Builders:
The question came up in conversation at our airport over the weekend. The person asking it was really interested in how few hours it takes to qualify for the federal license exam. Instead, in my 25th year of being an A&P mechanic, I shared the qualifications that mattered to our Embry Riddle Maintenance Department Chair, Richard Ulm, (USMC) :
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Above, Dick Ulm, on a 1962-63 West Pac deployment. Many of our instructors at Riddle were Vietnam combat aviators. The experience left them with a sharp definition of integrity. On issues that mattered, things were black and white, devoid of gray area.
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While I knew Mr. Ulm as both a student and an employee of his, I would more accurately describe him as my mentor of ethics in aviation. On the subject of being an A&P mechanic (which was very different than being someone who merely possessed the paper) he strongly felt that there were two simple requirements for anyone to rightly claim the title:
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