From the young age of nine years old, Colonel Paul Arland Barber, USAF, Retired, loved airplanes and the wonder of flying. He was raised on a wheat farm during the Great Depression in South Haven, Kansas. Times were tough and life was difficult. Paul’s hard-working parents modeled for him that everything you do in life, you do with excellence.

In 1943, the first class of aviation cadets from the Strother Field began low-level flying runs over Kansas heading to a bombing range in Oklahoma. As part of their training, these cadets would use the Barber’s big red-and-white painted barn as a navigational checkpoint. When Paul would hear the roar of the engines of the Vultee BT-13 Valiants and P-47 Thunderbolts in the distance, he would quickly climb to the top of the barn’s open hay loft to wave and cheer them on.