(Presidents Medvedev and Obama at Ray’s Hellburger in Arlington. AP photo  by Charles Dharapak)   It is not a gig I would choose now, but it is a pretty good one, and I might have been attracted to it in my youth, about the time I graduated and had no particular future.   Of course […]

I heard the other day that ThinkGeek, an innovative novelty company, had come up with a new gag product. Previous efforts included a bogus fondue pot that worked from a USB connection to your office computer. Funny stuff.   The latest hoax was centered around a re-branded canned meat product. It looks to me like […]

The big opening of the season party happened at Joe’s last evening. Mary Margaret worked all the details, and the event was Sangria-powered and had plenty of food- the classic potato salad, excellent deviled eggs, three bean dip, fiery wings, and Diana Ross’s most triumphant pigs-in-blanket.   If you can believe it, the great state […]

Copyright 2010 Vic Socotra www.vicsocotra.com Subscribe to the RSS feed!

(Sadamu Komachi. IJN picture in USN archives) Sadamu Komachi was on the flight as well, and like Lt. Sakai, had been badly wounded but returned to service at the bitter end. He bagged 14 Americans in the course of his career, and he “could not bear to see American bombers flying serenely over a devastated […]

(314th Squadron (VH) against Mt. Fuji, 1945. USAAF picture) Bill McCullough remembers when Curtis Lemay’s order to transition to low-level tactics against Japan, changing from high-altitude daylight missions to mass low-level night-time attacks against industrial and population centers on the Home Islands.   The crews and support personnel welcomed the change. The struggle to get […]

(Enos “Country” Slaughter signs a ball for a fan on Tinian) I made a note to tell you the story of that epic series tomorrow, when I have not been driving all over Arlington, Fairfax and Loudoun Counties before breakfast. Copyright 2010 Vic Socotra www.vicsocotra.com Subscribe to the RSS feed!

Big League Baseball at Isley Field, Saipan, 1945 Bill McCullough was part of the world of Friday Night Lights, the religion that is Texas high school football for 34 years after he got back from Saipan. He coached ball and track, and he recalled some of the best baseball he had seen was right there […]

(Joltin’ Josie Nose Art. USAF Picture) Bill Mccullough was having a pretty good Father’s Day yesterday, and the memories came back with precision. It was a long time ago now, the day he got his draft notice and was called up for service from Gober, Texas, located ten miles southeast of Bonham in southeastern Fannin […]

(The first runway completed at Isley Field, Saipan, September 1944)   Q: How are men and the weather alike? A: Nothing can be done to change either of them.   It is Father’s Day, and cause for me to think about what the men of his generation were expected to do without complaint. The weather […]