Col. James B. Swindal, 88; Piloted Air Force One for President Kennedy

Retired Air Force Col. James B. Swindal, who commanded Air Force One for John F. Kennedy and flew the body of the slain president to Washington from Dallas in 1963, died April 25 at Cape Canaveral Hospital in Cocoa Beach, Fla. He was 88 and had complications from a broken hip.

Swindal was a veteran of World War II and the postwar Berlin airlift. He had 11,500 flying hours to his credit, including a long stint flying dignitaries from what was then National Airport and Andrews Air Force Base. He became President-elect Kennedy’s personal pilot in 1960.

At first, he flew a DC-6 for Kennedy, but Boeing unveiled a custom aircraft for the jet-setting president in late 1962. On that Boeing 707 -- the first jet craft used for presidential transport -- Swindal took Kennedy to Love Field in Dallas from Fort Worth on Nov. 22, 1963.

From a portable radio inside the cockpit, he first heard the account of the president’s assassination.

“We were sort of in a bind, because there was no place on Air Force One for a casket, and we sure didn’t want to put it in the cargo hold,” Swindal told the newspaper Florida Today in 2003.

“But back there in the rear were seats for stewardesses, Secret Service and other passengers. So we unbolted those seats -- about four rows, I’m guessing, at least eight seats -- and made a space about the size of a couch. And there was enough room for people to walk around,” he said.

He said that after rushing to ready the plane for its trip to Washington, he left the cockpit to salute the coffin upon its arrival from what was then Parkland Memorial Hospital.

By early afternoon, the plane was off the ground, loaded to the limit with fuel to stay aloft as long as possible in case the assassination was part of a Soviet attack.

Moments before the flight, U.S. District Judge Sarah Hughes administered the presidential oath to Vice President Lyndon Johnson. His wife, Lady Bird, and the widowed Jacqueline Kennedy were at Johnson’s side.

Swindal flew briefly for Johnson and retired from active duty in 1971 from a managerial position at Patrick Air Force Base, the controlling center for Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.

James Barney Swindal, a carpenter’s son, was born Aug. 18, 1917, in West Blocton, Ala. He enlisted in the Army after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941.

Assigned to the Army Air Forces, he ferried men and supplies over the Himalayas in the China-Burma-India theater. In the late 1940s, while stationed at Rhein-Main Air Base near Frankfurt, Germany, he participated in the Berlin airlift that brought supplies to Berliners during a communist blockade of that divided city.

In retirement, Swindal settled in Cocoa Beach and only went on an aircraft once more -- when his brother died in California.

Otherwise, he had an aversion to flying that his family attributed to a distaste for not being in charge.

Survivors include his wife of 70 years, Emily Glover Swindal; two children; two grandsons; and a great-grandson.