Mr. Paul Cicci was a Technical Instructor for Purdue University’s Department of Aviation Technology. The Confederate Air Force (now Commemorative Air Force) had contacted Purdue University in 1980 offering student A&P mechanics the chance to work on their museum aircraft. Mr. Cicci, having family near Harlingen International Airport, requested to work for the CAF and was accepted. This is his story.
It is hard to believe 40 years have passed since I worked for the Commemorative Air Force during the summer of 1980. I packed up my family and we spent the summer in Brownsville, Texas with members of my wife’s family. I commuted to the Commemorative Air Force headquarters at the Harlingen International Airport, otherwise known as Rebel Field. The CAF had a small museum, a large WWII era hangar for maintenance of aircraft and two smaller hangars for storage of aircraft and numerous parts. Back shops and store rooms were packed with donated WWII fighter and bomber aircraft parts a