During the summer of 1949, Clive was hired as a delivery driver for an auto parts store. Not only did he get to drive the company truck, but he was eligible for an employee’s discount, a perk that helped him and his friends keep their cars running.
Clive’s high school academic record ruled out a four-year college, but he knew his parents expected him to continue his education. Pasadena Junior College (now Pasadena City College), a twenty-minute drive from Alhambra, offered a two-year associate’s degree and Clive, along with friends Felix Dupuy, Dick Klein, and Jack Hawkins applied for the fall semester. All four were accepted. Since English was the one subject in which Clive had shown promise, he majored in journalism and surprised his parents and himself by earning above average grades.
As their first year wound down, Clive and Felix began to plan a cross-country road trip. “The idea to take the trip,” Dupuy says, “like most ideas, was Clive’s. Our goal was to visit the four corner states - California, Washington, Maine and Florida - and as many others in between before we had to be back for school in the fall.”
Today, kids graduate from high school and think nothing of spending several months backpacking across Europe, New Zealand, or South America. In the early 1950s, it was highly unusual for two eighteen-year-old boys to set off on a grand tour of the United States. There was no question about their transportation. Not only was Felix’s 1939 Ford more dependable than Clive’s car, it was a convertible. During Easter break, they plotted their route and practiced packing and unpacking the car. If economical lodging was not available, they would camp out on folding cots or, in bad weather, sleep in the car.
During the first week of June 1950, Clive and Felix waved goodbye to their parents and headed north on Route 101. Amy and Eric were convinced the duo would be lucky if they got as far as San Francisco. Felix’s parents were a little more optimistic, predicting they might make it to Seattle.
When they left Alhambra, Clive and Felix had a total of $200 between them, but they planned to seek out temporary work along the way. In Oregon, the boys spotted a sign advertising for raspberry pickers. “The job,” Felix remembers, “paid fifty cents per lug, a tray that holds four wooden baskets. How hard, we thought, could it be to fill a bunch of those up?”
After a few hours in the hot sun, Clive and Felix were reduced to hiding rocks and sticks under the fruit - anything to fill the cursed baskets. That night, burnt to a crisp and aching, they calculated ten hours of backbreaking labor had netted each of them $2.20.
Back on the road, the car’s driveline began to make a strange noise and Felix pulled into a gas station. “I’ll never forget that station,” Clive says, “It looked like something right out of the Gasoline Alley comic strip. Instead of a lift, there was a grimy pit where the mechanic climbed down and worked on the underneath of the car. This old guy appeared out of the gloom, dressed in greasy overalls, a Quaker State hat and wiping his hands on an oily rag. An old yellow hound just laid there, mustering up an occasional half-hearted ‘Woof.’ After a ride around the block, the mechanic told us it was a problem in the transmission or rear end. But without pulling them apart, it was impossible to say which. He then offered some advice I have adhered to ever since, ‘If I were you boys, I’d just drive it until it breaks.’”
In Seattle, the boys stayed with Clive’s aunt and uncle. The strange noise, now localized in the rear of the car, had escalated to the point where something had to be done. Jacking the car up, they discovered a pin had worked its way out of the sleeve on the drive shaft where it entered the differential - a quick fix for two California hot rodders.
With their cash running low, it was time to look for real work. Clive was hired by Federal Pipe & Tank, the only company in the United States still producing wooden pipes and tanks for the railroads, to unload lumber from box cars for $1.55 an hour. Felix, who had worked in his father’s tire store since he was six, went to work at a Goodyear Tire store.
After almost a month in Seattle, their funds replenished, the boys bid farewell to Clive’s relatives, and several days later, crossed into Canada over the Ambassador Bridge in Detroit and drove to Niagara Falls. After marveling at the mighty cataracts, they pushed on to Maine, turned south, and two days later, arrived in New York City. After checking into the YMCA on West 63rd Street, they visited Grant’s Tomb, strolled through Central Park, rode the elevator to the top of the Empire State Building, and drove across the Brooklyn Bridge.
On Flatbush Avenue, they spotted a pool hall and decided to check it out. “Felix and I were dressed in our leather jackets and jeans,” Clive says. “The locals were wearing dress shirts and pleated pants. One guy got right in my face, ‘What gang are you guys with? What block are you from?’ After I explained we just arrived after driving from southern California, they looked at us like we stepped out of a spaceship. One dashed to the front window and pointed at Felix’s car. ‘That’s a real hot rod. You guys are California hot rodders.’”
The two tourists now found themselves surrounded by new friends who insisted on paying for their drinks. “Those guys,” Felix says, “didn’t have a driver’s license, much less a car. They lined up in front of the pool hall, and I gave them a ride around the block.”
After a quick stop in Philadelphia, Clive and Felix were soon in Washington, D.C. Rather than spending money on a hotel, they slept in the bushes next to the Capital building. “We crawled out in the morning, dragging our sleeping bags,” Felix says. “I can only imagine what would happen if somebody attempted to sleep in those bushes today.” Felix also recalls spending a great deal of time at the Smithsonian and Civil War battlefields. He smiles, “Clive has always liked that kind of thing.”
It was well after midnight, with a thunderstorm raging, when the boys arrived in Kingsland, Georgia, a small town close to the Florida border. Seeking shelter, they set up their cots on the front porch of a schoolhouse. In the morning, Clive woke up squinting at the business end of a large revolver brandished by the local sheriff. Accusing them of vandalizing the school, the sheriff ordered them to accompany him to the town’s barber shop.
On the way, Clive tried to explain they were just passing through, but the provincial lawman cut him off and pointed to his car. “It’s real fast, so don’t think you guys can get away.” Clive laughs, “That hick sheriff was bragging about a 1941 Ford four-door with fox tails, jeweled mud flaps, and blue dot tail lights. To us, a car loaded down with that gooker junk was a clown car.”
Wearing an apron, and in the middle of a haircut, the barber was also the town’s justice of the peace. Clive and Felix thought the situation was rather comical until the barber/justice of the peace jabbed his scissors at them and declared, “You boys are going to spend thirty days on the road gang.” Clive, uncharacteristically quiet up to that point, was fed up with hillbilly justice. “We’re two red-blooded American college boys, touring the great United States,” he snapped. “What kind of welcome do we get in Kingsland, Georgia? Threatened with a month on a chain gang for getting in out of the rain!”
Caught off guard by Clive’s outburst, the sheriff told the boys to stay put while he and the barber/justice of the peace walked to the post office and checked out the wanted posters. As soon as the two men were out of sight, Clive and Felix looked at each other, nodded, and sprinted to Felix’s car. A short time later, they were safely across the Florida state line.
After three days in Miami, they drove to New Orleans. “It was late August,” Clive says. “A large percentage of the population had fled the heat and humidity. The city looked like a ghost town.” Departing the Crescent City, the boys slept in a boxcar, toured Carlsbad Caverns, and spent two days at a dude ranch owned by Felix’s uncle in Arizona. The temperature was now reading in the low 100s. When the Ford’s engine began to overheat, a quick look under the hood revealed a cracked block. A liberal coat of liquid solder was smeared on the fracture - a makeshift fix that Clive and Felix hoped would get them home.
Driving at night, w
hen it was cooler, they crossed from Arizona into California at three in the morning. Clive was at the wheel; Felix was sleeping in the back seat, and more than 100 miles of deserted highway stretched ahead. Although he did his best to ignore it, Clive kept glancing at the temperature gauge. Its needle, slowly, but certainly was inching toward HOT!
“True story,” Clive says. “A few miles from Indio, it began to rain. As the engine cooled down, Al Jolson came on the radio singing ‘California, Here I Come.’ That old Ford got up and flew, and I knew we were home free.”
Three months and 13,600 miles after they left, Clive and Felix arrived in Alhambra. “Our parents were so glad to see us back in one piece,” Felix says, “they came completely unglued.” Clive describes their cross-country pilgrimage as, “a life changing experience. The trip gave both of us an entirely new appreciation for our country and its citizens. It certainly expanded our horizons.”
Little did Clive and Felix know their horizons were about to be expanded beyond anything they could have imagined.
During their three months on the road, Clive and Felix had paid scant attention to the news and were surprised to learn the “police action” in Korea had escalated into a full-blown war.
The boys registered for the fall semester at Pasadena Junior College, but when the government ratcheted up the draft, they decided it might be wise to enlist. Clive, who had always wanted to drive a tank, was ready to join the army. Felix convinced him they should consider a branch of the service offering more options than a perilous ride into combat in a steel coffin. On October 10, 1950, Clive and Felix, accompanied by several friends, drove to Los Angeles and were sworn into the United States Air Force.
A few days later, the recruits departed from Union Station in Los Angeles headed for basic training at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas. A sergeant, undoubtedly swayed by the fact Clive towered over his fellow recruits, announced he would be in charge during the trip to Texas.
When the train stopped in Alhambra, family and friends were waiting on the platform to see the boys off. One of Clive’s friends slipped him a large bottle of cheap bourbon, and when the train was once again underway, Clive and Felix headed for the club car. The bottle was passed around; somebody produced a banjo, and the congregation was soon singing “Good Night Irene” at the top of their lungs. One thing led to another, and several car windows were broken. Word of the fracas was wired ahead, and a squad of MPs climbed aboard at El Paso. Clive, relieved of his short-lived command, recalls the remainder of the trip was, “extremely subdued.”
At Lackland, marching and drills took up most of the recruit’s day. Clive and Felix were assigned to the same seventy-man squadron. Their commander, a corporal named Franklin, constantly reminded the squad that basic training culminated with an inter-company marching contest he expected them to win. When the squad realized how obsessed Frankin was with winning, they went out of their way to screw up. One man, on Clive’s signal, would suddenly break ranks and march off at a ninety-degree angle, or the first two ranks would take longer steps, and an awkward gap would appear between the lines. Felix often played the part of the spastic marcher. “Clive figured out all kinds of goofy maneuvers,” he says. “We drove Franklin nuts.”
Unknown to Corporal Franklin, the squad was planning a coup d’état. During their hour of free time before evening chow, the men would sneak off and practice marching by themselves. When the day of the big contest arrived, the squad marched to victory. Clive laughs, “Franklin couldn’t believe it. We didn’t know if he was going to burst with pride or go into cardiac arrest.”
A few weeks into basic, the recruits were required to fill out a form listing three choices for technical training and report for career counseling. Clive’s first choice was aerial photography. The sergeant interviewing him informed him aerial photography was not a realistic option. His second choice, Clive explained, would be military intelligence since it involved spies. Military intelligence, the sergeant advised him, was even less of an option.
Realizing his training might have more to do with the air force’s needs than his preferences, Clive asked about opportunities in the motor pool. Leaning back in his chair and clasping his hands behind his head, the sergeant drawled in a fatherly tone, “No way. A sharp guy like you doesn’t want to work in a greasy motor pool. All you end up doing is changing spark plugs. You want A&E - Aircraft and Engine.”
A&E school (now called Aircraft and Powerplant), consists of sixteen specialized branches of intensive instruction including hydraulics, electronics, engine theory, propellers, airframe fabrication, and fuel systems.
“That sergeant was good,” Clive says. “I bought his line and walked out of the office convinced that working on aircraft engines was far more glamorous than the motor pool. Instead of changing six spark plugs on a Dodge truck, I ended up changing fifty-six spark plugs on a Pratt & Whitney airplane engine. Real glamorous!”
After completing basic training, Clive received orders to report to the Department of Aircraft Maintenance Training at Sheppard Air Force Base in Wichita Falls, Texas. Felix Dupuy remembers the day they parted company. “Clive left Lackland at the end of November. We said goodbye, shook hands and he walked out the door. Just like that. We had known each other since we were kids and didn’t know if we would ever see each other again.”
Felix never received his orders. After sitting in the barracks for two weeks, he suggested if the air force had no need for his services, he would like to go home. After reviewing his test results, the air force sent Dupuy to electronics school in New Mexico where he studied the workings of the atomic bomb. After two years at a SAC base in Maine, Dupuy returned to California, graduated from UCLA with a business degree and eventually took over his father’s tire business.
Clive reported to Sheppard Air Force Base in November. He was not impressed with the Texas Panhandle. “Wichita Falls was the absolute pits,” he says. “When I attempted to find the falls, I discovered they had been destroyed by a flood in 1886. If you were looking for some real excitement, there was Archer City, the dismal little burg where they shot The Last Picture Show.”
A&E school lasted six months. Clive graduated in the upper 10 percent of his class, and he was ordered to report to advanced engine school at Chanute Field, near Rantoul, Illinois. Since the train was scheduled to depart on Memorial Day weekend, Clive and another airman, Bill Flaherty, decided it would be foolish to pass up a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to attend the 1951 Indianapolis 500. When the train stopped in Indianapolis’s Union Station, they got off and hitched a ride to the track. After watching Lee Wallard take the checkered flag in his blue and gold Belanger Motors Special, they hurried back to the depot. “When we finally arrived at Chanute,” Clive says. “Bill and I gave them a lame story about getting off the train to call our parents and being left behind.”
At Chanute, Clive worked on the Pratt & Whitney R-4360 Wasp Major, a powerful beast nicknamed the “corncob” due to its intertwined arrangement of four staggered rows of twenty-eight cylinders.
He graduated from advanced engine school in August 1951. After a tedious train ride, he arrived in San Antonio and found his way to Kelly Air Force Base.
Clive describes his three months at Kelly as, O.J.T. - on the job training. Working with experienced mechanics, he learned the ins and outs of the C-97.
In October 1951, Corporal Clive Cussler was ordered to an ATS Squadron at Hickam Air Force Base in Oahu, Hawaii. When he read ATS, Clive was thrilled, believing he had been assigned to an attack squadron. His joy was short-lived - ATS is Air Transport Squadron.
Shortly before he shipped out to Hawaii, Clive was given a two-week leave. After a few days in Alhambra, he asked Dick Klein’s girlfriend, Caroline Johnston, if she could find him a date. Caroline said her neighbor was available but definitely not Clive’s type. Envisioning the next two weeks sitting on his parent’s couch, Clive remembers telling Caroline, “I don’t care if she has two heads. Fix me u
p.”
On October 10, 1951, Dick and Caroline, with Barbara Knight in the back seat, arrived at Clive’s house in Dick’s 1942 Ford. Clive, smoking a cigar, sauntered down the sidewalk attired in a white T-shirt, Levis, flight jacket, and white scarf. The foursome attended a football game, during which Clive and Barbara sat as far away from each other as possible. “Our first date,” Clive says, “was a disaster. Barbara not only looked rather dowdy, she was the most introverted girl I ever met. We might have exchanged a total of ten words.” Equally unimpressed, Barbara confided to Caroline she thought Clive looked like a hoodlum member of a motorcycle gang.
While Dick and Caroline waited in the car, Clive walked Barbara to her front door. As they stood awkwardly on the porch, Clive did something he still cannot understand. “I asked her if she would like to go out again and couldn’t believe it when she said yes. Barbara always told me she never understood why she agreed to see me again.”
The next night, driving his mother’s Pontiac, Clive arrived at Barbara’s house. When she answered the door, they looked at each other in disbelief. Barbara, wearing a pretty party dress, was radiant. Squared away in his dress uniform, Clive was the picture of decorum. They spent the evening at several clubs in Hollywood, dancing to the cool sounds of Stan Getz and Nappy Lamare. Clive and Barbara went out two more times before he reported back to Kelly; although he might not have realized it at the time, Clive was in love.
Barbara Knight’s father grew up on a farm in Paige, North Dakota. During the Depression, Ted Knight climbed into a box car and ended up in Los Angeles. He enrolled at U.S.C. and majored in business. On a boat trip to Catalina, Ted met Helen Casale, a comptometer operator for the A&P supermarket chain. They were married in August 1931, and Barbara Claire Knight was born in Oakland on June 14, 1933.