listing/roster of Charleroi, Pennsylvania High School Graduates/Alumni


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    THE 50's
      Geraldine Marr, '56
      Kaye Eisenhower, '52
      Joseph Kormuth, '57
      Neil Lucas, '51
      Joseph Miller, '56
      David W. Jones, Sr., '57
      John (Jack) Stech, '51
      Bill & Joann Hagerty, '51
      Jack Fegela, '58
      Art Strelick, '59
      Roger Hough, '56
      Jack Young, '52

Neil Lucas still flying high in retirement years... By Dorothy Yagodich, for The Tribune-Review, May 2, 2004
Former Fallowfield Township resident Neil Lucas has chalked up a wealth of military flying experiences and post-military employment.

"I never enjoyed anything as much as I did my flying career," Lucas said. Having flown 16 different types of aircraft from single-engine prop and jets, two- and four-engine props and six-engine jets, as well as a smattering of helicopter time, Lucas holds a Federal Aviation Administration commercial multi-engine license and instrument rating.

"If I could have re-enlisted and gone to Iraq, I would have done it in a minute," Lucas emphasized. He retired from the military Jan. 1, 1974, with the rank of lieutenant colonel.

In the Charleroi High School yearbook, Class of 1951, Lucas said he wanted to be a veterinarian. He set out on that path at Penn State University but, after two years, decided he needed more time to mature. At the same time, the Korean War was winding down. The Air Force offered an aviation program for 15 months leading to commission and wings. Initial training took Lucas to San Antonio, Texas, Bartow, Fla., and finally to Greenville, Miss. By that time, Lucas had fallen in love with flying. He decided to make a career of it, a decision that provided more satisfaction over the years than monetary reward, he said.

After graduation, commission, and wings, Lucas became a flight instructor and went to Selma, Ala., at the same time that Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks were making history for the civil rights movement in Selma and Montgomery.

Lucas returned to Greeenville, Miss., and for the next three years, served as flight instructor there.

Then it was on to Chandler, Ariz., for F-86 fighter training and then to Las Vegas, for F-100 training. Then the military decided the Strategic Air Force needed fighter pilots experienced with formation flying. Lucas went to Wichita, Kan., for six-engine B-47 bomber training. With that training, he went to Sedalia, Mo., with "the assignment of many hours sitting on 15-minute alert with nuclear-bomb loaded aircraft."

This was in the early 1960's at the height of the Cold War. "We were targeted for a variety of places in Russia," Lucas explained.

"Sitting on alert in underground facilities for a week at a time, we would have two weeks off to fly and train on a variety of missions and related subjects," Lucas said. Once every three months he would fly from Missouri to a base in Spain, then England to sit on alert for 30 days. At the end of alert, it was five days of rest and recuperation.

"Anyone in the military will tell you, it was partying and no rest. You got the rest after returning from R&R," he quipped.

"I was able to visit Madrid, Barcelona, Toledo and the Island of Majorca while in Spain, then London, and Copenhagen."

Lucas can't count how many times he flew the Atlantic, both at night and daytime, but he was diverted into Goose Bay, Labrador, several times because of engine failure or bad weather.

When the B-47 was phased out, Lucas was chosen for a CIA assignment to work in the SR-71 Blackbird program. Sent to Thule, Greenland, Lucas was detachment commander for a support location for the SR-71 and the tankers that refueled it in flight.

While in Greenland, Lucas flew a ski-equipped Dehaviland Beaver and got a firsthand look at the polar ice cap and other sights of the Arctic such as walrus, seals, large pods of beluga whales and narwhals. He flew into Eskimo villages, taking medicines and mail. "It was an interesting experience."

Another interesting experience was living three months in total darkness and then gradually changing into three months of total daylight. "We were only about 600 miles from the North Pole."

Lucas already had temperate-zone survival training and underwent Arctic survival training in minus 50-degree weather.

After a year, Lucas was re-assigned to CIA headquarters in Langley, Va. He was placed in charge at the detachments in Alaska, Okinawa and Turkey, also supporting the SR-71 over-flight missions.

Since his assignment with the CIA was nearing an end, Lucas volunteered to go to Vietnam. "I wanted to go in a flying capacity and not as a staff officer in Saigon." but the CIA put a one-year restriction combat duty because Lucas had so much classified information. They did not want to risk the possibility that he might be captured.

Instead, Lucas was sent to Montgomery, Ala., as a flight instructor and later to Fort Walton Beach, Fla., for A-1 fighter/bomber training. After sea survival training near Miami, Lucas left for Vietnam in 1968 with a stop in the Philippines for jungle survival school.

From the Pleiku Air Base, close to the border of Cambodia and Laos, Lucas took part in search-and-rescue missions, and close air support for defoliating missions with Agent Orange along the trails into Cambodia from Laos. Lucas said, "I flew 304 combat missions while I was there and although I got shot up several times, I never did have to bail out."

In between, Lucas managed to get a week in Hawaii on R&R and four days in Singapore, "which I loved." He was also in Bangkok at the time Neil Armstrong landed on the moon. "I watched it on TV in the lobby of the hotel in Bangkok. What a proud day for us as we all cheered and toasted the astronauts."

During his tour in Vietnam, Lucas was part of a flight of four planes to fly air cover for President Lyndon Johnson when he flew into Saigon for a visit.

A later assignment took Lucas to Korea where he developed a set of war plans for a fighter wing. He described Korea as a cold, miserable place. "I didn't care for it at all."

Japan was better. Lucas, as assistant chief of command for a tactical fighter wing, eventually became chief of plans. In Japan, Lucas was able to do a lot of sightseeing.

Then it was back to stateside and Fort Walton Beach. Once again Lucas was assigned to a squadron teaching Vietnam pilots to fly the A-1. When all the A-1s went to Vietnam, Lucas was again chief of plans. His last duty before retirement was vice wing commander and wing inspector general.

Between all his military duties, Lucas managed to take some night classes at several universities but, too many temporary duties and transfers prevented him from getting a degree. "I moved 18 times in 20 years."

After military retirement, Lucas enrolled at the University of West Florida. He graduated magna cum laude with a degree in accounting and finance, and started its MBA program. Then a job, as operations specialist at Hospital Corporation of America's western division in Las Vegas beckoned.

By 1979, Lucas decided to move to Tennessee to be nearer his parents, Fred and Margaret Lucas. Fred Lucas once worked as a dispatcher for West Penn Power at the Fifth Street Extension substation in Charleroi. In 1954, Fred Lucas took a job in Saudi Arabia with the Arabian American Co (ARAMCO) before retiring in 1966 and settling in Tennessee.

With his parent's health declining, Lucas resigned from HCA and set out to establish some other area of income in Tennessee. Lucas tried an accounting/bookkeeping office, worked for the Census Bureau, opened a bait/tackle/convenience store and worked as financial officer for a Community Action Agency.

"My dad passed away shortly after I moved to Tennessee and then Mom died 1984," Lucas said.

Having suffered divorce during his military years, Lucas said, "It is a hard tour of duty for families because of the constant separation for home alert and overseas alert, I was one of many who were divorced because of it. More families came apart in the services because of separation than any other causes and I was no different."

Lucas became fond of another lady, and in 1985 they went to Cordova, Alaska, to visit a cousin. They were married there and "we have been together ever since." The newlyweds, each with four children from previous marriages, went to Tennessee to settle his parent's estate. "I had no reason to return to Pennsylvania since all the family was gone except for a few distant cousins scattered across the state," he said.

Wife Donna's birthplace was Indiana, although she had been raised in Michigan and had family there. In 1986, the couple moved to Kendallville, Ind.

Once again, Lucas was on the job hunt. It led from a Community Action Agency, for the IRS, a fabric store and machine repair, and in between, a noisy factory job as inspector/packer. "I liked what I was doing but, unfortunately, I lost another 40 percent of my hearing on top of the 30 percent I lost in the Air Force from aircraft engine/radio noise. So now I wear hearing aids."

Meanwhile, wife Donna was using 35 years of sewing experience doing alterations at home while Lucas began repairing sewing machines. A growing business developed and for more than 16 years Lucas had a good customer base, even though he did not advertise. Lucas dealt with fabric stores in neighboring towns where machines were left for repair. He also had done work for the local high school in the consumer science department.

Although both are officially retired now, Lucas still repairs sewing machines in his spare time and Donna is into quilting "big time."

Neil and Donna Lucas' eight children are scattered in the states of Florida, Colorado, Washington, Michigan, Tennessee and Indiana. There are nine grandchildren in the family.

Lucas added, "We don't go anywhere in winter. We still love the four seasons."

Belle Vernon resident Carol Campbell Robison recalled the friendship that existed between her late husband, Ray Robison, and Lucas. "They grew up together in Fallowfield Township and Ray just loved him. They were best friends." When a class reunion was planned, Robison said her husband always called Lucas to encourage him to attend. Of her own memories of classmate Lucas, Robison said, "I remember him as a red head."

Attorney Herman Bigi, of Carroll Township, also has a lifelong friendship with Lucas. "We started out at Cooper's School, then Fallowfield Consolidated School, and Charleroi High School." Last summer Lucas, wife and granddaughter spent several days at the Bigi home. They visited all the local sites and since the youngster had never seen a steel mill, Bigi took them to Monessen and Allenport. They also stopped at Frye Cemetery with its time-etched gravestones, close to where once existed a cabin, and an old stone house where the Lucas parents had a farm. "They had two cows named Mamie and Lady. We would milk the cows and then drink the milk," said Bigi.

Bigi said his memories of Lucas encompass their lifetimes of growing up together as best friends. "We are still close and keep in touch."

Dorothy Zippay Yagodich is a graduate of the 'Class of 1952'. In addition, she is an ongoing supporter and contributer of CharleroiPaHsAlumni.org.