Bill McDonald:  

Greetings classmates. Barely Graduated from BHS Jun 1963 always admired you beautiful studious girls. Going on to the U of Missouri I Began to get my footing making social inroads leading to way too much party and not enough study resulted in a greetings note from Uncle Sam. My dad could see me headed in that direction so ensured no party by making future college plans into a mandatory...read parental... reorientation at Wentworth Military Academy Jr College 63-64. Virtually NO party opportunity/booze or girls distraction which helped me make Natl Honor Society and Letter at Jr College Football...a blessed opportunity to make up for my many shortcomings at BHS. Thanks Pop, I needed that to get a jump start on life. So on to the U of Missouri where I promptly reverted to my old ways ....fraternity, pledge, party, booze and girls....next semester saw me on Scholastic and also Social Probation (caught in a panty raid) and forced to live off campus. Naturally also lost my student deferment and got a draft notice leading me to BEG my way back into school and into AFROTC with out the requisite GPA. LUCKY ONCE AGAIN. However, THIS time I got the message and on 31 Jan 1968, I was a B.S. Ed grad (and a secondary school teacher in History) from the U of Missouri Columbia, Mo and had a 2Lt reserve commission from Air Force ROTC. Old man was proud but almost immediately followed by my really ONE big disappointment in my life failing my pilot physical (genetic eye issue). So when called up in Feb 68 I became a student at Aircraft Maintenance Officer Tech School for 8 months at Chanute AFB, Illinois. Then upon graduation in Oct 68 I was the first and only 2lt to go VFR direct to Vietnam assigned to fighter maintenance while most others went to Thailand. From Nov 68-to Dec 69 I was a 2Lt then 1st Lt fighter flight line Maint Officer in the 308th Tactical Fighter Squadron at Tuy Hoa Air Base, Republic of Vietnam, launching F-100D fighters over Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos which provided some pretty interesting..sometimes scary moments, Lost a few people and learned to greatly appreciate life as under constant threat of attacks mandated growing up on a fast track. As a single slightly crazy dude and a wanna be fighter pilot I sought ways to make my tour more interesting so talked my way into flying a number of combat missions with the US Army 48h Assault Helo Company (UH-1s) supporting the 28th Whitehorse ROK and similarly flew several Forward Air Controller missions (O-1/2) with the Herb FACs from the 21st TASS. After 13 months in Vietnam, I came back to Travis Air Force Base, Calif to not so friendly anti war greetings...still more trauma for me than actual combat. Assigned to Florida (F-4s) from 70 to 72...great SCUBA and several overseas deployments. Got married in April to a 2Lt WAF (loved her paycheck and 66 Mustang), went on alert and two weeks later, in response to the North Vietnamese Easter invasion, I deployed from the US in late Apr 72 again assigned as the squadron maintenance officer for the 308th Tac Ftr Sq to Udorn RTAFB, Thailand where we began launching daily bombing missions over North Vietnam via our 'summer help' F-4Es for nearly six months.. Lost three birds to the bad guys...but thankfully no morts and left two POWs behind. Also got an illegal mission in one of my jets up over Laos, and N Vietnam. Back in the states at Homestead, I was soon then assigned to Sembach, Germany to join my wife living on the economy....asssigned to the 17th AF staff giving me a lot of autonomy and thus was a .great assignment.....and of course, again much MORE BEER and great skiing and exposure to several foreign cultures. Helped that I had learned passable German thanks to the U of Maryland courses opening many many more great opportunities. Also graduated from the U of Utah overseas (campus professors assigned from Utah to Ramstein AB, Germany) winding up with an MS in Ind...Expand for more