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Letter: Help wanted with history project on area pilot school
Dear Editor:
I hope that you are well and are staying safe.
I am working on a history project involving the Harvey Parks Pilot School which operated in Sikeston during World War II. In particular, I am attempting to identify and document the physical locations of the six auxiliary airfields in Scott, Mississippi and New Madrid Counties as depicted on the attached map which I believe to have been drawn by a student pilot named W. J. Vincent. One of the fields was located near Bertrand (Bernard), one near Morley (North), one west of Oran/Chaffee (West), one Southwest of Sikeston (Goetz), one in or near Matthews (Matthews), and one near Kewanee (South).
The auxiliary airfields were used to help train the student pilots to land and take-off. They were not concrete; they were turf. The fields were likely approximately one mile long and may have Quonset huts located at those locations.
If any of your readers have any knowledge direct or indirect of the location of any of these fields or the role they played in the training of the student pilots, I would like to speak with them.
Thank you.
Very truly yours,
Joseph C. Blanton Jr.
(573) 380.0346