The Celebration
Finishing your combat tour was cause for celebration. You'd survived—made it through 25 or 30 missions over Nazi Germany and occupied Europe. You were going home.
One crew, having just completed their final mission, decided to celebrate in the traditional manner: low passes over the field. Nothing too unusual—it was a common way to burn off adrenaline and mark the occasion.
But then they had to land.
The Landing
"I had another crew who, after flying their finishing mission, made a few low passes over the field and then landed long and hot, going off the end of the runway and dinging up the airplane pretty good."
"Long and hot" — pilot terminology for landing too far down the runway with too much speed. The combination is a recipe for disaster. The crew ran off the end of the runway and damaged the aircraft significantly.
Bob sent for the pilot.
The Question
The conversation started cordially enough:
"I sent for him and, after congratulating him on finishing his tour and entertaining us with his exuberance, I asked him if he knew how long that runway was."
The pilot's answer: No, he did not know.
The Assignment
"So I directed him to take a foot ruler and go measure it and let me know what he counted."
Take a foot ruler.
Measure the runway.
Report back with the count.
Bob admits he had visions of the pilot doing this on his hands and knees—inch by inch, foot by foot, the entire length of the runway. A humbling, exhausting punishment that would take hours and burn the lesson into memory.
The Solution
But the pilot, it turned out, was smarter than Bob had anticipated.
"I had visions of him doing this on his hands and knees but he was a smart boy I found out. He got the foot ruler all right but he nailed it on the end of a four-foot pole and walked the length of the runway, whistling 'The Star Spangled Banner.'"
Foot ruler: check.
Measurement: completed.
Time on hands and knees: zero.
Dignity: intact.
Anthem: whistled.
The pilot had followed the letter of the order while completely subverting its spirit. Bob couldn't fault the ingenuity. The runway was measured. The lesson—however it was learned—was delivered.
And somewhere at Polebrook in 1944 or 1945, a pilot walked the length of a runway with a foot ruler nailed to a four-foot pole, whistling "The Star Spangled Banner" and heading home a wiser man.