Speaker 1: This is Lee Habib and this is Our American Stories,
Speaker 1: the show where America is the star and the American people.
Speaker 1: And by the way, to check out our Our American
Speaker 1: Stories podcast, subscribe on the iHeart Radio app or wherever
Speaker 1: you get your podcasts. Up next, the story of Gael Halverson,
Speaker 1: a young pilot and the US Army Air Corps who
Speaker 1: was assigned as a cargo pilot at the Berlin Airlift,
Speaker 1: in which US forces flew much needed supplies into a
Speaker 1: war torn Soviet blockaded Berlin following World War Two. Gail
Speaker 1: grew up on a farm in Utah and joined the
Speaker 1: Army Air Corps in June of nineteen forty two. Here's
Speaker 1: Colonel Halverson with the story beginning with the three weasons
Speaker 1: why he and his fellow serviceman saw the Berlin Airlift
Speaker 1: as necessary. I stayed in the Air Force, the Army
Speaker 1: Air Corps at the time after the war and wanted
Speaker 1: to keep flying. And we were briefed in our pilot
Speaker 1: meetings all the time, every month about the world situation
Speaker 1: after the war, and we knew from these briefings the
Speaker 1: new enemy was Stalin and Communism. He'd just taken Czechoslovakia
Speaker 1: had the popular Democratic leader assassinated taking Hungary, we knew
Speaker 1: his headed west. The second factor was we knew that
Speaker 1: most of the two million two point five million people
Speaker 1: in Berlin, in West Berlin were women and children. Very
Speaker 1: few men and the starve man take fresh milk or
Speaker 1: food from babies, from and from women and children. That
Speaker 1: sub mitigating factor and how we felt about what we're doing.
Speaker 1: The third one was when I landed that my first
Speaker 1: trip into Berlin of twenty thousand pounds of flour, and
Speaker 1: opened that have that back door. A crew chief went back,
Speaker 1: opened the door. In came these Germans, at six of them, unloaded,
Speaker 1: about six in the semi trail. I wondered how these
Speaker 1: supermen are gonna look. And they had mixed uniforms, part uniform,
Speaker 1: parts of eating quoth doctors or vomuk privates altogether for
Speaker 1: one purpose. They needed freedom, they needed flour. We had both.
Speaker 1: And when Night got out of cockpit and walked back,
Speaker 1: and the lead man came right up, put his hand
Speaker 1: in mind and gripped it and looked me in the eye,
Speaker 1: and his eyes remoist and looked down at that flower
Speaker 1: like rangel from heaven. And we're on the same pace.
Speaker 1: So there three factors. So I got to go to
Speaker 1: Berlin and see them on the ground. I had a
Speaker 1: friend in Berlin who says, you get here. I got
Speaker 1: a jeep four in a driver you take you over
Speaker 1: and see everything. And so one day I came back
Speaker 1: and it was by the seventeenth of July. Came back
Speaker 1: and landed at a rhine mine about noon. Was a
Speaker 1: beautiful day, sunshine. I'm supposed to go to bed and
Speaker 1: fly that night, having a movie camera in my hand.
Speaker 1: And Bill Christian, a buddy from Mobile, Alabama, was in
Speaker 1: the and an airplane in the next Hardest Man, Lord
Speaker 1: of dry Potatoes, ready to go to Berlin, just getting
Speaker 1: ready to start the engines. That, holy cow, what an opportunity.
Speaker 1: A beautiful day. Bill's going. I'll just jump on the
Speaker 1: airplane with him. I'm not going to bed. I got
Speaker 1: a jeep waining for me in Berlin. I get off
Speaker 1: the flight line. I'll go over the sea and get
Speaker 1: these great movies. And so John Pickering, my co pot
Speaker 1: go to bed. John, you and Elkins get to bed.
Speaker 1: I'm going to Berlin. I said, you're crazy, and I said,
Speaker 1: I know it, but I'm going to Berlin. If this
Speaker 1: thing stops tomorrow, they're going to send us all home.
Speaker 1: They're not going to let everybody go side seeing to Berlin.
Speaker 1: And I want to see Berlin. I want to see
Speaker 1: Hitler's bunker. I want to see the rice style got closed.
Speaker 1: I loved history, and here I was right in the
Speaker 1: middle of it. I said, I want to it's gonna
Speaker 1: be where I'm going to Berlin. I'll see it before
Speaker 1: I go back. All he needs the uniform. Airplanes come
Speaker 1: back five, no reservations required. So I jumped on the
Speaker 1: airplane went back. We called in and the jeepest waiting.
Speaker 1: But before I went around town, I wanted to get
Speaker 1: on the end of the runway and take pictures of
Speaker 1: the airplanes coming over the billings before I had to
Speaker 1: come between the billing. And that's that's that's how dumb
Speaker 1: I was. I thought it was going to be over
Speaker 1: that quick. I thought I was there to get the movies.
Speaker 1: If I were had any kids, to show them the approach.
Speaker 1: And so I went around there and started shooting movies.
Speaker 1: The aeroplanes coming over barbar fence in front of me,
Speaker 1: bombed out billions a couple hundred yards over and then suddenly,
Speaker 1: here here are the kids. See the color of their
Speaker 1: eyes are right up against me looking at this uniform
Speaker 1: was bowing them three years before, maybe killed their dad
Speaker 1: and mom, who knows, And I didn't know how they
Speaker 1: get I looked on all of a sudden, these thirty
Speaker 1: kids about ruffie thirty stand right on their side of
Speaker 1: the barbar from me, looking at me, and they were friendly,
Speaker 1: And I thought, why would they be friendly? You know, here,
Speaker 1: here's that uniform right here, And it was the first
Speaker 1: time they've seen a uniform, of course the military rushing
Speaker 1: the first which is terror and occupation guys. Later then
Speaker 1: I found out later why they were so friendly because
Speaker 1: their aunts and uncles or arbitrarrily cut off with the border.
Speaker 1: Not cut off because you can walk across the border then,
Speaker 1: but they could walk across the border. Their aunt's uncles
Speaker 1: and whoever the close family taught come over to West
Speaker 1: Berlin to use the library to see what's going on
Speaker 1: in the world. They'd lost their freedom, they lost freedom
Speaker 1: of the press, the freedom of expression, freedom of travel,
Speaker 1: freedom of religion, freedom of electing who they wanted to
Speaker 1: be their ruler. They'd lost that. So they were over
Speaker 1: there and they were telling their aunts and uncles, man,
Speaker 1: I can't travel, I can't do this, you can't do that,
Speaker 1: And they knew. They knew then what comments like. They
Speaker 1: had missionaries from the commist not for this program, but
Speaker 1: negative missionaries said hey, this is not very cool, buddy,
Speaker 1: No way you do these guys, so they were friendly.
Speaker 1: And you're listening to Colonel Gail Halverson tell the story
Speaker 1: of why the Berlin Airlift was necessary. The people who
Speaker 1: Germany knew who we were. We were on their side
Speaker 1: and on the side of freedom. When we come back,
Speaker 1: more of this remarkable story not told enough in America's classrooms,
Speaker 1: the story of the Cold War, the story of the
Speaker 1: Berlin Airlift. Here on our American Stories. Lei Habibi here
Speaker 1: the host of our American Stories. Every day on this show,
Speaker 1: we're bringing inspiring stories from across this great country, stories
Speaker 1: from our big cities and small towns. But we truly
Speaker 1: can't do the show without you. Our stories are free
Speaker 1: to listen to, but they're not free to make. If
Speaker 1: you love what you hear, go to our American Stories
Speaker 1: dot com and click the donate button. Give a little,
Speaker 1: give a lot. Go to our American Stories dot com
Speaker 1: and give, and we continue with our American stories and
Speaker 1: the story of Colonel Halverson, and in the end, the
Speaker 1: story of the Berlin Airlift and why it was so
Speaker 1: necessary and in the end so remarkable and emblematic of
Speaker 1: the people the country that made it happen. American style
Speaker 1: freedom was their dream, and Hitler's passed and Stalin's future
Speaker 1: was their nightmare. They knew, those kids, they ate the fourteen.
Speaker 1: They were giving me a lesson about freedom. Look, I said,
Speaker 1: it's pretty good here in July. You know, the weather's
Speaker 1: not too bad to get some storm. But you wait.
Speaker 1: They had school English. They spoke. Someone spoke pretty good English. School.
Speaker 1: I couldn't spin any German. They said, come to winter
Speaker 1: in the fall. You can't get in here. It's going
Speaker 1: to be bad. Kids to give me a lecture, said,
Speaker 1: but when that happens, don't worry about us. We don't
Speaker 1: have to have enough to eat. Just don't give up
Speaker 1: on us. Someday we'll have enough to eat. But if
Speaker 1: a loser freedom, we'll never get it back. American style
Speaker 1: freedom with their dream, and he knew about the other systems.
Speaker 1: They didn't want him. Those kids were incredible. I just
Speaker 1: did the whole he count, and I got so interested
Speaker 1: in listening to them. I looked at whilst some acts.
Speaker 1: I've been there over an hour, and I said, boy,
Speaker 1: he might not be waiting. I gotta get out of here.
Speaker 1: So I started to run, so see you later, kids,
Speaker 1: and I got about five steps and then the kids
Speaker 1: I stopped. I said, boy, these incredible kids. I said, well,
Speaker 1: they got a postgraduate degree in international relations. They know
Speaker 1: what's important. They got their head screwed on. They really
Speaker 1: know it's important. And it started walking and the little
Speaker 1: voice just kept came back again. I don't know how
Speaker 1: it overcame to get to the jeep. You're late, but
Speaker 1: it did. It don't treat me. And then I knew
Speaker 1: in a flash why why? And it was because during
Speaker 1: the war and after the war, walked down the street
Speaker 1: in the foreign country where the kids had some chocolate,
Speaker 1: not much, but had something. And those kids that changed it.
Speaker 1: Going down the street, interception and surrounded begging for chocolate,
Speaker 1: and government, of course the military, since the Continental Army
Speaker 1: was Washington, going through a town to give kids stuff
Speaker 1: from the rushing they had a little piece of chocolate
Speaker 1: or hard attack or somebody give it. The kids that's
Speaker 1: nothing new. And then I said, thought, they haven't had
Speaker 1: any chocolate for months. They haven't had gum. They already
Speaker 1: knew what gum was anyway, but no chocolate for months.
Speaker 1: And not one of those kids would lower themselves to
Speaker 1: be a beggar for something, go striving against chocolate when
Speaker 1: they had flower to be free. They wouldn't ask for
Speaker 1: more than freedom, lower themselves to beg for something more.
Speaker 1: It blew my mind. When somebody gives you a million dollars,
Speaker 1: you don't ask for four bucks more. Yeah, you wouldn't
Speaker 1: ask for that. Well they didn't. They didn't ask for
Speaker 1: that cream on the top, because there was so thankful
Speaker 1: for what freedom meant to them. When I realized that,
Speaker 1: I just said, holy cow, can't believe it. Not one
Speaker 1: child put out their hand, not one by voice in
Speaker 1: reflection in the kid, which you got some chocolate or something?
Speaker 1: Not one. So I reached my pocket and just had
Speaker 1: two sticks are gone. The holy cow, two sticks are gone.
Speaker 1: You're gonna have fights, You're gonna have Blaine noses. Get
Speaker 1: out of here, and said, well, I'd never see these
Speaker 1: kids again. I'll be flying twenty four hours, I'll sleep,
Speaker 1: I'll be sleeping when the autopilots flying coming to going
Speaker 1: a copile. Probably, But I can't come to the fence anymore.
Speaker 1: I'll never see these kids again. How can how could
Speaker 1: I possibly get something that's everybody? Well, I said, well
Speaker 1: give it to him. It's all you got. Broke in
Speaker 1: a half four pieces through the barbar. The kids that
Speaker 1: were translating. I gave them half a stick. They did
Speaker 1: most of it, and boy, they looked like they got
Speaker 1: a hundred dollar bill. And boy they'd got a hold
Speaker 1: of that. And then here came the rest the kids,
Speaker 1: and no fight. They just wanted a piece of the rapper.
Speaker 1: And the kids with half a stick um tore off
Speaker 1: the outer wrapper and the tinfoil and handed the kids
Speaker 1: that didn't get any anything at all. And the kid
Speaker 1: they got a piece of paper, put it up their
Speaker 1: nose and smelled it and smelled it a piece of paper.
Speaker 1: I stood there just flattened them. Believe what I've seen,
Speaker 1: Holy cow. For thirty cents, I could buy them thirty
Speaker 1: sticks of gum and they could have the rapper and everything.
Speaker 1: But how do I deliver it? I can't come out here.
Speaker 1: Could I get some German to deliver it? Who knows
Speaker 1: what kids will get it, or if you'd even deliver it.
Speaker 1: About that time, an aeroplane flew over my head, landed
Speaker 1: right the runaway behind me, and I got to the idea,
Speaker 1: I'm coming in tomorrow. I can deliver to these kids.
Speaker 1: I can put it in that open place and I'll
Speaker 1: get enough for everybody. And boy, and then the red
Speaker 1: light came on. So you got to have permission for that.
Speaker 1: You can't drop stuff out of airplanes unless you get
Speaker 1: the clearance. And then I rationalized, and that's how you
Speaker 1: get in trouble. That's the first step getting off the path.
Speaker 1: And so I thought, well, starving two million people, not
Speaker 1: according to oil anyway, what's a few sticks of gum.
Speaker 1: And so I found myself almost horrified, saying, kids, you
Speaker 1: come back tomorrow. Stand in this open place. When I
Speaker 1: come into land, I'll drop enough out of the airplane
Speaker 1: who is before I land. If you'll share it, I
Speaker 1: know you'll vold your vold will share it. They said,
Speaker 1: you bet, and bouncing up and down, and I started leaving.
Speaker 1: They called me back, said I said, what's the matter.
Speaker 1: You gotta know what airplane you're in. Every five minutes
Speaker 1: there was an aeroplane coming by here. Well, I didn't
Speaker 1: know what aeroplane. Because the airplanes from Alaska had ridden
Speaker 1: noses and red tails. They crashed in the snow they
Speaker 1: could find them, and the airplanes from Hawaii had coconut
Speaker 1: palms and stuff on them. Everybody had a different singing.
Speaker 1: And I flew whatever airplane was loaded. I don't know
Speaker 1: what airplane do for. I'm just sure it was a
Speaker 1: four engine. You'd a lot of two engine see forty.
Speaker 1: It was still fun. So four engine, they said, I
Speaker 1: not enough. We're gonna know. They had told wiggle the
Speaker 1: wings when I come over the beacon of first before
Speaker 1: we go hice Berlin to come around land all wiggle
Speaker 1: the wings. Boy said let's let's get out of here.
Speaker 1: Let's start this thing. So I went all over town.
Speaker 1: Got the movies you seene in every documentary, every major
Speaker 1: producers put out has got my film in it. I
Speaker 1: took around the city and off of the airlift as
Speaker 1: it went on, and I took those pictures, went back
Speaker 1: to several hours, ready to start flying. That night went
Speaker 1: the basic Change opened twenty four hours a day, bought
Speaker 1: all I could. I'm a weekly ration and I didn't
Speaker 1: have enough. So I went to my crew and I said,
Speaker 1: I gotta have your ration. They gave me. There's a
Speaker 1: big double handful of chocolate, chocolate bars, hers, she bars, Babe,
Speaker 1: ruth bounds and double mint gum, and broke up in
Speaker 1: three piece. Put three parachutes on it, anxious parachutes, and
Speaker 1: next day flew. That night, of course, and the next
Speaker 1: day fore noon that weather was good. Looked down there
Speaker 1: and those kids were right in the open place between
Speaker 1: the bottom doll buildings and the barbar fences. They hadn't
Speaker 1: told anybody else. It's small group. Wingled the wings and
Speaker 1: he went crazy. Still see their arms that they came
Speaker 1: over the bottom doll building. Right behind the policy. There's
Speaker 1: a flair shute where emergency flares pushed out in case
Speaker 1: you have emergency in flight. It's easy for the cuchief
Speaker 1: stamp between the policy just access that. So as he
Speaker 1: came over, the head just told push it out, and
Speaker 1: he pushed it out, unloaded twenty thousand pounds of flower.
Speaker 1: The Germans did and worried that somebody had seen the
Speaker 1: airplane as parachutes to get me in trouble, and lined
Speaker 1: up to take off and or they pulled the parachutes
Speaker 1: over the barbed wire where they couldn't get him in
Speaker 1: on the field, but he tacks it out. There're three
Speaker 1: hanctors waving through it, all airplanes. Their mouths are going
Speaker 1: up and down, and we waved, and I said, wish
Speaker 1: they wouldn't do that, waving all airplanes. I love. That's
Speaker 1: how it started. And you're listening to Colonel Gail Halverson
Speaker 1: tell the story of how the Berlin Airlift came to be.
Speaker 1: Two million people trapped without any means of really supporting themselves.
Speaker 1: We had bombed many parts of Germany to bits and
Speaker 1: leave it to American gis to come up with the
Speaker 1: idea or one. As he said, a light bulb went
Speaker 1: off in my head. But then he realized, quote, you
Speaker 1: can't drop stuff off out of airplanes without permission. And
Speaker 1: then he added, Then I rationalized, and that's when you
Speaker 1: get in trouble. More. This remarkable story, the story of
Speaker 1: the Berlin Airlift, the story of American compassion and ingenuity.
Speaker 1: Here on our American stories, and we continue with our
Speaker 1: American stories and the story of the Berlin Airlift, how
Speaker 1: it came to be, how it happened, and the man
Speaker 1: on the ground. Then, who's now telling us this story
Speaker 1: is Colonel Gail Halverson. Let's continue where Gail last left off.
Speaker 1: After the first ye off, Let's say it was about
Speaker 1: three weeks later when I got called in and and
Speaker 1: chewed out because I didn't have permission like Colonel Hall.
Speaker 1: And it was about that long ago. And then they said,
Speaker 1: it's okay, but you've got a report down to Frankfort,
Speaker 1: to the press center at Frankfort. They want to know
Speaker 1: all about it, this news release that came out. So
Speaker 1: it was then I knew that voice something read. Somebody
Speaker 1: re thought this was a crazy idea. So I went
Speaker 1: in and all the news, all the news agencies. Of
Speaker 1: course we're covering the Brunerla. So they were all there
Speaker 1: in this big Prescott center in Frankfort, and I was
Speaker 1: pretty humble. The first lieutenant guy and had a chauffeur
Speaker 1: and the driver and took me into Frankfort in a hurry,
Speaker 1: and and all these guys waiting for me. Wow, what
Speaker 1: do I call? What had happened? Then I knew, and
Speaker 1: from then I was crazy. Everybody was talking about it.
Speaker 1: When the word got out. We came back from Berlin
Speaker 1: to the beds, and there'd be boxes of chocolate at
Speaker 1: bars gone. The guys give the ration, and we figured
Speaker 1: that overall we must have dropped about a two hundred
Speaker 1: and fifty thousand parachutes during the During the course of
Speaker 1: the flockade, we were able to dropped. My buddies dropped
Speaker 1: after I had left. They kept dropping and dropped until
Speaker 1: the end of September nineteen forty nine, so it went
Speaker 1: on that long. What happened is that the American Confectioneers
Speaker 1: Association that represents all the candymakers in America got a
Speaker 1: hold of me when I was in New York in
Speaker 1: September nineteen forty eight to pick up an airplane. General
Speaker 1: Tunner had me stay for a week in New York
Speaker 1: and appear on the early television program We the People,
Speaker 1: and the number of radio talk shows and to inform
Speaker 1: people about what the airlift was like and my operation.
Speaker 1: And they represented the American Confectioneers Association said how much
Speaker 1: of this stuff can you use? And I gave him
Speaker 1: some ridiculous number, and later they sent six thousand pounds
Speaker 1: of chocolate hours by boat and by rail from through
Speaker 1: Bremerhaven down to Rhine Mine. I came back to Berlin
Speaker 1: one day and and an officer met me and there
Speaker 1: with a cheep and said come with me, and with
Speaker 1: four in said I'll show you. Went over the railway
Speaker 1: spur on Rhine Mine and there was a box car
Speaker 1: with a armed guard. And then I said what's in
Speaker 1: the box car? And he says chocolate bars? And it
Speaker 1: was two shipments of one three thousand pounds one thirty
Speaker 1: five hundred pounds of chocolate bar. And we couldn't drop
Speaker 1: that much because we didn't couldn't tie up the parachute.
Speaker 1: We're too busy, and so we decided to have a
Speaker 1: Christmas party in Berlin was had. And we we got
Speaker 1: that about the middle of the East summer nineteen forty eight,
Speaker 1: those shipments, and and we hadn't we put it unloaded
Speaker 1: and put it in the you know, supply building where
Speaker 1: there's somebody there all the time to guard it. Because
Speaker 1: the boy that there's enough chocolate the Viking dings castle
Speaker 1: on the black market, there's an incredible value. And so
Speaker 1: we accumulated all of it before Christmas. And on the
Speaker 1: twenty fourth of December nineteen forty eight, the German Youth
Speaker 1: Association in Berlin was a useful of West Berlin, and
Speaker 1: the military teamed up and had Christmas parties for the
Speaker 1: kids all over West Berlin for their amount. But from
Speaker 1: then on they said, so we can't, we can't handle
Speaker 1: it this way. If we had it ready to drop,
Speaker 1: then we could drop it over the city as we
Speaker 1: came in. And so they said, okay, I don't know
Speaker 1: how they found it, but ELM's Junior College in Chickabee, Massachusetts,
Speaker 1: and missus a miss O'Connor said, we'll handle that project
Speaker 1: for him and send all the candy dust and we'll
Speaker 1: tie up the parachutes, put in the boxes ready to
Speaker 1: drop and ship it. In Chickapee, mass they had a
Speaker 1: fire station and old fire station that they get a
Speaker 1: new and so the city gave it to them. They
Speaker 1: had a big sign up from Operation a Little Viddles
Speaker 1: and twenty two schools with alternate tying up parachutes, and
Speaker 1: sail boat companies donated old sail cloth. They have cut
Speaker 1: it up parachutes about the size of man's hankshif a
Speaker 1: little bigger, and the twine companies gave them all a twine.
Speaker 1: The cardboard companies gave them all the cardboard. They had
Speaker 1: processed eighteen tons through that facility by January nineteen forty nine.
Speaker 1: And west Over Air Force Bases right next to Chickapee
Speaker 1: mass is one of the big transport basis that supported
Speaker 1: rhind Mine and there's airplanes going back forth at all times,
Speaker 1: and so I had all my squadron were there organized
Speaker 1: though that we had a map of Berlin with pins
Speaker 1: on the map on the best places to drop through
Speaker 1: the cloud when it was cloudy. We knew where the
Speaker 1: homing beacons were around the city for navigation, and so
Speaker 1: we knew where the biggest playgrounds or where the children
Speaker 1: most likely cargoding. So we'd bring that those boxes in
Speaker 1: and the pilot would take him out and we quit
Speaker 1: dropping on the end by the end of the runway
Speaker 1: because the crowd was got too big and concentrated area.
Speaker 1: I was afraid the kids get hurt bigger guys running
Speaker 1: over them for the stuff, and so we started dropping
Speaker 1: randomly all over the city. So when we come over
Speaker 1: different parts of the city where we wanted to drop,
Speaker 1: why the creachie should go back and just check this
Speaker 1: cut the top of the cardboard box and just check
Speaker 1: it up against the escape hatch and the stuff would
Speaker 1: come out like popcorn and just blow all over the
Speaker 1: place and scatter all over the countryside. We dropped it
Speaker 1: from the thousand feet to two thousand feet and they
Speaker 1: just go over And I've got letters from kids that
Speaker 1: but see one man. In nineteen ninety eight, we flew
Speaker 1: the I'm still flying the Berlin Airlift Flying Museum, the
Speaker 1: Spirit of Freedom, the Berlin Airlift Historical Foundation aeroplane and
Speaker 1: we make parachute drops out of it a lot and
Speaker 1: go to the air shows all over the country. In
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety eight we flew across the North Atlantic back
Speaker 1: to Europe, sixty nine days in Europe, air shows and
Speaker 1: air drops in Great Britain, France, Luxemburg, Berlin twice, and
Speaker 1: then Berlin. When the people had come through the aeroplane,
Speaker 1: you could tell immediately those who were there doing the blockade.
Speaker 1: They're very emotional about telling you thanks for our freedom,
Speaker 1: and wisht I did tell you how much it meant
Speaker 1: to them. And you've been listening to Colonel Gail Halverson
Speaker 1: tell the story of the Berlin Airlift. After that first
Speaker 1: drop of his the one where he didn't ask for permission,
Speaker 1: well just a few weeks later he was hauled in,
Speaker 1: as he put it, and showed out. But soon thereafter
Speaker 1: he found himself into Frankfurt in a big press conference.
Speaker 1: He'd stumbled on to something, by the way, this old
Speaker 1: adage that my dad taught me, a military adage, better
Speaker 1: to ask for forgiveness than permission. And boy, is it
Speaker 1: no better evidence of that than right here, and my goodness,
Speaker 1: starting the drop in one place created problems. Everybody started
Speaker 1: to gather. Then the next thing you know, Halverson was
Speaker 1: worried that the young kids would get trampled by the
Speaker 1: starving big kids. So then the drops started to get
Speaker 1: scattered all over Germany and from one to two thousand feet.
Speaker 1: Can you imagine being starving and waiting for stuff to
Speaker 1: come out of the sky from American planes that it
Speaker 1: bombed you only well, just years before. It's remarkable. Actually,
Speaker 1: when we come back more of the story of the
Speaker 1: Berlin Airlift here on our American stories, and we continue
Speaker 1: with our American stories and with Colonel GAYL. Halverson, who
Speaker 1: was there and who in essence sort of got the
Speaker 1: thing rolling. The idea of the Berlin Airlift. Let's return
Speaker 1: where Gail last left off, but one of the men
Speaker 1: that came through sixty years old and said to me
Speaker 1: fifty years the guy was a boy ten going to school,
Speaker 1: and the clouds were very low and was raining, and
Speaker 1: I knew you were using radar the land because I
Speaker 1: couldn't see hear planes. And suddenly, out of this cloud
Speaker 1: team a parachute of the fresher as she Candyborn, landed
Speaker 1: right at my feet and took me a week to
Speaker 1: eat it. He said, it's astounded. I hit the day
Speaker 1: and night, and he said, it's not. The chocolate is important.
Speaker 1: It was important, was it? Somebody in America knew I
Speaker 1: was in trouble. Somebody cared. He said, I can live
Speaker 1: on thin rations, but not without hope. Without hope the
Speaker 1: souled eye, he said. And one little boy was going
Speaker 1: to school. Suddenly he'd here come a much of parachute,
Speaker 1: said what that better weather before, and they're picking him up.
Speaker 1: But he was out of the group of ways, and
Speaker 1: he saw that one land in the duck pond, and
Speaker 1: he ran in the duck pond after it, he got
Speaker 1: all mucky with duck stuff and everything else. They got
Speaker 1: the parachute in the chocolate bar, and they went on
Speaker 1: to school wasn't very far from where they caught him.
Speaker 1: The head master, so I'm going, what are you going
Speaker 1: kind of school? And all mundy and all messed umpany
Speaker 1: showing the thing. The guy says, oh, that's all right,
Speaker 1: that's all right, that's okay. And so I think he
Speaker 1: had the same home to change his clothes. But so
Speaker 1: that was it was excited for him that they never
Speaker 1: knew where it was going to. These these Berlin kids
Speaker 1: wrote to me and said, look, we can't help it
Speaker 1: where they put the border were over here with these Russians.
Speaker 1: We like the Americans. And when we're getting some of
Speaker 1: that stuff, we come over to West Berlin and we're
Speaker 1: catching it, and we'd like to have you drop it
Speaker 1: over East Berlin. There's not so many people over here'd
Speaker 1: be a lot better for us, And so I said,
Speaker 1: point not, and so I did, and it'd be fun.
Speaker 1: There are some soccer fields in our pattern as we'd
Speaker 1: go around East Berlin and when they'd be playing soccer.
Speaker 1: That's what I liked it best, because we saved the
Speaker 1: candy and we got over the kids playing soccer in
Speaker 1: East Berlin and kick it out and the soccer ball
Speaker 1: would go one direction. The kids had chased the ball.
Speaker 1: The parachute is going somewhere else, break up the soccer game.
Speaker 1: But that was fun to watch it. We'd bank the
Speaker 1: aeroplane and get a look at what's going on. So
Speaker 1: I had to quit because in East Berlin, because the
Speaker 1: Soviets complained to the State Department, there's a dirty capitalist trick.
Speaker 1: We're trying to influence the minds of the young people
Speaker 1: against us. The Soviets by giving him a chocolate and
Speaker 1: they said it was a CIA operation, this government operation.
Speaker 1: Who got to stovel? Never a government operation. And so
Speaker 1: I came back from Berlin one day and this Austin
Speaker 1: met the airplane and says, what are you doing over
Speaker 1: East Berlin? And then I knew I was in trouble.
Speaker 1: He said, well, he got to stop, and he told
Speaker 1: me why. I've had lots of people in East Berlin
Speaker 1: that I've met that caught parachutes. Asked me why I quit.
Speaker 1: That's politics, not people, and politics a problem. I guess
Speaker 1: the addictive it's the only drug. I was very addicted
Speaker 1: to smile in the kid's face when he got something unexpected.
Speaker 1: I didn't think I did anything special. I just gave
Speaker 1: kids two sticks again, and I just keep thinking it's
Speaker 1: just two sticks again, and it's all of this and
Speaker 1: whatever is made of it, somebody else not not noting
Speaker 1: I done. I didn't. Whenever you think that you you're
Speaker 1: causing all the good things to happen, boy, you're in
Speaker 1: deep trouble. I mean, from then on you are off
Speaker 1: the path of life. If you don't give credit for
Speaker 1: a good Lord and what what he's made available to us,
Speaker 1: and what other people do for you, then you just
Speaker 1: as well say, hey, Bud, yeah, I'm not a contributor
Speaker 1: to society anymore. I'm a millstone on the system. I
Speaker 1: think the airlift was to me. It was a reinforcement
Speaker 1: of the things my church taught me all my life,
Speaker 1: and my family taught me. Basically, money is not the
Speaker 1: answer to happiness. The more you get, the more you want,
Speaker 1: and there's just no answer and open ended the chase
Speaker 1: for the found of youth. That the only way to
Speaker 1: real fulfillments serving others, service before self. And that's one
Speaker 1: of the air Force core values, service before self. And
Speaker 1: that's what the Savior taught. This is life, is you
Speaker 1: want happiness, serve others. The dead see is dead because
Speaker 1: it takes in all the good ideas of fresh water
Speaker 1: and gives out nothing, So it's dead. And people that way,
Speaker 1: they say, give me, give me all the time, and
Speaker 1: give nought of themselves. The dead see soul. And that
Speaker 1: was demonstrated in the space one. Jesus Christ said, greater
Speaker 1: loving this that no man that he lay down his
Speaker 1: life or a friend, and or you want to buddies
Speaker 1: gave their lives for an enemy, Germans that became a friend.
Speaker 1: Why because the service, the reward you get you can't
Speaker 1: buy by helping somebody, especially having somebody need, and the
Speaker 1: enemy is the epitome. You're able to do that, well,
Speaker 1: that's the that's the ultiment. If you're able to forgive
Speaker 1: and to serve an enemy, so service before so earless.
Speaker 1: The perfect demonstration, absolutely perfect demonstration. And that indicates what
Speaker 1: my parents and my church taught me. And the other
Speaker 1: thing is that the little decision you make in life
Speaker 1: are important, extremely important, more important than big decisions because
Speaker 1: they put your footsteps in your mindset on a path
Speaker 1: that leads you to your final destination, your final position,
Speaker 1: and you're down that path where you're not going to
Speaker 1: return when the big decision comes that little decision for
Speaker 1: two sticks are gone and the whole world change for
Speaker 1: me for two six. Again, that's by the small as
Speaker 1: you can get. Where does a little decision come from? Well,
Speaker 1: we get an impression. Everybody's got a conscious, a spirit,
Speaker 1: we believe every sort of person has, and the conscious
Speaker 1: and you've got a trigger and it tells you very
Speaker 1: subtly what you ought to do, and then you argue
Speaker 1: with it and do something different, and then you miss
Speaker 1: out on on the good things in life. The gratitude
Speaker 1: and break down the wall between people when you when
Speaker 1: you're grateful for something, and don't think that you've invented
Speaker 1: the world by yourself and everything that happens to you
Speaker 1: was because how smart you are, and give credit to
Speaker 1: nobody else. Boy, you're in the dead seat, getting the
Speaker 1: dead seat again. But the gratitude by stopping and telling
Speaker 1: the lady mopping the floor and the office building on
Speaker 1: the way out that boy, you're doing a good job
Speaker 1: and sure make this place look better if you can
Speaker 1: see that, then steed grateful back and that that job
Speaker 1: is getting better next time. And the other the other
Speaker 1: thing I guess too is attitude. Ninety percent of the
Speaker 1: things that happened to us, including the airlift, we can
Speaker 1: do something about. We can hate the enemy and be
Speaker 1: mad all the time, or we can get on with
Speaker 1: it and enough to get the reinforcements to find out
Speaker 1: that we're doing something worthwhile. But the attitude determined the
Speaker 1: success or failure in the family, in the home, or
Speaker 1: in the nation of the community. The attitude how you
Speaker 1: approach things. Ninety percent of the things I think that
Speaker 1: happened to us, we can determine how we feel. We
Speaker 1: have controls that one string on their violin that how
Speaker 1: we react. That's attitude, and ten percent we can't. Let's
Speaker 1: be sent John Drot me. The serenity to accept the
Speaker 1: things that I can't change at ten percent that you
Speaker 1: can't change, and accourage to change the things I can,
Speaker 1: and the wisdom to tell the difference. So attitude attitude
Speaker 1: both about everything. Then the earlift had all of them. Attitude,
Speaker 1: gratitude serves before self, and integrity. All those things were
Speaker 1: factored in this year. Lift to me and a great
Speaker 1: job on the storytelling and production by Greg Engler and
Speaker 1: his special thanks to Colonel GAYL. Halverson, who celebrated his
Speaker 1: one hundred and first birthday. Recently and thanks to the
Speaker 1: National Archives for the interview and the Truman Presidential Library.
Speaker 1: There is also a wonderful children's book, Christmas from Heaven,
Speaker 1: The True Story of the Berlin Candy Bomber, with Tom
Speaker 1: Brokaw narrating a story in the books accompanying DVD. My goodness,
Speaker 1: how rich to bump into a beneficiary of the Berlin
Speaker 1: Airlift decades later and have a grown man say, it
Speaker 1: wasn't the chocolate that was important. It was the sense
Speaker 1: that someone out there cared. A person can survive thin rations.
Speaker 1: One can't survive without hope. And my goodness, two point
Speaker 1: three million tons of supplies were dropped in the Berlin Airlift,
Speaker 1: two point three million tons. It was called Operation Victuals
Speaker 1: and took place over an eighteen month period. And I
Speaker 1: simply love what Halverson said at the end. The Berlin
Speaker 1: Airlift reinforced many of the things my church taught me
Speaker 1: and my family. Money is not the answer. Real fulfillment
Speaker 1: comes from serving others, service before self. It's what our
Speaker 1: Savior taught us. Colonel Gale Halverson's story the Berlin Airlift story,
Speaker 1: and a story of so much more, including the American
Speaker 1: spirit and American generosity. By the way, we did this
Speaker 1: with the British as well, our compatriots across the sea.
Speaker 1: Here on our American story.