Tennessee native and Milton resident Dr. James W. Jowers spent 28 years in the United States Navy with 4,560 flight hours, 212 combat missions, and 13 saves as a helicopter rescue pilot. Jowers said he and his men survived every mission without a scratch, but ironically he said Agent Orange, exposed to him in Vietnam, presumably resulted in his 1999 diagnosis of multiple-myeloma, or bone cancer. Jowers’ experiences in and out of the military were the inspiration for his four self-published novels.
While the Great Depression may seem a page in the history books, this was the period in which Jowers was born. His education began in a one-room schoolhouse in Lexington, Tennessee and culminated in a bachelor’s degree in business administration, master’s in management, and a PhD in clinical psychology.
After two years of college, Jowers joined the military and earned his wings of gold in the Naval Flight Program. Jowers said the rescues he made with the HC-7 squadron earned him 12 air medals and the Distinguished Flying Cross. Jowers discussed one of his civilian rescue missions when he lifted a father, mother, and two children from a wrecked ship at Marine Corps Air Station Kaneohe in Hawaii, before Hawaii became a state.
A highlight of Jowers’ career was instructing then U.S. Marine Major John Glenn “in the art of helicopter flight.” Jowers said he trained the future astronaut in 1958, four years before Glenn became the first American to orbit the Earth.
Coincidentally, Jowers said a device he worked on at a job in California, the Groshong catheter, eventually saved his life in Florida. Four years after his bone cancer diagnosis, in stage four, he said his oncologist, Dr. Boatright, saved his life. After a spinal tap in August of 2002, Dr. Boatright said he had only six months to live and recommended stem cell treatment. Jowers said, using the Groshong catheter, the technician was able to collect 12 million of his own stem cells. Two thirds, he said, went on ice while the remaining doctors used to treat his cancer. This treatment, along with chemotherapy, Jowers said, knocked out nearly all of the cancer. He noted he’ll never be rid of his bone cancer, but estimates he’s the oldest living bone cancer patient.
“I’ve always wanted to be a pilot and a writer,” Jower said. In 1990, he began his first novel, “The Sea Devils,” an 800 page work he finished in 1999. He said he was advised to cut the work in half. From his Gulf Coast Authors profile, “This is the story of his four tours to Vietnam from 1965 to 1969, Flying combat SAR (search and rescue) in the H-2 and H-3 helicopters. My squadron rescued 159 pilots that had been shot down in combat.”
Jowers’ second novel, “The Gideon Warriors,” is another combat rescue piece. “Captain Tom Colby takes a Group of Gideon Warrior combat helicopter pilots to raid the POW camp at Son Tay. Tom's old CIA nemesis attempts to compromise the mission (as a double Russia agent), by peddling plans of the mission to Russians.”
“Kill the Whistleblower” steps away from enlisted combat and instead stems from Jowers’ work on the Tomahawk Cruise Missile while working for General Dynamics at San Diego. This work of fiction features Sheriff Jack Curtin (from Lexington, TN) flying to San Diego to avenge the murder of his brother by the Mexican Mafia.
Finally, Jowers’ fourth novel, “Ask God and Be Amazed,” is about his experience with cancer. “This book is filled with his personal experiences of pain and suffering from the bone cancer along with flashbacks to his pilots and air crewmen, who also developed various cancers and died from being exposed to Agent Orange,” according to the Gulf Coast Authors’ profile.
Jowers, now in his 80s, is working on a fifth novel, this time, a western. “York and the Rebel Gold,” Jowers said, focuses on his character, Captain York, fighting for the south during the Civil War who traveled west to receive gold from sympathizers in California. After a battle in Arizona, York, the only survivor, buried the five teakettles of gold in a grave and returned a decade later to find them.
As a disabled veteran, Jowers said he has all the time he needs to write. He also meets with the Gulf Coast Authors during their meetings every two months.