Intermission 2

Five months before Ernst Muller made his first flight in CF-FAM, my father was getting ready to leave the African plains for destinations unknown.

Work had either dried up in the equatorial sun or grown too stale and boring for his lofty tastes.  In a pattern that would be re-exhibited several times over his life, my dad went on to something else.

His last flight in Africa was on April 19th, 1973 - a half hour, lunch time aerobatic jaunt in the RF-5. 

He spent two weeks in Germany, in the Hesse town of Bottenhorn in the foothills of the Westerwald mountain range.  He logged 46 minutes in ASK 13 gliders, did a dual flight in a Scheibe Falke motor glider and then ferried a Cessna 172 back from Breitscheid before continuing "home" to San Giacomo.

My dad's glider logbook and an appropriately stern Hessian gaze in the accompanying photograph. (Family Collection)

The 1st page of his glider logbook showing a dozen flights - 9 dual, 3 solo - for a total of 46 minutes. (Family Collection)

After three months, there were still no suitable job offers - at least nothing that piqued his interest.

Then, one day in August, came a knock at the door. 

Instead of the postman and a job offer, there were two carabinieri, Italian State Police, with orders to take Antonio F. Rotondo to the nearest military depot to be drafted into the Esercito Italiano.

And with that, my father became a 28-year-old private in the Italian Army.

Dad in his full dress uniform, 1974. (Family Collection)

Until very recently, all Italian citizens were required by law to serve the nation - many of them through terms in the armed forces.  My father had left Italy before being drafted and could return as long as he didn't stay longer than 3 months.  He had overstayed his welcome by a week.

At 28, he was at least 5 years older than the oldest of his draftee class and not well suited to the typical barracks tomfoolery.  The Italian Army hadn't won a battle since the height of the Roman Empire...and running around a field wantonly firing a sub-machine gun for enough money to buy a Coke and two slices of pizza wasn't his idea of a good time.
He immediately made an appeal to his commanding officer to be transferred to the Air Force given he was an educated man with pilot training - not a hoodlum or a kid straight out of high school.  His captain did the best he could - sending him to Naples in February to take a six-month course in becoming a wireless operator. 

Stamps and signatures from flying clubs in Bottenhorn Germany & Naples Italy. (Family Collection).

In Naples, he found the Aero Club di Napoli and, after a check ride with instructor Orazio Puccini, bookended his course in Morse code by indulging his hobby on three Italian built Partenavia P.66 Oscars.  As of 2010, all three (I-POSI, I-MERG & I-MISE) remain in service with the Aero Club at Capodichino Airport.



Aero Club Di Napoli's fleet.  I-MISE is first from the left in the middle row, I-POSI is second from the left in the back row and I-MERG is second from the right in the middle row. (Photo Courtesy: Aero Club di Napoli)



P.66 I-POSI pictured in December 2008.  This was the first P.66 my dad flew and the one he did most of his Naples flying in. (Photo Courtesy: Aero Club di Napoli)

In June of 1974, he returned to his unit as a Marconista (wireless operator) and participated in manoeuvres where he rode around in a Armoured Personnel Carrier festooned with antennae in order to signal the other APCs and tanks in the battallion.  He and his fellow wireless ops thought this was great fun until they realized, should their unit ever be sent into battle, their APC would be the first to be targeted. 

With his mates outside their barracks near Bari, 1974 or 1975.  My dad is 2nd from the left.  (Family Collection)

Despite the forced nature of their employment and the futility of their actions, these were happy times.  My dad recalled that they had little to worry about except to ensure that their boots were shined and pants pressed.  Gags like exploding shaving cream canisters and swapping out tapes of Morse code signals for the chart topper of the day were common.  They were well fed, well equipped and well respected.  In those days, a soldier in uniform could hitchhike home and often did.

Two Italian Army wireless operators in full dress uniform.  My dad is on the left. (Family Collection)

My father was discharged from the army in the winter of 1975 after 18 months of service.

In August, just a month shy of his 30th birthday, he returned to Canada where he had been offered a job.



Origins

My dad was born in the municipality of San Giacomo degli Schiavoni, province of Campobasso in the Italian region of Molise...about where the base of the calf begins on the Italian boot.
San Giacomo is a small town on the Adriatic coast - a charming union of craggy hills, sunflower choked fields, pristine sandy beaches and sapphire blue waters.  In the fall of 1945, about 1200 people called it home.  The town's population hasn't varied in numbers by more than a dozen since then.

My uncle Dante, my father & their cousins Ivana & Franco in San Giacomo circa 1955. (Family collection)

Antonio Francesco Rotondo came into the world on September 2nd, 1945 - the first-born son of Giovanni and Donata Rotondo (neé Sorgini).  There is some confusion surrounding the exact time of my dad's birth.  My grandmother maintained (and she would know) that he was born "on the second, after midnight".  She would scoff when anyone pointed out the obvious.
At any rate, the house he was born in still stands.  At least the stone walls do.  The roof has long since rotted away and the ever-present sunflowers that grow like weeds now call it home.

My dad in Termoli, aged about 18 years old, circa 1963. (Family Collection)

There is nothing in my father's origins or upbringing that would suggest a love for flight or any sort of aptitude for aviation.  His parents were farmers.  He liked hunting as a kid.  He once built a make-shift pistol which promptly backfired and put a rather large hole in his cheek.  He was an atrocious athlete and won the dubious nickname of "mani de merda" - literally "hands of shit."  He claimed to play the harmonica.  He was an above average student and graduated from a community college with the title of "geometrist."  He was well-liked and charming...and flighty.

Dad in Toronto, 1965. (Family Collection)

I suppose it was that inclination - a desire to leave home, see the world, strike out on his own - that brought him to Canada in 1965.  He lasted 2 years in Toronto and then took a job in Africa.

He was 23 and project manager tasked with building a water treatment plant in Bukoba, Tanzania. 

Trying to start a generator in Bukoba, 1968 (Family Collection)

He lived in the captain's cabin of a rust-bucket moored to the shore of Lake Victoria.  There was likely nothing to do except work, sweat, burn in the sun, worry about malaria and slowly go insane from mosquito buzz-jobs.

My dad wasn't one for vices - in fact, he hardly drank.  He enjoyed wine because it was constantly on the table as he was growing up but, other than that, he deplored anything in excess and, in his mind, getting blind drunk, even a few times, was the mark of an alcoholic.

Striking a pose in his office, Bukoba, August 20th 1969  (Family Collection)

Despite this, he was arrested once - with his entire crew of workers - for threatening a bar owner who refused to serve them drinks.
They had spent 18 hours pouring concrete and needed to put out some fires.  Turns out the bar was closed.  A few heatstroke, fatigue fuelled words later and the local gendarmes were called. 

Building the water treatment plant in Bukoba, September 1970 (Family Collection )

So, he came home one sticky night with a paper bag filled with basement gin and vermouth and set out to drink it all.  And when he shot his only living household companion, a fern, full of holes with a pellet gun because he "had nothing better to do", I suppose he figured he needed a hobby.

He found it in Nairobi, Kenya...at Wilson Airport and Wilken Aviation.