My hero, gone

I just received word that Brigadier General Harold Confer USAF Retired, passed away last evening. Harold hailing from good Southwestern stock lived in the San Antonio, Texas after he retired from the Air Force pursuing a second career in real estate. He is survived by one brother Paul of Culbertson.

When I was a child, my family lived in a two-story house dug into a canyon bank about 16 miles southwest of McCook. The exterior walls were made from hollow tile. The rear of the upper floor was ground level and a steep set of stairs led to the single room, kitchen, dining and living room, lower level which walked out at ground level. My mother hated it. A vivid memory as a child was mom screaming, looking eye to eye with a large bull snake, as she was walking down stairs. Dad thought it funny and that didn't help.

Living where neighbors were not close by the highlight of the week was attending services at the old Stone Church south of Culbertson. Mrs. Confer, Jessie, Harold's mother, was Sunday School Superintendent. Harold was the youngest of four sisters and three other brothers including Merle who later became a loved and successful coach at McCook Junior College. By then Paul was off to the U.S. Army serving as a stable hand in a horse Calvary outfit.

Not long after World War II kicked off and upon graduation from high school, Harold joined the Army Air Corps as an aviation cadet. On graduation and the award of silver pilot's wings he was assigned to bombers. Initially, he flew B-17s, as I recall, and then into the brand-new B-29. Just after Victory Japan, I remember seeing handsome Harold's picture in a newsreel clip at the Fox Theater. Harold was waving out the copilot's window while the crew crawled out of their B-29 having just set a world speed record flying from Japan to somewhere in the U.S.

After my own stint at Air Force pilot training I was going through "transition" learning to fly the KC-97, a direct descendant of the B-29 at Randolph AFB, near San Antonio.

On a weekend off I drove to Fort Worth to visit my hero Harold, better known in the Air Force as "Hal," who was learning to fly the B-58. His was the first-ever B-58 unit in SAC. Four engine, jet powered, supersonic, Mach 2, and designed to carry nuclear weapons.

Nicknamed the "Hustler" it was quite an aircraft! Major Hal was in the initial cadre.

Incidentally, Hal's best friend in that B-58 outfit was a fellow major by the name of Deutschendorf.

Hal, who had married a McCook girl by the name of Dottie Steele had children the same age and they grew up with Dutch's children next door. Later on, one of Dutch's boys got into music and adopted the easier to pronounce stage name of "John Denver."

The next thing I heard of Major Hal was when he and his crew were awarded the Thompson Trophy. That for setting three world speed records including a new record over the 1000 kilometer closed course of 1,284.73 mph in their B-58. Later on, Christmas when we were both home to McCook, I ran into Harold at DeGroff's. He told me that they were on the range near Edwards AFB.

They started at low altitude, went full throttles, lite the burners and rolled into a bank. To keep from exceeding the maximum for the aircraft they climbed all the way around the course finishing many thousands of feet above where they started all the time pulling something like 6 Gs. Quite an aircraft, quite a pilot.

Somehow, Hal seemed to have a love affair with speed. Next time I encountered him was at Kadena A.B. Okinawa during the Vietnam War. I was there flying the KC-135 and he the Detachment Commander of the temporary operating site for the SR-71.

Most time the SR was known as "Blackbird" but in Okinawa we called it the "Hubu," named after a local pit viper snake known for its lightning fast motion when striking an intended victim.

Hal invited me to visit and gave me a tour of his beloved Habu. Usually, access to that exotic aircraft was very restricted but Harold, being wing commander, had no problem escorting this humble tanker captain. He had me sit in the cockpit while he explained how everything worked.

Actually, I found it, as he insisted, to be a simple aircraft to operate. No wing flaps, no spoilers, just landing gear, throttles, a stick and rudder pedals. Programing for the engines was unfamiliar, but other than that, quite conventional controls and instruments.

He said it was easy to fly behind the tanker for refueling, very stable contra to some contemporary fighter aircraft.

One thing that he cautioned was that while flying at a high Mach number (pilot talk for the speed of sound) he had reached up to touch the windshield with the back of his gloved hand and burned his skin through the gloves.

Exotic airplane and now long retired it still holds many of the world's speed records. Today there is an example of the SR-71 at the SAC Museum south of Omaha.

One of Colonel Confer's questions that day has intrigued me since. He asked why I had never put in an application to fly the SR-71? He thought that I would be well-qualified and in his position he could have helped make it happen.

Wel,l the rest of the story, I did make application shortly thereafter but no chance to move while involved with the Vietnam War. Then Harold moved on to another command job and though I was found to be qualified I aged out before enough SR-71 pilots rotated and a slot became available.

Darn!

Several years ago I happened to be in the San Antonio area and again looked up Retired General Confer. He graciously picked me up to tour Randolph AFB with a stop at the Daedalians professional military pilot's society of which we both are members.

Another notable fact about the pride of Southwest Nebraska is that Hal Confer, commissioned through the Aviation Cadet Program was the last high school graduate, no college, to make General. Now he is gone leaving a sentimental hole in my life. God Speed good friend. Happy landings on the golden runways in heaven. My hero.

That is how I saw it.

Dick Trail