Keep the Wings level and True

THUNDERBIRD FIELD, AN ARTIST'S CREATION, STARTS 'EM OFF HEY COME TO THUNDERBIRD, these young boys, from all over the world. Americans, Chinese, English-young, eager, intensely serious these boys have come to Thunderfield to learn the ABC's of flying and all the preliminary business and rigamarole connected with it.

The English have their own field now, but Thunderbird-not far from Glendalehas known almost as many accents as Ellis Island.

Unlike Luke and Williams, Thunderbird is not an Army air school. It is privately operated by the Southwest Airways, Inc. but its operations are under the supervision of Army air force officers and you can bet your boots that Thunderbird graduates are ready for the second stage of air training, in the U. S. Army's "university course" of flight instruction. Like as not, the Thunderbird student, when he arrives at the field, has never been in a plane. If he survives the course, he not only can fly by himself but he can speak glibly about such things as meteorology, navigation, aerodynamics, mechanical theory and application, and jawbreakers like that, and he begins to drop his civilian slouch and to walk and to talk and to act like a soldier. Sometimes a boy will have had some flying and will think that he's pretty good and will assume the attitude that primary training for him is a waste of time. Those tough instructors at Thunderbird will show him a few tricks he never knew before and then the boy will settle down and learn the fundamentals of flying the way the Army wants him to Off we go into the wild blue yonder Keep the wings level and true. From the song of the Army airmen, "The Army Air Corps."

Thunderbird Field, owned and operated by Southwest Airways, Inc., is a creation of beauty, the handiwork of Millard Sheets, prominent artist. Here cadets get their first taste of flying in light Waco and Stearman trainers under the watchful eye of Army officials.

A class at Thunderbird appears in a group picture. Students in primary training not only learn how to fly but get intensive classroom instruction in meteorology, navigation, aerodynamics, and mechanics.

To learn them. The army is very particular about this first course in flying and a boy has to cut the mustard the Army way. Out of every class arriving at Thunderbird a number of the boys will fall out by the wayside. You may want ever so much to learn to fly but you're just not adapted for flying. It's like spinach some people just can't eat it. They even find out at Thunderbird whether you like spinach, and it doesn't take them long to find out whether you'll make a flyer or not. Thunderbird Field looks like a Hollywood movie set ready for technicolor cameras, and as a matter of fact it is. Mr. Leland Hayward, the president of Southwest Airways, Inc., is an After a dozen or so hours of flight under the watchful supervision of an instructor, the student some morning has the thrill of the first solo at Thunderbird. Civilian instructors and Army officials heed every detail of the cadets training and cadets not suited for flying are eliminated early in the course. Thunderbird graduates are ready for basic and advanced stages of instruction at other fields.

actor's agent in Hollywood and the investors in the company would sound like a Who's Who of Cinemaland. An artist chap by the name of Millard Sheets was chosen to design Thunderbird and he succeeded so well and so colorfully that a motion picture company has already been there making an air romance in technicolor and the joint has already appeared in pretty color pictures in the Saturday Evening Post. Thunderbird is photogenically perfect and after the war the field will probably settle down in its old age as a swank flying club.

Twenty-five-year-old olive trees and Bermuda grass sprang up over night, and beautiful bark peeled columns appeared around every building. The school immediately attracted nation-wide attention as one of the most carefully designed and beautifully executed training centers in the country.

Set apart on the broad desert space Thunderbird is a community unto itself. A visitor entering the grounds first comes to the administration building which houses the flight surgeon's office and hospital as well as the offices of the Air Corps Detachment and Southwest Airways, Inc. Farther on, and towards the field, are the cadet barracks attractively arranged in diamond formation. Inside the patio, amid landscaped lawns, are a tennis court and swimming pool for the cadets to use in their few leisure hours. At one end of the diamond are classrooms for the ground school courses that accompany the flying, and at the other are the mess hall and kitchens.

But don't think there is anything pansy-wansy about Thunderbird in these days of the tempest. The enemy (them louses) could learn a thing or two about how to teach youngsters to fly by having a few spotters hanging about the desert colored pastelled buildings. When a Thunderbird grad arrives at an Army field some place else for his next round of training he needs no other recommendation. Thunderbird turns 'em out well and soundly trained in the fundamentals.

Few schools in the country probably have better instructors. Shortly after Pearl Harbor six of the young instructors at Thunderbird were practically packed and on their way to the Army. They wanted action and quick. Officials of the field finally persuaded them to stay because their services were so badly needed, and they stayed. But how can you beat guys like that?

At Thunderbird both American and Chinese students receive primary training. English cadets also studied here while Falcon Field was under construction.