Bob tells a couple of stories about his CO, Howard "Deacon" Hively.

The first is when he was reporting for duty at Debden, he was traveling by train to get to the base. The train was traveling on tracks along side a hill with a river valley about 25 feet below.

As he glanced out the window, he noticed two P-51s flying inverted over the river, BELOW the level that the train was traveling at. He later found out it was Deacon and Group CO Don Blakeslee. It seems that they often greeted new arrivals in this fashion.

Another story about Deacon that he says is true but has been refuted by other veterans of the 4th as physically impossible is that Deacon would fly inverted in a Mustang with his canopy open and take a large piece of school chalk attached to the end of a 6' long stick and draw a chalk line on the runway.