All posts by Terry Pitts

Terry is a retired school teacher, retired Army Reservist, and retired civilian Department of the Army Civilian working about half the time as a pilot and flight instructor. He has been flying since age 19, adding gliders in 2011. He's been an FAA certificated flight instructor since 2013.
Books

Several More books…

I VERY MUCH LIKE reading as an indoor pastime, enjoying both fiction and non-fiction. It’s good to have a mix of the two. My reading interests overlapped my dad’s in many ways, so we would often exchange books. I inherited several hundred of his books. Some, Civil War history for example, were donated so others could enjoy them. A few went to my kids. The others I’ve been reading myself, then donating. (Museum links go to the respective museum; book links go to Amazon.)

Recently Melissa and I visited the National Museum of the Mighty Eighth Air Force in Savannah. At the entrance I saw a poster for Journalist/Historian Andrew Nagorski’s new book 1941, The Year Germany lost the War. Actually, the poster was about his upcoming visit to discuss the book in a few weeks. We bought three books between us.

When we went to Savannah I was reading David McCullough’s book John Adams. This was from my dad’s collection. It was a fascinating book to read. I learned a lot about the era and the people that combined to form the United States. I’ve read several of McCullough’s books, and this one is as good as the rest. I’ve read maybe three or four books about this era in the last few years, and really enjoyed them. Politics was, perhaps, just as contentious then as now, though without social media!

In addition to Andrew Nagorski’s book above, I bought Double Cross: the True Story of the D-Day Spies by Ben MacIntyre. I have been reading books about the World War II era since reading William Shirer’s Rise and Fall of the Third Reich as a 12-year old and Albert Speer’s Inside the Third Reich a couple years later. What I’ve noticed in the past 15-20 years is that I really enjoy reading the exploits of the actual people involved rather than looking at maps showing grand strategy – maybe grand strategy got boring after 20 years.

The British captured every German spy who landed there. Many of them were willing to serve the British government as double agents. Others in various countries volunteered to spy on the Germans on behalf of the British. Double Cross describes the background and motivation of many of several of these men and women, as well as their wartime exploits, and what they did postwar if they survived. The elaborate XX (“Double Cross”) system very effectively mislead the German intelligence community, preventing them from understanding the true nature of the Normandy Invasion until it was too late to stop it.

Nagorski’s 1941 was a great read. He weaves a story from the historical timelines of the various belligerent nations, then inserts anecdotes and details about decision makers and experts large and small. I really enjoyed the insight into the thought processes of those involved. For example, German generals and industrialists told Hitler “we need time to get ready.” Instead of waiting, Hitler responds “then I’ll attack before the enemy has time to get ready.” Great reading if you have an interest in this time period or how it impacted the next 50 years.

1941 had only just been out a couple weeks when I bought it. Hence the scheduled presentation I mentioned above. I decided, on rather short notice, to take the day off and attend the book discussion. Very glad I did! Now I have an autographed copy of the book.

Autographed copy of Andrew Nagorski’s book – this won’t be donated.

Brief insightful segue… I enjoy reading. A lot. But, I had become rather overwhelmed with quantities of books and nowhere to hold them. Other than expensive railroad reference books, I realized one day that most books I had would never be read again. “Read and store” is too expensive to sustain. What to do? I’ve since given hundreds, perhaps several hundred, books to the local libraries and Goodwill. “Read and donate” isn’t much cheaper than “read and store” if I’m honest. For authors who have been publishing for a while, but I’ve just discovered, I now buy many books used from Amazon – often from Goodwill! For new books from authors I like, I simply pre-order them from Amazon and read them when they arrive. In both cases the books are donated for others to enjoy.

In both cases the books are donated for others to enjoy.

Now, back to talking about what I’ve been reading. I was recently at the Beechcraft Heritage Museum in Tullahoma, TN. A book I saw there was John Bruning’s “Indestructible: One Man’s Rescue Mission That Changed the Course of WWII.” It turned out to be a bio about Paul “Pappy” Gunn’s life during World War II and the parallel story of his wife and four kids in a Japanese prison camp in the Philippines. I knew Gunn was the inventor of the B-25 gunship, but didn’t know anything else. This book reads like a suspense novel. It’s a great story of ingenuity, commitment to service, and a man’s love for his family. The book is really well written and avoids arcane technical jargon that would make it difficult for non-pilots/non-historians to enjoy.

Transitioning from non-fiction to fiction and skipping two books that will get their own page, I read Daniel Silva’s newest Gabriel Allon story The New Girl: A Novel in one full day. Great story will all Silva’s usual twists and turns, starting with the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabian turning to Israeli intelligence for help. I’ve ready all the Allon books in order since the first one. This is a series I enjoyed sharing with my dad – suspend reality for a little bit and just enjoy a good spy novel!

Biographical

Sprechen Sie Deutsch?

I like to think I speak rather good German. I was fortunate to learn it at an age still young enough to not sound too American, yet old enough to have a developed brain that could intelligently learn. I learned from school, from people I met, from the radio, and from reading. In recent times I find Google searches in German to be fun.

I was able to take a year of German in high school in Ohio before going to Germany. From a previous year of French, I had an understanding about learning a foreign language, and the year of German grammar and vocabulary gave me a good foundation for when I arrived. The first German word I learned was “Koffer” – suitcase – because one of my two suitcases didn’t make it to the baggage carrousel. The second word was, no great surprise, “Ausfahrt” on the Autobahn as my dad drove me from Frankfurt to Stuttgart.

My dad met a local German couple through one of his coworkers. I met them soon after I arrived. (We are still in contact today, 54 years later!) Having someone to practice with was very valuable. I learned not only “school German” but “real German” and culture too. I always try to listen to people’s word choice when they respond to me. They are fluent/native speakers after all! I then try to emulate their vocabulary and pronunciation.

I got tired of AFN radio very quickly. In trying to have something for everyone, they really didn’t have much for me (Maybe Charlie Tuna or Casey Kasem). So, I found a German radio station that played music I liked. I didn’t understand much at first, but I was surrounded by the rhythm of the German language. I think the first things I began to understand were the traffic reports. “Stau” joined my vocab before I was even driving!

I am an avid reader. I discovered if I bought German magazines on topics of interest to me, I could learn a lot. Captions explained the pictures. I was familiar already with the content. I had total control over the pace of content delivery. Everything was grammatically correct.

Traditional German Restaurant Sign

If you’ve studied communications, you are likely familiar with models that include barriers to communication. Thinking in English and translating into German is a barrier to communication. Translating responses from conversation partners into English is also a barrier. I decided one day to simply “speak German” instead of thinking in English, translating into German, saying the words “auf Deutsch,” and so on. It wasn’t easy at first, but it eventually happened.

By age 19 I had taken three years of high school German as well as a couple University of Maryland (European Division) advanced German classes and one class at the local Volkshochschule. I passed the language proficiency test to be admitted to study at the University in Tübingen. I believe this would be B2 in the modern European language proficiency scale.

Years later I was stationed in Stuttgart myself. And then in Wiesbaden. In both locations I was in glider clubs where I had the opportunity to talk about not just flying, but the weather, travel, life, and so on. Real uses of the language in a real environment. I learned a lot of car repair vocabulary too. During the two years in Wiesbaden I read close to 20 novels in German. I also took two C1+ level classes at the local Volkshochschule. (Although I didn’t test, my instructor thought I would pass the C2 level examination.)

Flying internationally (as pilot, not passenger!) requires a minimum of Level 4 (on a 1-6 scale) in either English or a local language. I tested as Level 5 in German (almost native speaker level). The examiner told me I would have passed Level 6, if there actually were a Level 6 test for German!

Funny side story – native speakers generally get Level 6 just for filling out paperwork. I was not able to prove that I had “spent six of my first ten years of life in an English speaking environment” so I had to take a test to prove I’m a native English speaker. A British guy tested my English ability. In a Chinese restaurant. In Germany. Cost €100. For a language no one doubted I could speak! Only the European Aviation Safety people could make it that complicated…

ICE Train

If you are in Germany with the military, you don’t have a lot of time to learn the language. Go to the local VHS for German class taught in German. They are the experts in teaching foreigners German. Two nights a week on base where 90 percent of the words in the room are in English will do very little, though certainly better than none! Good luck and hope my experiences help you.