Benjamin, Clyde A.

I flew the F-100A at Nellis.  I reported into Willy (Williams AFB, AZ) after completing basic flying school at Webb AFB in Big Springs, Texas.  After 3 days at Willy, I was transferred to Nellis as an experimental student to determine if pilots could go directly from T-33 to F-100, bypassing the F-86.

They did the same thing for Luke pilots that were flying the F-84.  All told, I think there were about 6 people that went through this program.  The F-100F had just entered the inventory, so that was the airplane that we used for transition.  After checkout in the F-100F, we flew the F-100A and completed the gunnery program at Nellis.

My next assignment was back to Willy to fly the F-86 and continue the gunnery and transition into that airplane.  At the conclusion of that training, we went to operational units and flew the F-100D & F at George.  I guess that the experiment worked as future classes went directly from pilot training, T-33, to F-100 at Luke.  I think that was the death knell for Willy, as all fighter pilots were vectored to Luke, and Willy closed.