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Old August 1st 16, 05:10 AM posted to alt.binaries.pictures.aviation
Savageduck[_3_]
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Default Consolidated B-24 Liberator [1/8] - Dad in Flight School 1942 a.jpg (1/1)

On 2016-07-31 20:29:40 -0700, Miloch said:



Pre Pearl Harbor in Lancaster CA, my father was like a lot of guys who were
interested in flying. Down the road was a flying service owned/operated by
Pancho Barnes and he took his first lessons from her.

After Pearl Harbor, he joined the Army Air Corps but came down & was bed-ridden
with rheumatic fever just after graduation from flight school and was
pronounced
unfit for combat duty.

At the time, 1942, there was a pilot shortage and he was kept on as a flight
instructor (eventually for B-24s). He told me that one of his instructors was
Jimmy Stewart. I remember him giving hilarious impressions of Stewart giving
him instructions during flight training.


OK! It was just that the way you wrote the above, it seemed to imply
that Zamperii was your father. ;-)

My father flew P-47s, and P-38s with the 9th FS, 49th FG, and had on
occassion flown as wingman to both Dick Bong and Robert Johnson until
he became a flight leader.
He also has had the privilige of having Lindbergh fly as his wingman on
Lindy's South-West Pacific tour. After that mission some of the
participants signed a dollar bill for his "short snorter". On the
dollar bill Lindbergh is the clear signature followed by Tommy McGuire,
who was Lindy's handler for the tour, and #2 USAAF WWII ace, Maj. Bob
McComsey, and Robert De Haven an ace from 7th FS, 49th FG.
---------------


My father stayed in and retired as Lt Col in 1962. He was a 2 1/2 pack a day
smoker and had a heart attack in '61. The Air Force grounded him permanently
but his attitude was that if he couldn't fly (he had over 10,000 hours) he'd
leave and he did!


1961 was about when my dad gave up smoking cold turkey, and hasn't
touched one since. He just turned 93 on July 23.
He left the USAAF in 1947 as a Captain.
At the end of the war, he had accumulated 156 missions and 400 combat
hours with 4 comfirmed kills and two probables. He won a Silver Star,
2x DFC, Air Medal + 4 OLC, Asia Pacific Campaign +5 Battle Stars,
Phillipines Liberation Medal, Japan Occupation Medal.
Also he was part of the escort for the Japanese surrender envoys and
the "Surrender Betties" from Japan to Ie Shima.

After the War he was stationed at Luke Field as an instructer.

The only pics I have of his flying days are attached...they all of him and some
of his buddies in flight school. Primary in '42 was in PT-22 Ryans and
advanced
was in AT6 Texans.


Dad in his P-38L at Gusap, New Guinea, 1944.




--
Regards,

Savageduck
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