Name dropping

I had recently received my commercial pilot certificate and was the only pilot available at our FBO to operate a charter flight to Las Vegas. My boss admonished me not to tell my passenger, motion picture star Yul Brynner, that I was only 18 years old, lest he go elsewhere for his flight. The 90-minute hop in the Bonanza was pleasant and uneventful. After deplaning, Brynner handed me a $100 bill, the first time I’d ever had one and much more than I was being paid for the flight itself ($6 per hour).

One of my most enjoyable charters involved taking Richard Boone, star of the popular western TV series Have Gun, Will Travel, to Gallup, New Mexico, where an episode was being filmed. Spending two days there with Boone and the cast was great fun. After returning to Santa Monica, I handed Boone a business card that I had crafted just for him. It read, Have Plane, Will Travel. No, I never saw him again.

I did have one repeat customer, Edward G. Robinson, an actor who was popular during Hollywood’s Golden Age and best known for his roles as tough guys and gangsters. During our flights to Palm Springs, however, he could not have been nicer. This is when I began to appreciate the obvious, that actors usually are not the same in real life as when they perform. One exception was John Wayne. He was on one of my TWA flights and sat in the cockpit jump seat from Amarillo to Wichita. In person, he was exactly like the man you see on the screen.

Edgar Bergen was a ventriloquist and comedian best known for his characters Charlie McCarthy and Mortimer Snerd. I once flew him to Palm Desert Airpark to pick up his Navion, left there because of fog that had blanketed the L.A. Basin. As I taxied the Stinson next to Bergen’s airplane, I could see Charlie McCarthy, Bergen’s ventriloquist dummy, sitting in the co-pilot’s seat as if preparing the Navion for departure.

Sky King was a television series in the 1950s, especially popular with those who enjoyed programs involving aviation. The lead character, Sky King, was played by Kirby Grant, who flew two twin-engine airplanes integral to the script. His first was a Cessna T–50, a “Bamboo Bomber,” and his second a Cessna 310. I cannot begin to describe how thrilling it was for a young pilot like me to fly Sky King to a central California ranch—in a Cessna 310, no less.

I also was a teenage flight instructor in those halcyon days, and one of my most memorable students was actress Jill St. John (see photo). Jill would 14 years later become the female lead in the James Bond flick Diamonds are Forever, and was nothing short of gorgeous (and an excellent student). The most challenging aspect of teaching her to fly was to conceal my developing feelings for her. (She was engaged to be married.)

Maj. Gen. Archie Old Jr. might not be as famous as some of my charter passengers, but he was responsible for one of my most exciting charter flights. I was still 18 and flew a photographer from Life magazine to March Air Force Base to photograph the arrival of three B–52 bombers completing the first nonstop flight around the world made in jet-powered aircraft (January 1957). Gen. Old led the formation.
I was allowed to stand next to the runway with the photographer abeam where the B–52s were to touch down. He handed me a camera and said, “Here, kid. Shoot the whole roll. You might luck out and get the best shot.”

I’m sure I didn’t get the best shot, but I’d bet I had the most fun.

Barry Schiff is also the author of our monthly quiz, “Test Pilot,” which he has been writing for 30 years.
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