12 Gs?
Twelve Gs in a centrifuge, first time? I always thought that 9 Gs was tops.
shareI think the "12 Gs" referred to William Lundigan's paycheck.
As in, "What? Y'mean all I have to do is go around in this thing for five minutes and I get 12 Gs? Well, what are we waiting for?!"
Hi Hobnob53, Nice to hear from you. For a 12G paycheck, sign me up (but no centrifuge). 12Gs might be a rather nice hunk of change in today's dollars. Best.
shareReally? $12,000 was a lot more in '54 than today -- three or four years' salary for many people. Of course, that was without centrifuge. I think the test pilots and Air Force personnel who pioneered that kind of training back in the 50s (as in The Right Stuff) got paid around $200 a month...plus some rat-infested dive to "live" in, if they had a family.
shareHi Hobnob53. $200@mo. When I was in the Army back in 1967, I cleared ~$127@month. I was stationed at Schofield Barracks in the Hawaiian Islands, about 26 miles from Honolulu. Twelve out of the 18 months I was out there, I was assigned to the Hawaiian Command headquarters outfit. Soft. Hand-picked personnel with higher levels of education than the average soldier, therefore less discipline problems. Carried my pass around like a driver's license outfit. The rest of that hitch was spent in two line outfits, both of which were a hybrid cross between Burt Lancaster's "From Here to Eternity," and Oliver Stone's "Platoon."
shareStill as low as $127 in 1967? You sound a few years older than me (maybe six or seven), so would have a much better idea than I would. I took that approximate figure of $200 from my very inexact recollection of what test pilots were paid in the 50s from the book (and movie) The Right Stuff. But my hazy memory may well be wrong, or the source material.
I always remember hearing of the $21-a-month pay for soldiers and sailors around 1941. I guess that was a real number for many. Later on during the war pilots made in the neighborhood of $400 or so per month, I've heard, which was good money back then...provided you lived to spend it.
Either way, you don't make a career in the service for the dough.
Hi Hobnob53. Other reasons for people staying in the military are for the security, benefits and retirement, especially in today's economy. One of my old high school friends put about 20 years in the Navy and is still drawing his military pension along with Social Security.
shareNo question, service can offer secuity and benefits. But some of the conditions -- neglect may be a better word -- to which the people who serve in our armed forces are often subjected are nothing less than shameful. (Poor housing, stagnant salaries, bad medical care). This isn't constant or universal but it happens often enough to rightly raise the public's hackles. People who serve deserve a sure and consistently high level of benefits, during their military careers as well as in retirement, but that isn't always the case in practice.
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