Cecil Miller

My name is Cecil Ray Miller, December 8, 1937, I was born at home in a Farm House, southeast of Shelbyville, IN. My earlier memories are related to the war. We experienced blackouts and formation flying of airplanes overhead. The men went to war and the women left home to fill in behind them.

We moved into Shelbyville in case my father was drafted, he didn’t want to leave us on a farm... I was the youngest of four kids. My parents both worked, and my brothers and sister were in school, so I started to school in September 1943, I was only five years old. We moved several times and when I graduated from Fairland H.S., IN, in 1955, I was only 17 and I would not turn 18 until December. I decided to join the Air Force. The men had an eight-year military obligation, including active an inactive service.

They sent me to Lackland AFB, TX, for my Basic Training. Toward the end, we took a battery of test and then met with a career counselor. I don’t remember any of the results, but he told me I could choose whatever career field that I wanted. He suggested air traffic control school. I wasn’t aware of anything pertaining to air traffic control, but I told him that would be fine. After Basic, they sent me to Kessler AFB, Biloxi, LA for Tech School.

I was assigned to work in the control tower at Edwards AFB, CA. I left a little town in Indiana for an AFB on the high desert in CA. All the airports were still using propeller-driven airplanes, but when I arrived at Edwards AFB, most of the airplanes were jets. Including the commercial jets that were being tested, like the B-707 and then later the DC-8 and the CV-880. The 1950s was the Jet Age. WW II was only over ten years ago and the Korean War was only over two years previously. Edwards is a test base, they had military and civilian test pilots as well.

I found it fascinating when I did my research to find out so many interesting things about the test pilot. About all of them, including the civilian test pilots, were all WW II and/or Korean War Hero’s. I knew several and I worked with a lot, while I was at Edwards. Both of us had a job to do and we just did it. So, we didn’t really know much about each other. They were still flying the “X” series of airplanes. I worked several different ones including Cpt. Kincheloe when he flew the X-2 to set an altitude record of 126,200. Two weeks later I worked Cpt. Apt when he flew the X-2 to break a new speed record, over Mach 3, but due to “Inertial Coupling,” he did not return. I also worked Cpt. Kincheloe when he departed on a routine flight and the engine flamed out, just quit. He ejected, but he was too low to survive. I worked for the first X-15 flight that Scott Crossfield piloted before the engine was ready, they dropped him and he just did a “Dead Stick” landing on the Lakebed. I worked all of the “Century Series” airplanes and others that did not go into production. Working at the Edwards control tower in the 1950s was very challenging. We didn’t have radar and other technology, it just wasn’t available and pilots would visit the tower on numerous occasion to visit or to observe a certain mission from the tower cab. What an experience. We worked with the Test Pilot Schools pilots. We also worked with the “Contractors Row” pilots. In my book, I mention my experiences at Edwards.

I was discharged from the air force in 1959 and I started with the FAA at the Indianapolis Weir Cook Airport control tower (IND) in 1960. Because we controlled military airplanes which is part of our countries defense, I received the military discharge that I normally would have received after eight years.

In 1956 two airliners collided over the Grand Canyon with no survivors. Two years later the FAA was formed, and this brought about major changes in air traffic control equipment and new procedures. In 1957 Russia put Sputnik in space. This started the “Race to Space” and money was shifted to the Space program. The results of these changes were more noticeable during the 1960s.

There was so much that happened during this period and I always thought I should write a book about my experiences and all of the changes that I was involved in as a young man. My life moved on and I had a thirty-year career with the FAA working in four different control towers. I started out at IND, then Lansing Tower (LAN), due to a potential downgrade, I returned to IND. Then I went to Kansas City International Airport (MCI) control tower. I then went to Dallas/Fort Worth Airport Control Tower/TRACON (DFW). Then to Washington DC, Headquarters, in air traffic control requirements Branch. Interest rates on a home mortgage climbed to 18% and higher. It looked like the PATCO (Controller) Strike was going to happen, so we returned to DFW where I remained until I retired in 1990.

I became a contractor for the University of Oklahoma who had the contract to run the new air traffic controller school as an instructor. I commuted from DFW to OKC. One year later I became a contractor for Technology Planning Inc. (TPI) in Rockville, MD. I supported the air traffic control Futuristic Requirements Branch at Headquarters. I worked on four different national teams. Two years later, 1994, they opened up a contractors position in the Southwest Regional Office in Fort Worth TX, which is my home, so I was selected and I returned to Fort Worth fulltime. I was working under the Lockheed Martin National Implementation Support Contract (NISC) until the summer of 2013 when I retired.

After several months I became bored and finally decided to write my book about the 1950s, the Jet Age. Once I got into the writing and the researching part of it, I would find something that I became curious about. I would research it just for my own benefit. Like why and when did they start air traffic control? I also became curious about the first airplane and then I became curious about a test pilot and I decided to research his past. Then I thought, if I was curious then I should share this with the readers. Then, of course, I had my fifty-eight years of working or supporting air traffic control, so I decided to write about each decade. I started out with 1900-1909 and continued up until I retired in 2013. During my research, I ran across the “Fun Facts” for that particular decade. A reader can look at this and make comparisons to another decade, interesting! I’ve always thought outside the “box” as they say and I enjoy thinking futuristic. I have several different endings to the book. One is how the airlines and the manufactures of the future airliners. Another is the engineering community and, in both cases, up to 2050. I have given this considerable thought and I have detailed a completely new system. I would require a lot of help in this effort, so I doubt if I will use this as a finish. I don’t believe anyone is looking at the problems and issues the flying cars, car helicopters, drones, and the regular helicopters will be facing.