According to Gelbart, he and Reynolds visited the 8055th after the second season of “M*A*S*H,” where they recorded 22 hours of audio with the people working in the unit. One individual really stood out and inspired a fictionalized version as the titular character in the episode “Smilin’ Jack.” As Gelbart explained:
“One of the people interviewed was a chopper pilot named Dan Sullivan. A very colorful guy, we created a character for the series based on his experiences. We added a twist by having our fictional chopper pilot fall victim to diabetes. This was purely a creative invention. Sullivan never had that condition. Sometime after the episode aired, Dan — the real Dan — became afflicted with diabetes. It was a bizarre case of life being imitated by art only to have art then be imitated in life. I only mention all of this now because I was recently written by a friend of Sullivan’s (ah, the wondrous Web) telling me of his illness (of which I had been unaware) and saying that a group of friends were gathering this week to honor him — and would I care to write a few words to him, as well. Of course, I was happy to.”
In the episode, Smilin’ Jack is a helicopter pilot who transports wounded soldiers from the front lines to the MASH units, and he’s in competition with some of the other pilots to have the highest number of wounded transported. Sadly, he has diabetes, which brands him a risk, although he refuses to be grounded.