Page 231

“Lockheed,” Hughes announced. “Three Four Three at the Used Car Lot. Request taxi and takeoff.”

Howard Hughes turned to Clete Frade.

“Pay attention, Little Cletus,” Hughes’s voice came over the earphones, “and try to learn something.”

Three minutes later:

“What the nice man just said, Little Cletus, is that we’re cleared for takeoff. Now, the way we do that is you put your hand on those levers and push them to where it says ‘Takeoff Power.’ Then you steer down the runway. The controls will come to life at about forty knots. It will just about take itself off at about ninety. When I call ‘one hundred,’ ease back on the yoke.”

“Yes, sir,” Clete said, and put his hand on the throttle quadrant.

[FOUR]

Jackson Army Air Base Jackson, Mississippi 1745 5 August 1943

“Do you think you can put it down there, Clete?” Howard Hughes asked.

&nbsp

; They were flying over a small airfield at an altitude of two thousand feet as slow as Clete dared to fly the Constellation. He had his hand on the throttles, ready to firewall them the moment he suspected they were close to a stall.

Howard’s now serious; otherwise he’d have said “Little Cletus.”

When in doubt, tell the truth.

“I don’t know, Howard. It would be helpful if I knew how long that runway is, and what the Constellation needs.”

“I like you so much better when you are cautious and modest,” Hughes said.

Clete flashed him a dirty look.

“Let me put it this way,” Hughes said. “I could get us in there . . .”

“You want to land it, go ahead. I have a total of five hours thirty in this airplane, one takeoff, zero landings. I really don’t know how to fly it.”

“At the risk of repeating myself,” Hughes said, “I like you so much better when you are cautious and modest. What I was going to say is: I would come in low and slow, full flaps, lots of power. I would try to touch down as close to the threshold as I could, and I would chop the power the moment before I heard the chirp. I would then judiciously apply the brakes, so as not to burn them out, and then, when I was halfway down the runway, I would decide whether I had enough runway and brakes left or should firewall the throttles.”

Clete didn’t reply.

Hughes then said, “It occurs to me that if you were to steer and work the brakes, and I worked the throttles and flaps, this would be educational for you. Do you want to have a whack at trying that?”

He wouldn’t make the offer unless he thought I could handle it.

"What about me shooting a touch-and-go—a couple of touch-and-goes— first ?”

“I was about to make that very suggestion,” Hughes said. He picked up the microphone: “Jackson, this is Army Three Four Three. As you may have noticed, we’ve been flying around your field. The reason for this is there is a student pilot at the controls who has been gathering his courage to shoot a couple of touch-and-goes. He has found the courage, but considering his youth, lack of experience, and all-around flying ineptness, you might want to wake up the fire truck drivers and have an ambulance on standby.”

The controller was laughing as he replied, “Three Four Three, you are cleared for multiple touch-and-goes. You are number one to land.”

Twenty minutes later, Cletus Frade, having approached the runway threshold as low and slow as seemed appropriate based on the experience of two previous aborted landings, touched down very close to the threshold, quickly retarded the throttles, and, a moment later, gingerly applied the brakes. Long before he reached the halfway point of the runway, he decided he had more than enough of it left to stop before burning out the brakes.

“We’re down, Howard. We seem to have cheated death again.”

Hughes chuckled. “For a moment, I wasn’t too sure about that. Not bad, Little Cletus. There may be hope for you yet.”

“This is a great airplane,” Clete said.

“We think so. Just remember when you go to turn it around that it’s a great big airplane.”