I mean all my friends are basis and they also tell us to quit arguing and petty as I would not argue we're just discussing so she and I have a great relationship and I know now that was a period you know from about when she was 14 dating when she thought they had with a square peg in a round hole.

[02:22:46]
To be that means it's a normal situation she now has 2 children she has 2 children she's been married twice she's a single mother and if you've got 2 boys that are $6.00 and $4.00 carrying and Joss and I have the privilege of every setting and a lot on a weekend great great.

[02:23:05]
Fun Michael Michael. Michael with the tech one year he's the youngest and he. Studied architecture and then he got. Top and he went to West Georgia College for a while and he going to drive on a couple occasions and recently he's been back in college studying telecommunications and he's good on computers and things like that it's great but he's never said he's never gotten married never settle down he has a little health problem now which just slowed him down and he's not in school yet we have a condo George has a condo downtown which he lives in down on Holland Avenue which is going to tween Hilton told over toward sort of Everest at least got some goals so you know exactly what he wants to do he had he run over a few bumps in the road.

[02:24:01]
And he's 43 man in years and was the son. And the middle child is is a boy and he he he got I got a scholarship offer to Auburn and Georgia state and because of a girlfriend he took Georgia state where he was reared right here on the golf course but he was right I put it with a pro.

[02:24:26]
You know I just had to start along and learn when I was a kid didn't have enough money in the 1st place but when we moved here that one reason we came down here was because of the golf course there and he got started with a pro at 10 so he learned good techniques and plays a good golfer he's a junior.

[02:24:44]
He's a senior you know I mean he's very senior now he's Hollis he David a lot David Lloyd Sr and his son David Lloyd Jr dad when he was 9 and leukemia and he would have been about 15 now Interesting. And. It was. Very spread. Out so we.

[02:25:19]
You know we put a lot but our faith especially the children a lot of joy is not in God and may have made it so far still pretty tough on a mother and a grandmother and everybody but something from me but one of the things we were kids I always wanted to fly about sundown or down here to say airport and and all 4 of us took the bus.

[02:25:47]
I never did become a certified pallet but I flew no that airplane we used did until it was Christ and David to fly with Christ But he went alone and I bought another from bought another airplane from Joe Cowan which was a twin engine beach Baron and we let my son David to fly it far friend of ours that was on the board Norman Pascoe who's a big tech fan by the way he lives up on the north side but he got a plant here that been it replenishes cotton did that get them into.

[02:26:20]
Rock cotton and other things and makes it into things that can be used for Lot fillers and so forth all over the world in a way he used to a plaza around now before he now 80 something and but he's turned it over to his his son in law and some other people but he still kind of the office but my son David took that beach Baron and and freedom around all over the southeast and we did a bit isn't it and he is now a captain for us there always.

[02:26:48]
A flat 757767 David. He has a son Michael and Michael he has a daughter my Rachel who the oldest lady Rachael a little both a beauty queen she's going all over she was accepted at Tech I told her she had a job. So she wants to be an industrial psychologist and she's an a student and she may come to Texas and go study some in biochemical which is the place to be anything to do it.

[02:27:24]
So they have very bright futures and so there's 4 grandchildren who for Paddick 2 for David and David The youngest is Michael you know his name is Michael Hollis David got the low it out of my name is and I and the lone guy and he just turned 14.

[02:27:43]
And he. Be a good golfer and a good basketball player shooting up tall but he got a brilliant so you can because the video for Georgia Tech of articles he may want to get into the building design or something well that but he's got a good musically he got it he is in the orchestra at rising star for the rising star and star band orchestra and they just were chosen to go on a contest over Christmas up in Chicago.

[02:28:19]
And he plays the piano and. A plays the. Other instruments that are similar He has many talents so. It's interesting because now at Tech. You think it's part of the curriculum for all these years we can advance thank you it was never a credit thing gradually over the years.

[02:28:45]
You know it's just less good I mean you can he can do that and study architecture to be one thing if he wants to be great building course building construction program. But my family is it for everybody and I have my family is the biggest asset that I have if I've ever succeeded in anything it's because of them and especially joyous being supporting me and going back to them for a minute you know I told about by and helping me with a condo and because of that daughter said I'm not I'm still not going to move to Canada but because the headquarters up there in Montreal.

[02:29:25]
She she decided to come up and she and I would take French I'd always want to speak French and so we took a cram course in French but losing a 1000000 a half a day I started having to go out of town and when I was not and in town I would get home late or not at night so she said I'm going back to Georgia where the kids are the grandkids where I live and I had a suite and I'm condo for one year and then I had my suite and Queen Elizabeth Hotel which is right downtown and I love that it's a great country a great $10000.00 restaurant just after the terrible weather that staircase time because you know it didn't bother me because up there there is.

[02:30:09]
Unlike a lot a lot of not many u.s. companies have chauffeur driven car but I had a driver and car and he would drive I had to go to auto a lot most of all run it was prime minister when I went up there and he and his deputy prime minister they want to see who this green go was from south of the 40 knots and they called me up to Ottawa to talk to him and but I was always dealing with the government up there because a lot of people out there still think they're accountable long to the government don't even realize it.

[02:30:39]
Now somewhere when I read about your family I rejoice with. She is good she didn't recognize that our None of us recognize that until she got interested I won't say but you know in our thirty's early forty's so she started off with just water colors and then she got into different kind of painting and finally a doll and she can take a picture you paint your part paint a picture.

[02:31:10]
Yeah she she really she likes now when she gets a wedding invitation or something our shower she will she will pay me for the pay in addition to a gift she was. Going to go back from she left to entertain and she like to do and she didn't think she's always now she had cancer 3 or 4 years ago but ovarian cancer and colon cancer but the doctors with the good Lord's help got it all and so she's been out playing now for 3 years that's great and another crisis for you as a close family goes through everything.

[02:31:52]
You know one time things were going really good and and I was and you know what what have we done to deserve this and then things started happening I mean in my mother and dad were still alive till about 10 years ago actually till 996 my father. And.

[02:32:13]
Wonderful son then now something has happened to just about every one of us. Like what a code you about my grandson one thing after another I met life it's made us stronger sure we believe totally in God and if there was a reason for whatever has happened and and just believe that they would pay it well our children believe that sometimes we're tested against.

[02:32:42]
The future how much longer are you going to. Tell us No I probably will continue to do something as long as good or lets me have my health. And as you know I have announced that I'm retiring you know whatever meeting in May I don't know whether you'd pick that up or not but yeah I saw that but that doesn't really mean you're going to do nothing you know me he found somebody to pass the reins to and they and General Foti when he's retired people say the Air Force and chairman he was on the Joint Chiefs and he's now my advisor panel with the wrong file he's on my board and he agreed to be a non-executive chairman and I passed on the baton to random Martinez to be president chief executive officer he would come to you Executive Officer on April 1st and another guy brought in will be chief operating officer so I got there but $47.48 so I got the young lad ready to go you do you got the young lads receive them but you're not going to sit around and do anything do you still have if you don't want to see the world Yes I've been around the world I mean I own an actual linear trips about 25 times you know one way or the other for and then I've been I were saved many many times I just went like go from Vancouver to Hong Kong and back so the world is your neighborhood you pretty well I've been on every continent except Antarctica and Joe a cab and I plan to go down there you know Georgia Tech takes trips down there and I look at some of those roads are you know more around or not show you the same goes on some of the detector but the Antarctica trip is really funny I only do it once but we want to go down the pub in Argentina and take that about pretty brave to go to Antarctica and it's not a whole lot.

[02:34:33]
But pretty cold you have a life of great adventure as much adventure is Jack Armstrong ever driven and all that and then but I've been fortunate and I thank the good Lord for it and I thank my family for and you've been very generous giving everywhere you go back in May seem phenomenal Some people don't pay attention to where they came from but you have paid attention.

[02:34:58]
But I like buddies the better for having been around but I. Am. I have to tell you that is the main reason that I have been able to achieve some sort of mind I've been jealous of my rest my children but the 2nd biggest reason is that I got my degree at Georgia Tech and I would not have gotten that if I had had good friends Delta like David Garrow and others who.

[02:35:27]
Made it possible for me to get my degree while I was working with them and been prowlers been proud to say that I have a degree from Georgia Tech very proud to call you back the mutual admiration society if. I am in no way could I was amazed when you called me and said you were going to do that I know I had.

[02:35:50]
Just a grad a over there was a he was a wanted told you write your name is on the what we call. Captains of Industry. So yeah but there's so many stories I may be a little tense I don't know what you know I'm sorry to tell you sir you were cast in the original lot of people have said or allow a different airline I've been chairman of I can hold a job.

[02:36:15]
Posting here is a real story and then they know and then they go Well thank you for taking time for us to do it we have taken a chunk out of your day to day and we're grateful to to world and to you for the top line it's a story that we're going to take back to Georgia Tech I'm glad you came down and let me tell you about world in my life thank you sir.