...he trudged in off the desert floor into the museum, hot and dusty, his 50 mission crush cap worn from years of use, but, out of the closet, he put it on for his visit to the B-17 Museum.
"I was 19 when I did my first of 28 missions, " he told me. Out of England, called East Anglia at the time, he was part of the 8th Air Force that bombed the German Reich back into the stone ages in 1944 and 45.
" Gosh," he said, " it was awful." At 89, still using 'gosh,' I thought, what a character - 28 missions stacked with blood, gunfire, explosions, flak and death, this guy, at his age, still says, GOSH like a Montana farm boy, but still standing straight with a boyish smile on his face, he had no regrets.
"I flew in the middle of the pack, " he added, " in the left seat (command pilot) and most of the 8 hours in the air, I got a severe case of eye strain and vertigo."
He had to keep his eye on the airplane 70 feet above him right under his nose, in those days, it was "put your wing in my window," they flew so close, so tight, they often bumped into each other. The idea was with 12 machine guns pointed in every direction, the enemy wouldn't dare make a direct attack on the flock of B-17's - too many machine guns.
"About 30% of the time, the ME 109's killed the pilot and co-pilot in a head on run, shooting right at us. Thank God, they never hit me, " he said. In those cases, the top turret gunner came down and flew the mission, he was the third pilot on board. "Lucky thing," my visiting pilot buddy added, " my top turret was crappy at landing."
In 28 missions, my B-17 pilot visitor of the day, flew 16 different B-17s, most crashed and burned on return to their bases in East Anglia. One, the "Dorothy Dee," was so shot up, when he landed at Jimmy Stewart's base (the actor who was sound asleep at the time), he said he could swear the crew was whistling they were so happy to have made it.
When he left the plane, the ground crew chief told him to turn around and check out his 17. When he did, his jaw dropped. It took him a half hour to count OVER 700 bullet holes. The miracle was not one of the 10 man crew was even scratched.
The crew wasn't whistling,...the airplane was. The scraped the plane and the boys were bused back to their own base.
None of the 10 crewmen were over 20.
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