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senior CAP leader.<br />
So, in September 1975, Patterson became the first<br />
CAP national commander from the volunteer ranks. He<br />
held the post until September 1976.<br />
Patterson is<br />
credited, along<br />
with previous<br />
national board<br />
chairmen Brig.<br />
Gens. S. Hallock<br />
du Pont Jr. and<br />
Lyle Castle, with<br />
introducing the<br />
cadet program, the<br />
basics of which are<br />
still used today.<br />
“He believed<br />
very much in the<br />
cadets and would<br />
do anything he<br />
could to assist them<br />
in any way,” Ann<br />
Patterson said. “He<br />
worked to give William M. “Pat” Patterson.<br />
cadets every<br />
opportunity that was possible for them to have.”<br />
Before joining CAP, Patterson served in the Army Air<br />
Force, flying B-24 Liberators in Europe during World<br />
War II. He retired as a lieutenant colonel in the reserve.<br />
“As an Air Force Reserve officer he accumulated<br />
over 5,200 flying hours and held multiple ratings, the<br />
most unique being one of only eight rotorcraft ratings<br />
issued to a small group that mastered the gyroplane,”<br />
said Lt. Col. John Knowles, Maryland Wing vice<br />
commander, who researched Patterson’s biography as<br />
project officer for the memorial service, which featured<br />
a eulogy by former CAP national commander Brig.<br />
Gen. Richard L. Anderson.<br />
“Delivering CAP’s final tribute to Gen. Pat<br />
Patterson was simultaneously the hardest and most<br />
satisfying duty I have ever performed in 40 years of<br />
Civil Air Patrol membership,” Anderson said. “As<br />
secretary of CAP’s national advisory council, I worked<br />
with him on a frequent and regular basis, something I<br />
enjoyed immensely because I first met him when I<br />
was a teenage CAP cadet colonel and he was the<br />
sitting national commander.”<br />
Patterson’s<br />
grandson, Brian<br />
Roche, remembers<br />
that his grandfather<br />
owned a large lot in<br />
Hunt Valley, Md.<br />
“He had a gyroplane<br />
at his home. I was<br />
only 6 at the time,<br />
but it is in my early<br />
memory of him.”<br />
Roche’s son,<br />
Nicholas, 13, is a<br />
cadet in Maryland’s<br />
Carroll Composite<br />
Squadron.<br />
“I sincerely<br />
believe Nick’s<br />
interest and pride<br />
in becoming a Civil<br />
Air Patrol member<br />
is due to his great-grandfather’s continued interest<br />
and pride in what the cadet program offers the youth<br />
of America,” said Ann Patterson, the teenager’s greatgrandmother.<br />
Nicholas Roche, who affectionately called his greatgrandfather<br />
“General,” as did Patterson’s other<br />
children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren,<br />
agreed. “He was always talking about flying, and it<br />
interested me,” the cadet said. “After I joined CAP he<br />
told me he was really proud.”<br />
Nicholas’ squadron commander, Capt. Brenda Reed,<br />
said his pride in his great-grandfather was evident when<br />
Nicholas placed third in the wing’s recent annual public<br />
speaking competition for a speech about Patterson.<br />
Asked how Patterson would have felt about that, Ann<br />
Patterson, who admitted she hadn’t known about the<br />
speech, didn’t hesitate for a second: “He would’ve<br />
popped his buttons,” she said. ▲<br />
Brig. Gen. Richard L. Anderson, CAP national commander from 1993 to 1996,<br />
presents a U.S. flag to Ann Patterson at the memorial service for Brig. Gen.<br />
Photo by Capt. Brenda Reed, Maryland Wing<br />
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