A young trainee identified in period handwriting as Howard Frederick Melius of Richfield, Wisconsin, poses on a flight line beside a fabric-covered light training monoplane, camera in hand. Snapshots like this were common keepsakes among aviation cadets at the civilian-contract airfields used to conduct primary and elimination flight instruction during World War II, when trainees often carried personal cameras to document their time around the aircraft they trained on. Project: 218579