If you read this stuff...
...And wonder where I've been. I can only apologise. Last post on march 10th and here we are on March 29th.
I can't say much has happened. I've been chasing down the legacy of Herbert W. Davis and through the efforts of the 44thBGVA I think I know a little bit more. It appears that someone called Herbert Davis was in the 68thBS, 44thBG on the ground side somewhere. Having been told he's there I now see him listed in the personnel of the 68thBS.
Not much further on the local research. I have been out of town unsuccessfully chasing down another job and while I've been away I haven't made much progress. Still, since I'm staying in the area I can pursue some of my own lines of enquiry again.
Still more information
The indefatigable Leslie Simpson sent me a newspaper clipping from the Webb City [Missouri] Sentinel dated 10/24/2004 entitled "What happened to the Joplin Jalopy?" written by Jeanne Newby as part of a column called "Ancestors, Legends & Time" The article is clearly a follow up to an earlier article about the Jalopy. In this article a local man has recently called Jeanne to tell her of a childhood memory of playing on the plane when it was located at a Salvage Yard in Webb City called The Swappers Salvage Company. This would have been, so the article says, in around 1949 or 1950.
This adds another new angle to the "Jalopy" story. It was here for longer than I'd thought, and the possibility that pieces may exist in the locality has risen from "zero" to "slim"
Mission Detail - August 9, 1944
I got a copy of Webb C Todd's book "History of the 68th Bomb Squadron, 44th Bomb Group : The Flying Eightballs" on Inter-Library Loan (it came from the Combined Arms Research Library at Fort Leavenworth, KS!) and found a couple of interesting details. There is a list of every one of the 44th BG bombers, and under the entry for Joplin Jalopy it says "Suffered heavy flak damage, Saarbrucken, 8/9/44"
This would have been 8th Air Force Mission 533, the 44BG's Mission 205 and the Jalopy's 6th. The crew on this mission was 1st Lieutenant John C Titter's crew of the 506th Bomb Squadron - this was Titter's 37th and last mission.
The primary target for this mission was Sindelfingen but the war diary says "22 aircraft and 2 PFFs dispatched but the formation had to turn back 50 miles west of the target due to adverse weather conditions. 17 A/C and 2 PFFS bombed the briefed secondary target" (Saarbrucken)
This (the flak damage) explains why the Jalopy's next mission was 8AF Mission 568 (Group 212) on August 24 1944.
Inter-Library Loan footnote - I haven't been able to get hold of a copy of Norman Kiefer's "Green-Nosed Flying Eightballs - A History of the 506th Bomb Squadron, 44th Bomb Group". Someone told me there was a copy on eBay for a starting bid of 399 dollars - I can't bear to look!
More Archival Treasure
From Charles Gibbons' "Angling in the Archives" again: City Officials in November 1944 were pondering an offer that could place a surplus warplane in a city park as a war memento after the war. "They used to put old cannons in parks as mementos of wars, but now it's going to be airplanes" reported the [Joplin] News Herald. Mayor John M. Temples advised the City Council today the federal works administration has notified him that the surplus war property administration is going to offer 'surplus war planes for memorial purposes' to tax-supported bodies such as municipalities The council referred the proposal to the park board and the board of education for further consideration.
The Jalopy's extended family (1)
Looking through Charles Gibbons "Angling in the Archives" yesterday I was struck by a couple of articles which I had previously missed. It seems that "Joplin Jalopy" was not the only warplane, or item of war materiel to be bought via the sale of War Bonds in Joplin between 1942 and 1944. How does 75 Jeeps, a P-51 Mustang, two B-17s, one or two other (as yet unidentified) four-engine bombers (one of which may have been Joplin Jalopy) and a 10,000 ton Victory ship sound?
I was slightly astounded too.
I haven't yet seen the original articles in the "Globe" but Gibbons shows the following
August 1943
7,000 Pupils of the Joplin Public Schools aimed to collect $75,000 in war stamps and bonds to pay for a P-51 Mustang. They actually collected $162,578.20 between September 1942 and May 1943. The P-51 was named "The Joplin Public Schools" and North American Aviation sent a photograph to E.A. Elliott, the superintendent of schools. With the money left over from the deal they paid for 75 Jeeps. (!) The article says "Many of the purchases were of 10 and 25-cent stamps, which school children bought from their allowances in place of candy bars".
August 1943
Two days after the P-51 story, the paper reported (and pictured) the first of two B-17F Flying Fortresses "which Jasper County, by its purchase of war bonds, has put into the sky to blast the Axis out of the war. Bearing the name 'Jasper County Missouri' this Boeing...was purchased by the sale of $300,000 in series 'E' war bonds in this county in the second war loan drive last spring A second and similar Fortress was purchased by the city and county in bond sales in the month or six weeks which followed the war loan campaign"
Researching in Joplin
Yesterday I did some research in Joplin to follow up a few leads. Firstly I started at Missouri Southern State University and met their archivist, Mr. Charlie Nodler. I was wondering about the relationship of Frank Wallower Jr to Frank C. Wallower. Charlie confirmed what I suspected, that Frank Jr. is Frank C.'s son. He showed me a couple of family photographs and in one of them there is a young man who could easily be the uniformed CAP Captain of later years.
Charlie also let me look at a copy of "Angling in the Archives" by Charles Gibbons, who worked for the "Joplin Globe" for many years - and I found a couple of extra items of information and a few surprising bits of new information.
Enthused by all this (and because I only had a one-hour parking spot at MSSU) I went over to the Joplin Public Library to get copies of the pages I'd just seen.
Learning more and more
I got a very nice phone call from the Mighty Eighth Air Museum in Pooler, Georgia this morning. I've been wondering where Herbert W. Davis may have deposited copies of his materials - sadly it wasn't with them. I have written to another couple of places and also asked the Southern California chapter of the Eighth Air Force Historical Society if he was a member. I did find out that the Museum in Georgia will shortly be celebrating its 10th anniversary. My congratulations and thanks for taking the trouble to get back to me. I also picked up a useful lead from them, which I ought to have encountered before and didn't. This is the Eighth Air Force Archive at Penn State University.
