The Music

    I'm sure you recognize the music as the theme from the great John Wayne movie, "The High and The Mighty".  Why did I choose this music?

    In listening to dad describe his flights, and looking at the pictures of the Himalaya Mountains, I got a sense of fear, exhilaration, loneliness, and triumph when the mission was completed.  I remembered seeing this film as a very young boy, and I remember the same emotions and feelings in the characters.  And of course, the haunting theme music has stayed with me all this time.  It took literally months of searching the web for a wave file of the theme, but it was worth the time.   This music evokes the same feelings that the movie characters felt and experienced, and I believe that the pilots and air crews who flew the HUMP felt and experienced them also.  If it has finished playing, go back and start the page again.  Close your eyes and listen, and imagine yourself in the cockpit of an overloaded, under-powered transport plane flying in bad weather, and just barely above the tips of the highest mountains in the world.  

Footnote:

   Some time ago, the 50% owner of the rights to the composition, Warner/Chappell Music, Inc. denied me the usage of this passage without clear explanation or reason as to why.  I don't really understand why, but that was their decision when I contacted them.  I thought that was the courteous and proper thing to do, never suspecting that my request would be turned down.  At the time, I examined the Fair Use clause in American copyright law and concluded that Warner/Chappell was within their rights to deny me the usage.  It was with a great deal of sadness that I left it out because I truly felt that this music, based on the stories I have heard from my father and other HUMP pilots, more than any other that I have found or heard, evokes the emotions and feelings felt by anyone who made that crossing.  However, a loophole in the Fair Use provision now has me convinced that because I am using the music to illustrate the emotions and feelings that I believe these brave aviators felt on each HUMP crossing, in a non-commercial application, and on a web site that can be considered educational in nature, my usage is completely legal.  The music has been turned back on and will remain as an integral part of the opening to this site.