Thursday August 28 2008 11:27:07 am

Received in email from Phillip Schulz:
I sent a inquiry to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers History Office in Alexandria, Va. Ask if they knew where a person could get the original drawings and specs for the Pratt AAF buildings. The person that answered is from Marion and is returing this fall to a high school reunion. A small world out there.
He gave me a couple leads as to where to look. I think Pratt has some drawings but don't know what they really have. I would really like to find it in black and white what the letters stand for on the drawings and sizes and specifications of the different buildings.
I came across an article in a newspaper that was 3 years old about a guy that worked on Bombsights at Topeka AAF. I searched for the name and came up with one in the Shawnee Mission area, turns out this is the guys son and is an architect and he gave me his dads phone number. Called him as the parents are in an apartment complex.
Dad was born in one of the southern states and went to aircraft electrical school and was near graduation when a captain came into the class one day and ask if the top 5 of the 50 students would be interested in working for the military as civilian employees. He got into the program and went to Minneapolis Mn and then to Wright Field at Dayton, Ohio. for Bombsight schooling. When he finished school he had a choice of 3 airfields and he chose Topeka because it was the Capital of Kansas. He didn't know anything else about Kansas.
He was always a civilian. He talks about having 3 helpers working for him. They had a copy of his ID in the paper article. He mentioned the Sight repair shop being in the back of the armaments building. You had to go thru the armament section then thru a secure door to the back area where their repair shop was. He mentioned the vaults in the back of the building, nobody got back there except him and his 3 helpers.
I am coming to the conclusion that the vault by the R&R hangar is the remains of this long repair building. They had armed guards and nobody got into their shop but the 4 of them and the Captain in charge of Bomb Sight Security. They flew B-24s at Topeka and the crews would come in pickup their new airplane and fly 5 to 10 hours then leave for Florida and to Europe. He rode with some of the crews to test the sights. Some of them gave him quite a ride as he recalls. Low level tree top flying in the B24s after the higher altitude sight testing.
When they removed the sight there were Military Police to guard the sights transfer to the storage vaults. His shop was airconditioned and heated very well as the temp stayed a certain level. He confirmed it was refrigerated airconditioning. Guess this is similar to the conditions in the Celestial Navigation Buildings. I remember seeing one of these old refrigerated airconditioners here at the Stafford airport in the early 60's about half as tall as a refrigerator and had big coils and a big electric motor, which probably created as much heat as the cold air the unit put out. Wish it was still around.
His son bought him a new surplus bomb sight several years ago and they have it on loan to the Museum at Forbes Field, Topeka. Very interesting to find this info from him and his wife. It was so good to find someone who acturally handled and worked on those sights... Guess they have a nice display of the Bombsight and related material at the museum.