Dave and Marian Cutting: Aviation Partners in Life - Part I
This project began as a story about Dave Cutting’s aviation career. It soon became apparent that it is a story about Dave and Marian Cutting—partners in aviation and partners in life. Flying for Dave is more than a metaphor for life, it is how life is lived.Theirs is a love story, which is not apparent from the outset because Dave is laid back and pretty easy going. His demeanor makes it somewhat difficult at first to realize the depth and intensity of his passion for life—his love of flying as a young WWII pilot, working with people in his business and community, and Marian, his wife of 57 years and his 4 children, Jane, Davis, Rob and Rick (Rick passed away in 1986).Dave turned 83 years old this summer and it is hard to see how he has slowed down from his youth. Dave was 19 years old in 1941 when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. He remembers sitting in his dorm at Cornell listening to the New York Symphony Orchestra on December 7th when the program was interrupted to announce the bombing of Pearl Harbor. By February of 1942, Dave had enlisted in the Army Air Corps and by July started his career in aviation. Dave’s college was interrupted for a period of time while he served in the military on IE Shima island, a stone’s throw from Okinawa. First, though, he went to Atlantic City for all sorts of physical and mental tests, practicing drills, wearing a uniform, and marching. He was then sent to Syracuse (his home town) for 3 months of college training detachments before leaving overseas. He did get just enough training in ROTC at Cornell (2 or 3 days?) to qualify to become a flight lieutenant in charge of a barrack of 30 men. (Dave lasted only a few days in ROTC when he decided it was not for him. The shirt itched and he did not like being told to stand at attention. But he was the only soldier with any ROTC experience in his cadet squadron so he was assigned a cadet lieutenant.)I asked Dave if he remembers his first solo. Of course he remembers, fondly. After receiving 8 or 9 hours of instruction. Dave said, “We were flying the PT 19, a Fairchild. The instructor was in the back, the student was in the front. And in-between there’s kind of a tripod, just in case you flipped over because you would have crushed your head!” “When the instructor walked away from the airplane and I took it down the runway and picked it up and ahhhhhh! ohhhhhh! It was an unbelievable thrill. It’s an open back cockpit. The white scarf. The helmet. The goggles! It was very dramatic.”Learning to fly was an exciting, thrilling experience: “You were so immersed in it. That’s all you did was talk about it. Everyone was flying—19, 20 years old. To go up and just fly. I remember seeing beautiful cumulus clouds and coming up the side of a cloud, rolling over and putting my canopy right into the cloud and then roll over. You did crazy things.”Dave’s thrill and enthusiasm for flying carried into meeting Marian and getting married after the war in 1948. While working as a squadron adjutant in Japan at a recuperation site in the mountains for combat soldiers, he received a letter that had finally reached him after 5 weeks from his mother. She wrote: “Davis, I have met a charming young lady who’s going to be attending Wells College in the fall of ’46 and I want to be sure that you look her up.” Dave returned from his military service in the war in 1946 and re-entered the Hotel School at Cornell. Before getting in, however, he had to re-take a chemistry class. The Dean of the Hotel School said, “Dave, you had a wonderful war record but, boy, you busted chemistry.” Dave told him, “Dean, I don’t like chemistry.” The Dean replied, “I’ll tell you what. You come this summer and pass chemistry.” Dave did go to summer school and “passed the damn chemistry.” After passing, Dave and a few friends went out to dinner and he gave “this girl at Wells a quick call to say hello.” (Marian piped up and said Dave arrived at 10:30 pm and she had to be in by 11:00 pm.). They were married in 1948. Dave says that his flying experiences in the military, such as landing at night with nothing but smudge pots for runway lights (no clicking possible there), has “helped me in my career. When you’re 19-20 years old, you can do anything! I’ve always kind of felt I can do that.”“Being an adjutant of a squadron at 22 years old, that’s a lot of responsibility and I think that I grew up in the service. I gained a lot of confidence. When you fly the best fighter plane we had you know you can do anything. And I’ve had that attitude.” Dave’s can-do attitude was the motivation to start many business and community efforts—early on he was class president at Cornell and president of his fraternity. He took leadership roles in putting together the very successful Empire Games in 1979, started the Tompkins County Area Development Corp. and the Cayuga Venture Fund (both to bring businesses to Ithaca). He was one of four who started the PeeWee Hockey program in town for youth. He was also instrumental in building the McGraw House (housing for elderly). Dave’s been a community player by giving of himself. Acting on his “I can do that!” attitude.
Elizabeth Grigoriu