Chiang sent over two colonels, three lieutenant colonels and two majors for flight training – pilots, copilots and flight engineers. The two pilots were Col. Chang, Chinese Air Force, Deputy Commissioner of Sungshan Air Force Base, Taiwan, his personal pilot, and Col. Wu-Hung, chief of the Air Force Presidential Flight Section.

            They brought along an entourage of mechanics-- Northwest trained them, too – and others. For living quarters they rented a generous amount of space in a multi-story apartment building off Freeway 494 near the airport. Among the group were some cooks, I know that because when I stopped by there now and then I was always greeted by the pungent fragrance of soya sauce.

            These men were friendly, capable, intelligent men. They were easy to work with, no tensions, no problems. No problems but one. We never knew when they would show up for training. A culture gap, I guess. We’re mostly on time folks. The Chinese tradition, as some interpret it, is patience, no hurry, there’s plenty of time out there. Other crews were trained in a month or so. With the Chinese it was four or five months. Actually, I wasn’t slated to do much of the training but I ended up working with them personally most of the time because I was always there. Along with Don Abbot and Bob Mielke we were always “on call”. Because they had purchased only so many training hours, I had to concentrate my efforts on Col. Chang and one of his copilots.

            One problem was that when Col. Chang was in the left seat he didn’t want his copilot with him. Normally we train the pilot and copilot together. I guess he was afraid they’d see him make a mistake.

            I’m not sure what they did in their spare time but I think they did a lot of traveling. One day Col. Chang came in and said he wanted to take the plane and fly to Florida for a few days. I said no way, not without me, you’re not qualified to fly the plane yet. He was insistent and I said if you do I’ll call the State Department and have you grounded. He backed off. He knew darn well I meant it. They went someplace but not in the airplane.