Taking The Bus To Work

contributed by Chris McWilliams
{764th Commanding Officer at the time]

I once rode from the [main] station [at Saint Albans AFS, VT] to the GATR in the bucket of a front-end loader in the middle of a snowstorm [circa 1970]. Our schoolbus had gone off the road into a snowbank right at the GATR site after making a shift change. It was rapidly getting dark, and the snow was piling up fast. We decided we had to get the bus out fast to prepare for bussing the kids to school in the morning, and the front-end loader seemed like the best bet. No room in the cab, so I rode in the bucket with a couple of powerful flashlights to indicate to the driver where the road was (it was snowing hard, and very difficult to see). We got the bus back on the road OK, and I rode the bus back to the station with the front-end loader following us. Those were the Good Old Days!