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Ron Khoury presumed joining the U.S. Air Force in 1953 would get him up into the wild blue yonder \u2013 but he didn\u2019t anticipate a trip on a troop ship up the Pacific Coast to Ladd Air Force Base in Fairbanks, Alaska via Anchorage.<\/p>\nRon Khoury presumed joining the U.S. Air Force in 1953 would get him up into the wild blue yonder \u2013 but he didn\u2019t anticipate a trip on a troop ship up the Pacific Coast to Ladd Air Force Base in Fairbanks, Alaska via Anchorage.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were all quite enthused because many of us had never been on the ocean before and it was a beautiful, sunny day when we sailed under the Golden Gate Bridge. But when the coastline slipped away and the rolling of the ship became very noticeable, many of the airmen started doubling over with seasickness. The sight and sound of this then had a \u2018snowball effect\u2019 on the others,\u201d recalls Khoury in his book \u201cThe Junior Sourdoughs,\u201d a rollicking memoir of military travel he is aiming to have published.<\/p>\n
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Khoury and the troops, sleeping on canvas cots, were happy to see land and get ashore, but what they found in Alaska was bitter weather. \u201cNew arrivals were scheduled for \u2018Overnight Survival\u2019 training during which we were marched out into the Alaskan wilderness and made to sleep in tents. Our sleeping bags were shaped like the inside of a mummy\u2019s coffin, but some guys stayed up all night by the fire because they were afraid they\u2019d freeze to death,\u201d recalls.<\/p>\n
On nights the airmen stayed inside there wasn\u2019t much to do but play cards or listen to \u201cGunsmoke\u201d on the radio so Khoury jumped at the chance to do a little sightseeing when some locals offered to take him to Fairbanks for what they called nightlife. \u201cThe place was a tar paper shack with a hard-packed soil floor and bare light bulbs hanging from the ceiling. The bar was a long plank nailed to the top of wooden barrels,\u201d he writes. \u201cIt was a rough crown so I drank half a beer and got out of there.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Summer brought the \u201cMidnight Sun\u201d and once the ice melted in June, Khoury and his sleep-deprived friends fished the crystal clear Tanganyika River near Mt. McKinley for trout. \u201cThere weren\u2019t any snakes or spiders, but the mosquitoes made up for them. They were big and hungry and came in swarms.\u201d Their reward, though, was the surprise of skimming gold flakes right out of the icy river.<\/p>\n
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Late in the summer Khoury\u2019s adventure continued when instead of just hunting birds or rabbits, he joined friends who\u2019d secured a single-engine seaplane to drop them off in the wilds for four days of moose hunting. \u201cIt was an eerie feeling watching that plane disappear and hearing the silence close in. You can hear silence \u2013 it\u2019s spooky. All kinds of weird things started going through my mind: what if a grizzly bear attacked me?\u201d writes Khoury, who did make it out by seaplane four days later \u2013 but barely. \u201cOn takeoff from the small lake we were so low I could feel the floats on the bottom of the plane hitting the shrubs and bushes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Khoury\u2019s very candid, sometimes graphic manuscript includes plenty of traveling characters including his smelly-footed roommate \u201cPancho\u201d; \u201cAce\u201d Armstrong; and\u2026bedbugs.<\/p>\n
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\u201cEveryone was in bed and I wasn\u2019t sleepy so I just started writing. Once I got started everything just came to me,\u201d says Khoury of his decision, with no experience, to become an author.<\/p>\n
There are laughs, tears, romantic dalliances and wild fights\u2026plus a somber return to Michigan after Khoury\u2019s service in Alaska came to sudden end, all of which he recounts with great authenticity, detail and humor in the book he is aiming to publish: \u201cThe Junior Sourdoughs.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"