Then luck came in

An Aviation Sergeant Who Yearned To Fly
By Andrew A. Caffrey
The sergeant was a much abused man. Wartime flying had not used him any too well; nor had after the war aviation done any better. Now he was nearing the end of his Army career.
The sergeant had wanted to fly. He wanted to go solo and do his own birding. It had always been his one ambition. And it was through no fault of his own that the big desire had never been fully realized. Fact is, along those lines the much abused sergeant was without fault. He had always done his share.
The sergeant was too willing in 1917. Later—too late—he realized this. Had he held off, as the other millions did, and waited for the war to get at good speed, he would have made his way into a ground school and started right. But the sergeant did not know that there were to be such schools. None knew this. So the sergeant enlisted. Willingly the aviation branch of the Signal Corps took him. Oh, yes, of course, they said he would fly.
But the sergeant turned out to be a handy mechanic. Good mechanics were few—and are still—so the sergeant, though he didn’t guess it, was never going to get to fly.
On the other side of the pond his bad luck continued. That was when they made him a sergeant, made him a sergeant, chief airplane rigger, while they made flying cadets of the goldbricks in his squadron. That hurt—hurt like—well, it hurt.
“But look here, Sergeant,” his commanding officer said in rebuttal, “now let’s be reasonable; it takes years to make a good mechanic. And only hours to lache a full fledged pilot; and the stuff of which airmen are made need not know anything—or much. See the point? You’re important on this field; these other birds going out as cadets are, as a rule, culls we’re glad to be rid of. Now get back to your hangar and feel satisfied that you are doing your bit, and a hell of a big bit, Sergeant!”
That line of official chatter did not help the sergeant at all.
“I’ve heard it before,” he told his rigging crews. “Doing my bit! Bit be damned! The effect of my first patriotic drunk has worn off. What I want to do is fly and I’m going to!”