A Veteran's gift

  • Published
  • By Senior Master Sgt. Ellen Hatfield
  • 349th Air Mobility Wing Public Affairs
TRAVIS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. --  A ninety year old veteran of World War II recently made a special gift to the Travis Air Force Base Museum with the donation of his U.S. Army Air Corps uniform.

Former Army Air Corps Master Sgt. Bill Meck of Napa, Calif., with the help of good friend Col. Barrett Broussard, 349th Air Refueling Wing vice commander and an Air Force reservist, met with Museum curator Master Sgt. Terry Juran - also a reservist with the 349th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron - for the presentation.

We need to flash back 69 years for the start of the journey of Bill Meck and his uniform.

Dec. 7, 1941, Bill and Jeannie Meck, young newlyweds, decided to go to the moving pictures at the theater across the street from their apartment in Cleveland, Ohio. When they emerged at 9 p.m., a corner newsboy was holding aloft his wares, shouting, "Read all about it! Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor!"

"My first response was 'where's Pearl Harbor?' My second response was to enlist in the Army," said Sergeant Meck. "I'd never been out of Cleveland, well, maybe to Akron once."

As an infantry soldier, he was sloshing through the mud and practicing with a bayonet. Realizing quickly that he didn't care to do that, he signed up for radio school. "I flunked out of that," he said with a wry grin. "So I decided I wanted to fly."

Of course, as enlisted, he couldn't be a pilot, although one of his pilot buddies let him take the controls of a B-29 Superfortress once.

"He didn't like my take-offs and landings, I bounced too much," he said, blue eyes twinkling with laughter. But his first assignment to Keesler Field, Miss., put him on as crew with the heavy-duty, long range bombers. From there he went to Waller Field, Trinidad, and then on to Guam, and he was in the war.

Guam was 1,500 miles from Tokyo, Iwo Jima was 750 miles. Sergeant Meck said the aircraft needed a rendezvous point, which turned out to be Iwo Jima. If they got shot up or needed to refuel, they would return to Guam.

The war ended in Europe in April of 1945, and they moved many of those troops to the Pacific. "We used to sing this song, 'The Golden Gate in '48' because that's when we believed the war would be over for us," he said with a faraway look. "Then one day, my colonel came to me and said we could stop singing the song.

Meck went from being a private to a master sergeant in four years, a feat you wouldn't see in today's ranks, all because he could type.
"I had wanted to be a newspaper reporter before the war, so I began typing while still in school. In the Army, it helped me make private first class in about a month; corporal in another two months, sergeant, another two months and staff sergeant in a few months more. I was in line to make technical sergeant when they asked me to become a first sergeant. Within 12 months, I made master, and skipped tech."

He reminisced about his time in the war, and his buddies, fondly, and said there was only one time he was really miserable, during the trip by ship from Washington to Guam.

"My buddy had the strongest stomach of anyone. He was throwing up further!" he chuckled.

His time after the war was no less colorful and interesting. He returned to Akron and became a door-to-door milkman. Being the entrepreneur that he was, he realized there was competition, and began undercutting their business with his talent for sales. His next endeavor had him selling meat patties for a butcher shop. Soon after that, he and his partner borrowed $500 to rent space and start their own meat patty business.

They added more products, and a few years later, rented a larger space across the street. In another seven years they outgrew that space, and built their own store, 10,000 square feet, in Burlingame, Calif. A few more years, and they added another 10,000 sq. ft. Another 10 years went by, and they acquired the building next door.

Eventually splitting with his partner, he leased the business to a company synonymous with San Francisco, "It's It" ice cream, invented in 1928. He eventually sold out, and the last company he worked for was Pan Ready Foods, a company he took from $1.5 million in sales to $12 million in sales in as many years.

Meck likes to say with a look of pure innocence that after that, he retired on a fixed income: "I fixed it," he said, laughing. He bought an Aero Commander airplane, and often flew the executives of Raley's, Armour Foods, and other giants, to conferences, special charity events and golf tournaments.

"If they were late for a golf match, he'd just land on the course," said Col. Broussard, smiling. "It's true, we have witnesses."

It was around 1962, and Meck was flying some friends to a golf tournament at the Silverado Golf Resort in Napa.

"I had to get them there on time, so I landed on the 18th hole - it was a long par five - now it's the 10th hole. The sheriff was hot, fussing on about insurance, and liability and all that. I told him, I don't need your conversation; I just need a golf cart. They tell me I rattled all the dishes in the Clubhouse," he said, rolling his eyes and laughing.
These days, a golf cart is Meck's regular ride, as he can go right out his front door and be on the course at Silverado, headed for the Clubhouse. The cart he sports he won in the Bob Hope Golf Classic at Pebble Beach years ago. Wonder Woman graces his hood, and Hope's initials are embroidered on the seats.

"I met him once," Meck said. "I went over, stuck out my hand and said 'Mr. Hope, Bill Meck, glad to meet you.'" He said, "How are you doing, Bill?"

I turned to my friends and said, "See? He knows me."