Robert L. Hammar, St. George, Utah: an interview by Winston Erickson, September 8, 2000: Saving the Legacy tape no. 104

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ROBERT L. HAMMAR PT MB JR 20 0 RLH: Oh boy. Then we got to _[unclear]_ and wer waiting for rder and Elliott-Idiot .... Elliott-sent a plane down to pick us up and flew us up t Tuni and that's my first encounter with a twin-engine airplane. WE: The P-38. RLH: No guns. Just cameras and a 45 automatic if you wanted to take it with you. WE: That wouldn't do much for aerial combat, would they? RLH: No. And, of course, they didn't have instructions like we had in the States when they were checking out an airplane. We got there one afternoon and the next morning there were six of us and they said, "Come on out to the flight line. There's that 3 8." And they said, "Okay, let's get up on the wing" and climbed up on the wing and he said, "Okay, Red, get in the cockpit." So I got in the cockpit. And his instructions on how to fly this were probably about two and a half minutes. He said, "This is like the single engine plane except you've got two of everything. You've got two engines and you have two throttle controls and two Mickey controls and so forth and here's your flap handle and your landing gear handle. Start it up." So I started the engines and he said, "When you taxi out," now this is a true story, so help me, "get down to the end of the runway, put on the brakes and hit the power and when the superchargers cut in ... " I'm going, what's a supercharger? So being young and kind of stupid, I guess, I said, "Okay." So I taxied down and put the brakes on and took off and that's the end of my instructions on how to fly a 38. WE: How did it handle? I understand the 38 had counter-rotating props ... RLH: No torque. WE: So didn't have any twin engine torque? 21