Some Pomp, a Flyover, and El Toro Is History

By SCOTT MARTELLE and H.G. REZA

July 3, 1999 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITERS

In a ceremony that encompassed more than half a century of military and Orange County history, the El Toro Marine Corps Air Station officially closed Friday, a bittersweet day for more than 3,000 people who packed temporary bleachers to bid farewell not so much to Marines as to an important place.

The base was, in the words of one general, a “home for warriors,” a launchpoint for U.S. involvement for some of the major military campaigns of World War II and the Korean and Vietnam wars.

In the end, the closing was more a formality than anything else. There weren’t enough Marines left assigned to the base Friday to muster up a parade, so two platoons from Miramar Marine Corps Air Station in San Diego County and one from Camp Pendleton presented the colors for the last time.

For the crowd, though, it didn’t matter. Even starchy military language--officially, it was a “disestablishment ceremony”--couldn’t overcome the air of an informal reunion. Paunchy gray-haired men in old uniforms and service-logo T-shirts greeted each other like old family members, while younger families brought children for one last look.

Among the crowd were 11 Legion of Valor members--soldiers awarded the Medal of Honor, Distinguished Service Cross, Navy Cross or Air Force Cross for their actions in World War II, Korea and Vietnam.

In a poignant tribute to the Marines who passed through El Toro in its 56 years, assistant commandant Gen. Terrence R. Dake saluted “those who are heroes. Those who have defended this great nation and have been a part of Marine Corps Air Station, El Toro.”

Not all those heroes survived.

“Too many times we have been in the chapel for memorial services,” Dake told the crowd, acknowledging the core reality of war. “It is in the pride of their victories that we stand here today.”

Dake, a helicopter pilot who left El Toro for the Vietnam War in 1968, described the base as glue binding together the men and women of the Marine Air Wing--almost all of whom have passed through El Toro.

“It matters not when we served here,” Dake said as a row of military flags and the stars and stripes snapped in the steady breeze. “There’s a kinship among us.”

The kinship extends to part of the surrounding community, as well.

“My first pair of blue jeans are from the PX. They cost $4,” said Tonya Dalton, 42, of Mission Viejo, for whom the base was a personal touchstone even though she’s from a nonmilitary family. “This was kind of the whole center of the community here.”

Her mother, Peggy Dalton, moved to Costa Mesa from Texas just a few years after the base opened. Over the years, the family made the annual El Toro air shows a spring ritual.

“We used to come out with the Coleman stove and make breakfast and Bloody Marys and wait for it to begin,” the daughter said. “One year it was raining so hard a military policeman came up and said, ‘Ladies, you have to go. We’re not going to fly today.’

“We were all wrapped up in plastic, we looked like sausages,” added the mother, who declined to give her age.

Tragedy was mixed in, too. Friday’s trip to El Toro was the mother’s first since an F-18 crashed in front of her during the air show in 1988. The pilot survived, but she lost her taste for the inherent risk that drew so many of the curious over the years.

But the mother felt compelled Friday to make one final trip. “We’ve shed a lot of tears,” she said.

The Daltons were both probably still sleeping in their beds when Daniel Beck, 20, of Rancho Santa Margarita and Holly Hoegi, 18, of Laguna Niguel showed up Friday at El Toro’s front gate.

At 5 a.m., the young couple was well ahead of the crowd.

“She [the guard] was surprised at the gate when we said we were here for the ceremony,” Beck said.

The guard let them in anyway. While Hoegi stretched out on a bleacher seat for more sleep, Beck walked in darkness to the middle of the runway, marked down its middle by outsize white stripes to aid pilots in their landings.

“I felt like I was a little tiny ant on a road,” Beck said. “I love this place. I wanted to soak it in.”

Although Orange County’s landscape and character have changed over the years, El Toro has remained a point of constancy, 5th District county Supervisor Tom Wilson told the crowd.

“The base is a part of Orange County that will hearken back fond memories of a county in transition,” he said.

Yet there’s more transition to come. El Toro remains a key point of contention between Orange County officials who want to convert the base into an international airport, and South County residents determined to kill the idea.

Local politics were all but invisible Friday, though. More lighthearted wake than celebration, temporary bleachers faced a row of military and American flags. The ceremony itself embraced the pomp of military rituals dating back to Alexander the Great.

During more than 20 years in the Marines--most of them at El Toro--Chuck Howe, 77, of Anaheim sat through more than his share of military pageants. So as the band started its song list Friday, he was grabbing a cookie from a tray in a tarped reception area.

Howe served in World War II and Korea but decided to retire “right about the time they were ready to start Vietnam.” He stayed in Orange County, working for Union Oil until retiring for good in 1985.

Even in retirement, though, the base has been a focal point of his life, with its social amenities and his volunteer job as a docent.

“I hate to see it go,” he said.

After the speeches, three platoons of Marines passed in review before the grandstands, and the 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing band continued a series of marches and patriotic songs.

The final official moments were marked by a World War II-era F4U Corsair’s symbolic touch-and-go landing, and a flyover by two F/A-18 Hornets.

The Daltons--mother and daughter--said the ceremony gave them what they came for--a last look, and a last touch, of a place that has been an integral part of their lives.

“It was great,” the daughter said as the last two Hornets screeched past, then abruptly pulled up to make a nearly vertical climb into the clearing sky.

“Look,” she continued, rubbing her left forearm. “Goose bumps.”

* WHAT’S NEXT?

The fight over a proposed international airport at El Toro moves to Washington. A26