The Daily Alaska empire., 1942-08-04
TELLS OF SKY LEAP
 TO BATTLE
Pdrdfrooper Gives De- suiption of Fall-First
 of Five Jumps
By CAPT. BARNEY oLDFIELD

1,5O0 feet above Lawson Field when the jump-master commanded:
 Stand in the door!"
 First up was It. Leonard Anglin, of Lumpkin, Ga. He planted his feet ana let the prop blast roar into his face as he stuck his head CTS.
 Then, the jump master, swinging the flat of his hand hard up against the underside of Anglin's leg, yelled: "Go!'
 As in an unfinished old-fashioned out the door.
 We were all hooked up, our static lines fastened to the long cable in the roof of the transport. It was graduation day for paratroop- two-scp left foot in the lead, right coming up but never passing, we shufiled to the door Pivot on the right ioct, left to the ledge, push and we hurtlsd through space, turn ing a quarter turn left and drop ping under the tail of the plane.
 Count off!
 1000, 1000, 30O0,' we said.
 That's three seconds.
 If the snap of the chute open ing hadn't been felt by then, we were instructed to pull the reserve ripcord on "4,000." Mine opened in the middle of "2,0OO." I said it something like two UMPH- thousand"
 I looked up and the canopy was over me like a tent, suspension lines talG. Below me was the field, like a well kept lawn. There was no feeling of falling or height, but was swinging a little, so grabbed the right front and left rear risers, chinning myself to check the oscil- lation.
 If They Could See Me
 We were about 800 feet up Some body yelled. It was It. Rodger Meadows of Akron, o.
 Nobody in Akron would believe I'd ever do this" he said. Same goes for all of us in our home towns, I guess.
 An air current hit me at 1O) feet. I grabbed the risers, rocked them hard to keep oscillation from setting in again.
 Twenty feet up, I looked down, prayed I'd land lightly on that week old sprained ankle, then sud- denly realized I was coming in Backwards.
 The ground :
 The Ankle Escapes
 I spilled backward, did a com- plete roll, and never touched the ankle. The chute collapsed, and as unsnapped the harness, I looked for the next groups already in de- scent.
 Meadows lit fairly easy. It. Hen- ry Buchenan. late of Anderson, 5. C., came in on a slight knee bend and stood up without a roll. There was a puddle of water off to the right, and It. Robert Carlson, Utica, N. Y, plowed it up like a motor boat.
 We started rolling up our chutes to get off the field.
 Meet The ParatrOOper
 And that, with accompanying post mortems, covered the first of five jumps necessary to qualify as a parachute trooper. It took the Ar my four weeks to train us for this landing, which is about two per- cent of what a parachutist has to do. The other 98 percent is fight ing the enemy tooth and nail, when encountered, and winning.
 What klnd of man does it take to become paratrooper? First. without any bouquets, I would say it takes a man who can conquer his fears, grit his teeth and do what's expected of him in any pinch. Like no other soldier, he proves his courage every day of his training
 Second. it takes a man who is originel, individual. and who be- lieves ne can take command of his own destiny.
 Third, it takes a man who has the spirit of pioneer. There IS