Loving to fly in a day gone by

George Grimes went to flight school with President George H.W. Bush.

One of the trainers at the same school was President Ford.

He flew in the same squadron as baseball great Ted Williams.

He took boxing tips from former heavyweight champion Jack Dempsey.

Grimes, 88, had a fulfilling career as a pilot for the U.S. Navy, although he prefers to downplay his service during World War II.

"I got there just late enough where they had already done all the heavy fighting," he said.

Grimes' missions mostly were to target installations and food sources for the Japanese. He flew those missions in 1944.

By the time the Korean War rolled around, Grimes was married with three kids. His days of flying combat missions were over. He left the U.S. Navy as a lieutenant commander.

His love of aviation stuck with him.

He doesn't fly any longer, but he still talks seriously about it. He even flew planes prior to enlisting in the Navy.

His commanders wanted him to be an instructor.

"No, Japan," he told them. "I want to be in the war."

Grimes started throwing down pamphlets on his bed - little instruction books on every meteorological characteristic of the Pacific Ocean. There were battles going on and pilots were being sent to war left and right, but all of them had extensive training. It was, and remains, the Navy way.

He threw down books on storms, cold fronts, warm fronts - he continued until he piled up nearly a dozen of them. He's kept from more than 65 years.

"You had to know all of that stuff," he said.

Grimes wears hearing aids, but his health otherwise remains strong. He walks confidently, has a slender build and speaks clearly.

He has been married to his wife, Eleanor, for 17 years. They moved from Beverly Hills to Spring Hill a few months ago.

His stories bounced from the serious to the comical more than a couple times Saturday morning.

While a flight candidate, he was about to fight his fourth boxing bout when he met Jack Dempsey.

The champ asked him to show him his fighting stance. He jotted down a few notes and gave Grimes some defensive tips.

Then he got into the ring with his opponent.

"All I remember is my fight being over," he joked.

He had fought three times and won all of them on points. He faced off with a left-handed fighter and was knocked out.

Years later, Grimes and a friend visited a restaurant in New York owned by Dempsey. He told one of the waiters he'd like to see the champ.

Dempsey, who Grimes described as a hulk of a man, came out and listened to him retell the story.

The boxing legend didn't remember, but he laughed. He was charmed by Grimes' charisma - or maybe he felt remorse for not helping him enough.

"The meal's on me," he told Grimes.

The retired pilot, who worked as a commercial artist during his civilian life, has accumulated stacks of newspaper articles, photographs, letters and mementoes of his former flight instructor classmate, President Bush.

The two communicated occasionally, even after Bush was elected to the highest government office.

Grimes wishes to remember him as the young, bold pilot with whom he shared laughs and memories while they were flight students.

The two attended pre-flight school at Lambert Field, Mo., outside of St. Louis.

One night a group of them went to a watering hole in the city and missed curfew. They sneaked around to the rear of the base and tried to climb over a small fence.

Grimes, Bush and the others came face-to-face with a snarling dog.

They realized they weren't quiet or clever enough to avoid getting caught. They humbly strolled back toward the front and faced the music.

Grimes and Bush spent many more hours together - marching with rifles as punishment for their indiscretion.

His finest moment while in the Navy?

"Getting out," Grimes answered.

"Oh no, honey," his wife said. "He loved being in the service."

For years he made it to every air show he could. He even flew to several of them.

Even before he joined the Navy, he devoured all things aviation. If there was a story about Charles Lindbergh, he read it, cut it out and kept it. If there was a model plane inside a store somewhere, he would beg his mother to buy it for him.

His mother had hoped his love of aviation was a phase, but it wasn't.

Before he enlisted in 1942, she told Grimes, "Promise me one thing. You'll fly low and slow."

Grimes laughed.

Today, he better understands what his mother was talking about. In spite of advances in technology, he doesn't think pilots today are as well trained as he was.

Grimes shudders at the latest news stories of pilots flying hundreds of miles beyond their destinations or other aircraft spilling into lakes and rivers.

"I really miss it, but I feel aviation today is a riskier business," he said.