Brown Leather Jacket And Grape Pie - Paperback

by Lt Col Jack Laurie (Author)

These words are the memoirs of an a 84-year-old man who fought in WWII as a P-38 fighter pilot, flew jet bombers during the Cold War, met and married a beautiful girl who turned out to be a gourmet cook, became a professional journalist and a nationally known high school journalism teacher after serving twenty-two years in the USAF as a pilot and public affairs officer.

Author Biography

Originator and director of Yearbook Newspaper by the Bay for 25 years, Jack Laurie grew up in Alhambra in Southern California. He became interested in journalism while a sophomore in high school when the local daily newspaper published one of his humorous essays for an English class. Hooked on writing, he joined the newspaper staff in his junior year and became assistant editor as a senior. While in junior college, he was sports editor until war came in 1941 and he joined the Army Air Corps as a private. He qualified as an aviation cadet, which led to pilot wings and a commission as second lieutenant. As a kid, he had seen the Lockheed P-38 Lightning fighter planes zooming around Southern California, but never dreamed he would ever fly one. He did, for over 100 combat missions during World War II in the South Pacific.