island. Without knowing whether they were over the rocks south or north of it, they made a prayerful turn and in about five minutes could hear voices on the short-range radio. They were over Tinian Island, which had an airfield. As they landed the B-17 and taxied down the runway, the engines sputtered one by one and then stopped. Their last fuel had been used up on the runway. Boyd's last assignment was as operations officer for a search and rescue unit at Itami Air Base, near Osaka. 'Just when I was scheduled to go home, my commanding officer called me in and told me we were opening a new flight at Osaka and that I was to be the operations officer. Well, I expressed myself to him. I think I'll even admit I used a few scriptural terms out of context. He listened very patiently, and when it was all over with he said, 'Well, that's all right, Packer; you're still going.' And so it was. That afternoon, on a C-47, with all my gear and the others who'd been assigned, I sat bitterly grumbling over knowing that it would take months; it wouldn't be just an assignment of a week or two. Then I pled with the Lord, saying, 'Why is it?' I had never wanted anything so much as I wanted to be home. I'd prayed for it and I tried to earn it, I'd tried to deserve it, I'd tried to behave myself, and then, when it was within my grasp, the very thing I wanted most was denied me. Somehow, I don't remember how, I took hold of myself; but looking back now, I can say the Lord was answering my prayers then. There came from that experience, from things that happened in those few months, lessons essential to the preparation for the calling that is now mine. I couldn't see that far ahead, but by those tests or trials that we receive, often times the Lord will prepare us for what He has in mind. Their terrible circumstances of post-war Japan were evident to Boyd on many occasions. One was while he was stationed near Osaka. He and other crew members went one day to the waterfront in Kobe Bay to look for a suitable dock for the boat of their air-sea rescue squadron. Kobe Bay itself looked something like a burned-over forest, with the masts of sunken ships sticking above the shallow water of the bay. 'Virtually everything had been destroyed,' he recalls. The road went around a fairly sizeable tidal basin that at low tide was only about waist deep at the deepest part. We noticed a number of Japanese women and children wading in the water. Oil from the sunken vessels was captured in this tidal basin at low ride. It was very cold. We stopped to see what they were doing and found that they were gathering the thick oil scum as it washed onto the shoreline. They were molding it into small balls, squeezing the water out of it, and putting it on boards to dry in the sun. Obviously it was for fuel against the cold winter that was coming. A sad incident happened on Boyd's train journey to Yokohama. The station, or what was left of it, was cold. Starving children were sleeping in the corners, the fortunate ones with a newspaper or old rags to cover them. Boyd had undressed for the night and was sleeping fitfully in a bunk that was too short for him when, in the bleak dawn, the train made a brief stop at a station. Amused by an insistent tapping on the window, he raised the blind to see a small boy of six or so dressed only in a ragged shirt-like kimono. He was emaciated from hunger, his head scaly, his jaw swollen and a dirty rag binding it. He held a beggar's cup out to Boyd. 'When I saw him, and he saw that I was awake, he waved his can. He was begging. In pity, I thought, 'How can I help him?' Then I remembered. I had money, Japanese money. I quickly groped for my clothing and found some yellow notes in my pocket. I tried to open the window. But it was stuck. I slipped on my trousers and hurried to the end of the car. He stood outside expectantly. As I pushed at the resistant door, the train pulled away from the station. Through the dirty windows I could see him, holding that rusty tin can, with the dirty rag around his swollen jaw. 'There I stood, an officer from a conquering army, heading home to a family and a future. There I stood, half-dressed, clutching some money which he had seen but which I could not get to him. I wanted to help him, but couldn't. The only comfort I draw is that I did want to help him. That was decades ago, but I can see him as clearly as if it were yesterday. 'Perhaps I was scarred by that experience. If so, it is a battle scar, a worthy one, for which I bear no shame. It reminds me of my duty.' Boyd K. Packer, (first row, left,) and his bomber crew 50 Leon Claron Packer Leon Packer was elected to the office of Student Body Treasurer while a student at Weber during 1936-1938. As war clouds thickened over the world. Packer joined the Army in April of 1941 and was assigned to pilot training in the Army Air Corps. During the war, he was stationed in England with the 8th Air Force and flew 22 combat missions for a total of 200 combat hours as a bomber pilot. On a bombing mission, for a target in France in 1943, his plane was badly damaged by antiaircraft fire and German fighter planes. He was forced to crash land his plane at Land's End in England. He barely made it back across the English Channel. During the summer of 1943, Packer was assigned temporary duty in Benghazi, Libya, flying combat missions over targets in southern Europe. On one such mission, he was forced to land his aircraft in a dry lake bed in Sardinia, unable to make the return trip to Benghazi. For his courageous actions and leadership, Packer was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross with two Oak Leaf Clusters, the Air Medal, the Croix de Guerre with palm (from France), a Presidential Unit Citation with one Oak Leaf Cluster, European, Africa and Middle East Campaign Medals with 9 Battle Stars, WWII Victory Medal, and various other campaign and recognition ribbons. Packer remained in the Air Force Reserve until 1972 when he retired as a Brigadier General. His unique record of service is a tribute to his family and to all alumni of Weber College. Milton H. Page_ My first assignment led me to Minter Field, Bakersfield, California. I was assigned as an instructor pilot in the Basic Flying School. Pilot training then was divided into Primary, Basic and Advanced, each taking about three and one half months to complete. Minter Field here in Bakersfield was a Basic Flying School. We used Vultee BT-13s, with 450 horsepower engines. Also, the latter half of Basic, UC-78s were used to introduce the cadets to twin engine flying. I had five cadets assigned to me in each three-month class. Later on, more instrument flying was introduced. volunteered to teach this phase, since I felt well qualified. It is a tough part of flying to learn. The student is in the back seat, and a 'hood' is pulled over the cockpit space, cutting off all view of the outside world. From the front seat, I would taxi the airplane out to the end of the runway, line it up for take-off, and then turn it over to the cadet in the back seat. While totally on instruments, the student would take off, and fly a preplanned cross country course, returning to the airfield and make an instrument letdown and low approach before again seeing the outside world. This was quite a realistic simulation of flying inside solid cloud cover. Some cadets who were otherwise excellent pilots, could not handle flying under the hood, without having problems ranging from claustrophobia to disorientation. By this time, the Air Corps had spent many thousands of dollars training them, but they would have to be 'washed out.' I only lost one cadet to this problem in my groups of five over the seven months of my assignment. We had absolutely no control over what airplanes we would fly, or the type of assignment. I had often requested to fly fighters, to no avail. But then everyone else had done the same. My next assignment took me to England. I traveled there aboard the original passenger liner Queen Elizabeth. She had been converted into a giant troop ship. The ship was fast enough to travel unescorted, avoiding German subs by changing course frequently. My destiny in WWII was to fly transport planes, dropping paratroopers behind enemy lines and to land close behind the lines and evacuate the wounded to large field hospitals. One time I had landed there waiting for field ambulances to arrive, when flying very low and fast, came a flight of two German ME-109 fighters headed our way. We scattered fast, hitting the ground and were not hurt. The only damage came from one of their bullets blowing a large hole in my propeller blade. This of course disabled the airplane. I participated in many minor combat drops. The two major ones were The Rhine River Crossing, and The Battle of the Bulge. Mostly, I dropped British and Polish paratroopers. Only had one ever refuse to jump, a Brit. Just prior to this time, we had been flying missions out of our base near Kettering, Lanchester, England. The nights here were often nerve-racking, since Germany was sending their big V1 and V2 rockets into targets over all of southern England. One never knew where the next one would strike. We could hear the rocket engines driving them a long distance off. However, at 4 a.m. one morning, we were all asleep when one landed close enough to shake the whole Quonset hut, and knocked me half out of bed. I also want to describe the conditions in southern England, and more especially in and around London in 1944. Soon after Hitler's over-running of Western Europe, the British began an all out effort to mount 51