Word: quesada
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Boat Will Rock. The son of a Spanish father and a mother of Irish extraction, Pete Quesada was born in Washington, D.C. 55 years ago. His father's family have long been private bankers in Madrid, and Pete's father himself was an expert on currency engraving for the U.S. Treasury Department. Despite the family's connections in high finance, young Quesada had no dreams of becoming a dollar scion. He flitted from school to school-Wyoming Seminary (Methodist) in Kingston, Pa., the University of Maryland, Georgetown University-played topflight tennis and some football, and did little...
...drifted in his lifeguard's rowboat, a playful swimmer reached up and began rocking the boat. Quesada's response was strikingly similar to his techniques even today: he raised an oar and whacked the swimmer on the hands. The victim was an Air Service pilot. The two made friends quickly, and soon thereafter the pilot took Quesada up for an airplane ride. That did it: the day after his first ride, Pete Quesada joined the Air Service, went off to training as a flying cadet. He became a first-class pilot...
Days of Adventure. Second Lieut. Quesada was a flying fool. After the hot-pilot fashion of the day, he barreled under most of the bridges between Washington and New York. He never missed a chance at extra flying duty, and he quickly amassed a reputation for being brash, undiplomatic and vain (there are many oldtime comrades who have found no reason to change that judgment...
Those were the days when aviators were known by the adventures they logged. When the German plane Bremen crash-landed off Labrador after its historic east-west Atlantic crossing in 1928, Quesada and a young captain named Ira Eaker flew north to help save the crew. At one point during that mission, Quesada got lost flying above the clouds. He began thinking "how marvelous it would be if there were some way to do airborne refueling on a continuous basis." Quesada later got Eaker to push his idea with high Air Corps brass. The result was the famous Question Mark...
...Start an Engine. As captain, Quesada had been on assignment as adviser to the Argentine Air Force for close to three years when he was ordered back to the States in late 1940. On his own, he took off in an old Grumman amphibian that the U.S. Navy wanted returned to the country. Laden with five 5-gal.gas cans, a pair of pliers, a tire casing and some safety wire, Quesada chugged along having himself a fine time. He fished in the lake region of Argentina, threaded through the Andes ("with the Christ of the Andes above my head...