All his life, Marvin Riehl has loved airplanes.  As a young boy, he possessed an adoration of flight that was not swayed in the slightest when, at the age of 13, he witnessed a plane crash into a nearby hill.

At 21 he worked on a ranch to earn money to take flying lessons. He operated airplanes in the military and later taught in an air school. After the war, he built a small plane in his own backyard.

In 1939, he joined the Army Air Corps and was sent to Illinois. Later, he sailed out of San Francisco.

He remembers that after Pearl Harbor was bombed, he was sent to the Equator. From there he was sent to Australia. He remembers traveling in complete silence so as not to be noticed by the Japanese.

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