HomeMy WebLinkAboutDon Nicholas Radio Transcription #1City of College Station
Heritage Programs Oral History
Interviewee: Don Nicholas
Interviewer: Tom Turbiville
Place: College Station, Texas
Project: Veterans of the Valley
Transcriber: Brooke Linsenbardt
00:00: Tom Turbiville (TT): Hard to imagine that anyone has packed more living in the 87 years than Don Nicholas of Bryan. A&M class of 1948. A&M quarterback in ’47, ’48, ‘and ’49. Played
football and baseball in the service before the Korean War heated up. And once it did, he flew 20 B-29 missions from his base in Okinawa. What was gonna be a single hitch in the Air
Force followed by a coaching career, turned out instead to be a 31 year career as a flyer. And that included three tours of Vietnam, flying 69 B-52 missions. And then after he retired
in 1976 well, Don Nicholas and his Air Force buddy Ken (Lighty?) spent 15 years as one of the top senior doubles teams in the country. It’s been quite a life. First off let’s hear Don
Nicholas talk about flying in Korea.
00:52: Don Nicholas (DN): Well the tours out there were generally six months long and they were rotating crews in there, pretty regularly so, I think my crew flew about 25 missions.
I flew 20 because generally when the new crews came in, they bumped the co-pilot, and took the new pilot along with, the old head. Gave him a couple of rides and, along with the navigator.
The two key guys on the crew. The flying was, generally interdictory type. In other words we were up after troop concentrations, marshalling yards. Whenever some kind of a skirmish
broke out and they needed some air support, we were called in up there to, to help out with that.
TT: But then in Vietnam, B-52s. 69 missions. Here again Don Nicholas.
01:46: DN: In 1966 went out as a, just a line pilot. And I, so I was flying a crew and we were flying every third day. 8 to 10 hours like you say. And then my second tour out there,
got a squadron. And so I did a fair amount of flying with my people. We had, I had about 15 crews out there. So I would flew, fly with them, on a regular basis. And then the third tour
out there in 1972 there was a pretty good break, between ’67 and ’72. I was the Vice-Wing Commander of a, a unit in (Placid?), New York and we were flying FB-111s. I guess, the people
were manning the, the jobs out there, saw my B-52 experience and, decided that I would be, somebody they could use out there. And at that time they were building up the force, for eventually,
going north. And, so I was the, director of operations for the Air division. And we had about, two tactical wings out there about that time. And then the, the incumbent of the Vice-Commander
job was moved into another job and so I got the Vice-Commander job.
TT: We’re gonna hear more from Don Nicholas and about his service in Korea and Vietnam next week. I’m Tom Turbiville, this is Bravo Brazos Valley.