Comment

It's impressive how these flyers seem to be all in on the war--something that hasn't happened since WWII as far as I know. This is stuff I never would have looked for on my own, and I'm happy to be reading it. I love the photos too!

During WWII my father was a radar mechanic at the far end of the shuttle bombing, dubbed Operation Frantic, in which allied bombers left England to bomb Germany and German-held territory. But instead of having to fly all the way back to England, they could fly the re…

when I hear about virtually ANY WWII AAF guys, my standard questions are "What neighborhood in Brooklyn?" and "Which high school did he attend?"

if this sounds a tad blinkered (or even just single-minded), humor me. this is one way of saying that I'm not entirely sure why I'm asking, but I always ask. I seem to have a weirdly abiding interest in the histories and cultures of NYC high schools. I figure it's harmless enough.

and it's a great story. after the war, did other government agencies try t…

Great comment!

My father lived at 505 12th St. His father taught physics at Manuel Training High School (I think tht's the correct name)--including to I.I. Rabi (Nobel winner) and the pilot of the Enola Gay. His mother taught second grade somewhere in Brooklyn.

My father learned to drive probably at least a decade, maybe two before his mother learned to drive. (His father never drove.) I think my father's friend Sam Chavkin, onthe same base, was also from Brooklyn.

The Brooklyn thing led to a prob…

these are great stories. at that time, there were thousands of them in the NYC Board of Ed. in the fifties, when I was in elementary school, I had several genius teachers. this was especially true of my fifth-grade teacher, who made it his business to "deal with" my stammer and to involve me in projects with other kids to bring my grade in "Works and plays well with others" from an "Unsatisfactory" to an "Outstanding." these were absolutely brilliant, dedicated people, who were making enough as…

Back in the mid-90s, when I hit the "age barrier" in upper-level Hollywood, I briefly considered the option of doing some substitute teaching in LAUSD (a fate I was eventually saved from by being monolingual), but I took the C-BEST exam, the California state teacher's competency exam (in which you demonstrate a 9th grade level of knowledge). Unlike everyone else who took it that day, I did not take any cram courses, and the last time I had done "story problems" was in 1958. We had three hours t…