[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 151 (Wednesday, October 21, 1998)]
[Senate]
[Page S12900]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




               TRIBUTE TO LIEUTENANT GENERAL DAVE McCLOUD

 Mr. KEMPTHORNE. Mr. President, I rise today to offer a tribute 
to Air Force Lieutenant General Dave J. McCloud who died in a tragic 
plane crash on July 26, 1998 in Alaska. Dave McCloud was an outstanding 
officer, husband and father. The nation and the Air Force lost one of 
its finest military leaders when Dave McCloud passed away. General 
McCloud was an energetic, sincere and honest man who I considered a 
true friend. Like many others, I mourn Dave's passing every day.
  I know Dave's wife Anna misses her partner and I know his son and 
daughter, Robyn, miss their father. I offer my deepest condolences to 
all of Dave's family and friends.
  As a final tribute to fighter pilot Dave McCloud, I offer the 
following poem, ``High Flight,'' which epitomizes my friend in so many 
ways.

                              High Flight

                     (By John Gillispie Magee, Jr.)

     Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
     And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
     Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
     Of sun-split clouds--and done a hundred things
     You have not dreamed of--wheeled and soared and swung
     High in the sunlit silence, Hov'ring there,
     I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
     My eager craft through footless halls of air.
     Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue
     I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
     Where never lark, or even eagle flew
     And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod
     The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
     Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.

       By Pilot Officer John Gillispie Magee, Jr. No 412 Squadron, 
     RCAF (1922-1941)

  ``High Flight'', a poem by John Gillespie Magee, Jr. An American/
British fighter pilot. He flew with the Royal Canadian Air Force in 
World War II. He came to Britain, flew in a Spitfire squadron, and was 
killed at age 19 on December 11, 1941, during a training flight from 
the airfield near Scopwick, Lincolnshire. The poem was written on the 
back of a letter to his parents which stated, ``I am enclosing a verse 
I wrote the other day. It started at 30,000 feet, and was finished soon 
after I landed.''

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