Reply from Altus

I had a very cordial email from MSgt Richard Guinan, who is the Historian of the 97th Air Mobility Wing at Altus AFB in Altus, Oklahoma. Sadly he doesn't have any records of what happened at Altus 60 years ago, although he says he's very interested to learn that a few more planes apart from "Memphis Belle" escaped the incinerator at Altus.

This is not unusual (I wouldn't expect an individual unit historian to have histories of the base they happen to be at) but I salute MSgt Guinan here for his reply. I will forward some of my "Town Bomber" notes to him to show how many planes did escape the incinerator, and some of which still remain to this day.

Speaking of Altus Survivors

Here is "The Bomber" - aka B-17G-105-VE 44-85790 which was flown from the WAA lot at Altus in 1947 and mounted above a gas station in the Portland suburb of Milwaukee, Oregon - it's been there ever since, although the gas station has gone and been replaced by "The Bomber" restaurant. The B-17's nose was removed in 1996 for restoration.

Photo by George Yobst , taken on Feb 1 2006 -
Many thanks George, for braving the recent monsoon and getting some pretty wonderful pics.

You can see a few more pictures of "The Bomber" (courtesy of George) and some other illustrations in my flickr photostream. This is also accessible from the little pictures on the sidebar of this page (you may have to scroll up a little to see them)

CAP News

I had an email from Major Debbie Leslie who is the CO of the Joplin CAP Squadron (Col Travis Hoover Composite Squadron - Travis Hooper was one of the Doolittle Raiders and was the pilot of the second aircraft behind Doolittle's).

Major Leslie has done some research and has saved me a certain amount of trouble by contacting CAP HQ at Maxwell AFB and finding out they haven't got anything in their records. Shame but at least we know. She did contact a couple of older members of the CAP who remember Major Chris Oltman, a former commander. One member she spoke to told her that his unit had removed one of the Jalopy's engines and dismantled it. This is very interesting. I haven't seen this written in any of the records anywhere else. I don't suppose there are any pieces left but it adds another piece to a fairly complex picture.

Progress of a kind

Not much blogging done in the last few days. there are many reasons, but I have been getting some research done - honestly!

• The National Air and Space Museum don't have a copy of the Jalopy's Individual Aircraft Record Card (IARC) - so I've written to the Air Force Historical Research Agency at Maxwell AFB, Alabama as well.
• No response from the Joplin Historical Museum Complex.
• No response yet from the Joplin Civil Air Patrol
• I have written to a couple of the crew members whose names and addresses were passed to me by Jerry Folsom.
• I have emailed the Historian at Altus AFB if any further RFC / WAA history exists there.
  
• Leslie Simpson found a reference to Frank C. Wallower (son of a Pennsylvania newspaper magnate) and who owned a lot of land and mines in the Joplin area. His former home is now part of the campus of Missouri Southern State University. See this article. I assume that Captain Frank Wallower Jr (CAP Pilot) was related in some way to Frank C. Wallower.
  There is also an archive at the University of Missouri, Rolla. I can see that a trip to some academic institutions in Missouri may be in order.
  

B-24 Exhibit at Willow Run!

Part of my wider research project is looking for records of other bombers which may have been exhibited in towns and cities across the US after the second world war.

I knew that the Edsel Ford post of the American Legion obtained a B-24 known as "Old Number 139" for a memorial at Willow Run - its identity is a mystery to me (at the moment) but I have a couple of pictures of a "silver" (NMF) B-24 with a large number "139" painted on the nose being wrangled into postition with a couple of tractors. Sadly "Old Nunber 139" was scrapped in 1950.

I found in my copy of 8-Ball Tails that there was at least one other B-24 exhibited at Willow Run. It was a weary 44th BG B-24 named " San Antonio Rose" (it had previously been "Limpin' Old Sadie")

All the more reason to contact some historians in the Detroit area.

Work to be done (3)

I have a couple more leads to pursue about the thefts of items from the plane in 1946/7. These are the Jasper County, Missouri Court records, or the City of Joplin PD and City records depending on who arrested whom.

Jerry Folsom wrote to me and sent me a few more names and old addresses of 44th BG pilots and crews. I keep forgetting he was president of the 44thBG Veterans' Association. Some letter writing to be done.

It also struck me that I should be following up on the Michigan and Oklahoma ends of the story.

Altus AFB, OK had a pretty extensive website at the time when I wrote this blog item in February. By the summer of 2006 it had been removed (along with some of the interesting content).

There is also a Public Library in Altus which is part of the Southern Prairie Library System and furthermore the Museum of the Western Prairie is located in Altus.

At the Michigan end of things there is DALNET - the Detroit Area Library (This is their member list) So this also sounds like a good place to start with Willow Run related enquiries.

8 Ball Tails

On a happier note: Yesterday I received a copy of the latest edition of 8-Ball Tails - the newsletter of the 44th BG Veterans' Association. I'm not just saying this because I'm biased, but it is a pretty impressive publication.

Reading through it, I found it a little odd but comforting to see names I recognise from my research.

Thank you, Ruth Davis-Morse. I appreciate the gesture.

First Spam e-mail received

I received my first spam e-mail to the Yahoo account sometime yesterday. Apparently someone has 86 million dollars holed up in a bank account in some remote location and wants my help to get it out of there. Good grief.

You'd think these people would have given up by now, but apparently not - if there's one born every minute (as the saying goes) there are a lot of new suckers out there.

B-24 short field performance?

I'm going to take a look at the old Municipal Airport site in Joplin tomorrow (Sunday) and see what it looks like. I think the site is mostly turned over to industrial uses now. The question which strikes me is - was it big enough to accomodate a B-24 landing? I haven't seen any pictures of any planes at the old Joplin Airport so I can't judge properly, and the existing photographs (the ones I've seen) are ambiguous.

The "Jalopy" would have been stripped of weapons but I notice it still had the additional armor plate fitted to the cockpit sides when it returned to Joplin. It also had a smaller flight crew. So maybe it did land at the old airport.

Civil Air Patrol Crew (and others)

One of the Murwin Mosler photographs published in the Joplin Globe on 13th August 1946 showed a handover ceremony in which the title to the plane was handed over to the Vice-President / Acting President of the Joplin War Dads. (Hmm - it wouldn't have been the actual title as the USAAF normally retained formal title to any such plane - look what happened to Memphis Belle last October)

The people listed in the globe article are:

Joplin Jalopy Flight Crew
Captain Frank Wallower Jr - pilot
Flight Officer Marvin Pearson, co-pilot
Sergeant Glenn Pearson (former Seabee and mechanic for the flight)
Sergeant Henry Thomason and/or Bradley Thomason
Captain Viers / Veirs
Paul Smith
L.L. Travis - former Joplin postmaster and the person who arranged the transfer of the Jalopy from the War Assets Administration (WAA) to the City of Joplin

Also shown at the handover are:

Major Oltman - CAP Squadron Commander
W.H. Brown - Vice President of Joplin War Dads
Lieutenant Geltz Zenter CAP Pilot for Joplin - Altus Leg
Captain O.L DeMier - CAP Pilot for Joplin - Altus Leg
Norton Brown - Joplin Photographer

This gives me a little more to work on - I don't expect many of these folks are still alive, but there may be something in the local archives somewhere.

Civil Air Patrol

I don't know why I thought the Civil Air Patrol ceased to exist after the Second World War. One of my wife's co-workers told me that her sons are members. Another assumption bites the dust. It was the Civil Air Patrol who flew down to Altus (in 3 planes, according to the Joplin Globe) and delivered a crew to fly the Jalopy back.

And here's the website address - http://www.cap.gov