Latest news with #B-24Liberator
Asahi Shimbun
6 days ago
- General
- Asahi Shimbun
WWII bomber crash left 11 dead and ‘non-recoverable.' 4 are finally coming home
This October 2017 photo shows wreckage of the B-24 Liberator bomber, Heaven Can Wait, lying on the seafloor where it went down during World War II in Hansa Bay, Papua, New Guinea. (Courtesy of Project Recover via AP) WAPPINGERS FALLS, N.Y.--As the World War II bomber Heaven Can Wait was hit by enemy fire off the Pacific island of New Guinea on March 11, 1944, the co-pilot managed a final salute to flyers in an adjacent plane before crashing into the water. All 11 men aboard were killed. Their remains, deep below the vast sea, were designated as non-recoverable. Yet four crew members' remains are beginning to return to their hometowns after a remarkable investigation by family members and a recovery mission involving elite Navy divers who descended 200 feet (61 meters) in a pressurized bell to reach the sea floor. Staff Sgt. Eugene Darrigan, the radio operator was buried military honors and community support on Saturday in his hometown of Wappingers Falls, New York, more than eight decades after leaving behind his wife and baby son. The bombardier, 2nd Lt. Thomas Kelly, was to be buried Monday in Livermore, California, where he grew up in a ranching family. The remains of the pilot, 1st Lt. Herbert Tennyson, and navigator, 2nd Lt. Donald Sheppick, will be interred in the coming months. The ceremonies are happening 12 years after one of Kelly's relatives, Scott Althaus, set out to solve the mystery of where exactly the plane went down. 'I'm just so grateful,' he told The Associated Press. 'It's been an impossible journey — just should never have been able to get to this day. And here we are, 81 years later.' The Army Air Forces plane nicknamed Heaven Can Wait was a B-24 with a cartoon pin-up angel painted on its nose and a crew of 11 on its final flight. They were on a mission to bomb Japanese targets when the plane was shot down. Other flyers on the mission were not able to spot survivors. Their wives, parents and siblings were of a generation that tended to be tight-lipped in their grief. But the men were sorely missed. Sheppick, 26, and Tennyson, 24, each left behind pregnant wives who would sometimes write them two or three letters a day. Darrigan, 26, also was married, and had been able to attend his son's baptism while on leave. A photo shows him in uniform, smiling as he holds the boy. Darrigan's wife, Florence, remarried but quietly held on to photos of her late husband, as well as a telegram informing her of his death. Tennyson's wife, Jean, lived until age 96 and never remarried. 'She never stopped believing that he was going to come home,' said her grandson, Scott Jefferson. As Memorial Day approached twelve years ago, Althaus asked his mother for names of relatives who died in World War II. Althaus, a political science and communications professor at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, became curious while researching World War II casualties for work. His mother gave him the name of her cousin Thomas Kelly, who was 21 years old when he was reported missing in action. Althaus recalled that as a boy, he visited Kelly's memorial stone, which has a bomber engraved on it. He began reading up on the lost plane. 'It was a mystery that I discovered really mattered to my extended family,' he said. With help from other relatives, he analyzed historical documents, photos and eyewitness recollections. They weighed sometimes conflicting accounts of where the plane went down. After a four-year investigation, Althaus wrote a report concluding that the bomber likely crashed off of Awar Point in what is now Papua New Guinea The report was shared with Project Recover, a nonprofit committed to finding and repatriating missing American service members and a partner of the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, or DPAA. A team from Project Recover, led by researchers from Scripps Institution of Oceanography, located the debris field in 2017 after searching nearly 10 square miles (27 square kilometers) of seafloor. The DPAA launched its deepest ever underwater recovery mission in 2023. A Navy dive team recovered dog tags, including Darrigan's partially corroded tag with his the name of his wife, Florence, as an emergency contact. Kelly's ring was recovered. The stone was gone, but the word BOMBARDIER was still legible. And they recovered remains that underwent DNA testing. Last September, the military officially accounted for Darrigan, Kelly, Sheppick and Tennyson. With seven men who were on the plane still unaccounted for, a future DPAA mission to the site is possible. More than 200 people honored Darrigan on Saturday in Wappingers Falls, some waving flags from the sidewalk during the procession to the church, others saluting him at a graveside ceremony under cloudy skies. 'After 80 years, this great soldier has come home to rest,' Darrigan's great niece, Susan Pineiro, told mourners at his graveside. Darrigan's son died in 2020, but his grandson Eric Schindler attended. Darrigan's 85-year-old niece, Virginia Pineiro, solemnly accepted the folded flag. Kelly's remains arrived in the Bay Area on Friday. He was to be buried Monday at his family's cemetery plot, right by the marker with the bomber etched on it. A procession of Veterans of Foreign Wars motorcyclists will pass by Kelly's old home and high school before he is interred. 'I think it's very unlikely that Tom Kelly's memory is going to fade soon,' said Althaus, now a volunteer with Project Recover. Sheppick will be buried in the months ahead near his parents in a cemetery in Coal Center, Pennsylvania. His niece, Deborah Wineland, said she thinks her late father, Sheppick's younger brother, would have wanted it that way. The son Sheppick never met died of cancer while in high school. Tennyson will be interred on June 27 in Wichita, Kansas. He'll be buried beside his wife, Jean, who died in 2017, just months before the wreckage was located. 'I think because she never stopped believing that he was coming back to her, that it's only fitting she be proven right,' Jefferson said.
Yahoo
20-05-2025
- Yahoo
Today in Chicago History: Cubs catcher Michael Barrett punches A.J. Pierzynski during Crosstown Classic
Here's a look back at what happened in the Chicago area on May 20, according to the Tribune's archives. Is an important event missing from this date? Email us. Weather records (from the National Weather Service, Chicago) High temperature: 95 degrees (1977) Low temperature: 33 degrees (2002) Precipitation: 2.54 inches (1975) Snowfall: None 1943: During bad weather, a United States Army Air Corps B-24 Liberator crashed into a 500-foot-tall gas storage tank at Municipal Airport (now known as Chicago's Midway International Airport). All 12 people aboard the flight, which originated in Fort Worth, Texas, died. 'There was an instantaneous explosion of terrific violence and flames shot high from the top of the circular steel structure,' the Tribune reported. Heat generated by the explosion was felt more than a mile away. 1970: University of Chicago physicist Albert Crewe, former director of Argonne National Laboratory in Lemont, announced he captured images in a specially built microscope of single atoms as they exist in molecules. It marked the first time scientists could 'see' the incredibly small world of atoms. 1987: Doris Fischer, her two daughters and a son-in-law pleaded guilty to running a prostitution ring out of their Buffalo Grove home as part of a probe by the FBI and Internal Revenue Service called 'Operation Safebet.' 1988: Laurie Dann shot six children at Hubbard Woods Elementary School in Winnetka killing 8-year-old Nicholas Corwin, during a rampage that ended in her own death in the North Shore suburb. 1992: Chicago aldermen frustrated with the proliferation of graffiti in their neighborhoods banned the outright sale of spray paint cans in the city, branding them 'weapons of terror.' Ald. Richard Mell, 33rd, resurrected the long-dormant proposal, which won approval 38-1. Only Ald. Dorothy Tillman, 3rd, dissented saying that aldermen should be more concerned with problems of unemployment and housing than keeping spray paint cans out of the hands of vandals. The ban is still in effect. 1994: The Chicago Bulls played their last game at Chicago Stadium — a 93-79 victory over the New York Knicks in Game 6 of the 1994 Eastern Conference Finals. The Bulls lost the series on the road in Game 7. 2006: Chicago White Sox baserunner A.J. Pierzynski's shoulder block into Chicago Cubs catcher Michael Barrett spawned a second-inning, bench-clearing brouhaha at home plate. The fight boiled led to four ejections — including Pierzynski and Barrett. Pierzynski said he was simply trying to score and Barrett was in his way. Barrett conceded Pierzynski had 'every right' to slam into him and that he made a 'great play.' But he said he was 'irritated' when the Sox catcher walked toward him after the play. 'I hit Michael (who was blocking home plate) and I got up and my helmet was right behind him,' Pierzynski said. 'I went to get my helmet and the next thing I know I'm in a bearhug and he said, 'I didn't have the ball, b—.' The next thing I know I got punched.' The Sox wound up beating the Cubs 7-0. Barrett received a 10-game suspension and undisclosed fine, while Pierzynski received only a $2,000 fine. 2012: Though President Barack Obama relocated a planned G-8 Summit to Camp David, a NATO summit took place as scheduled in Chicago, drawing thousands of protesters to the city's streets. 2017: The Cubs postponed an afternoon game against the Milwaukee Brewers because of the threat of inclement weather. When it didn't rain, Brewers General Manager David Stearns suggested the Cubs had ulterior motives. Subscribe to the free Vintage Chicago Tribune newsletter, join our Chicagoland history Facebook group, stay current with Today in Chicago History and follow us on Instagram for more from Chicago's past. Have an idea for Vintage Chicago Tribune? Share it with Kori Rumore and Marianne Mather at krumore@ and mmather@
Chicago Tribune
20-05-2025
- Sport
- Chicago Tribune
Today in Chicago History: Cubs catcher Michael Barrett punches A.J. Pierzynski during Crosstown Classic
Here's a look back at what happened in the Chicago area on May 20, according to the Tribune's archives. Is an important event missing from this date? Email us. Weather records (from the National Weather Service, Chicago) 1943: During bad weather, a United States Army Air Corps B-24 Liberator crashed into a 500-foot-tall gas storage tank at Municipal Airport (now known as Chicago's Midway International Airport). All 12 people aboard the flight, which originated in Fort Worth, Texas, died. 'There was an instantaneous explosion of terrific violence and flames shot high from the top of the circular steel structure,' the Tribune reported. Heat generated by the explosion was felt more than a mile away. 1970: University of Chicago physicist Albert Crewe, former director of Argonne National Laboratory in Lemont, announced he captured images in a specially built microscope of single atoms as they exist in molecules. It marked the first time scientists could 'see' the incredibly small world of atoms. 1987: Doris Fischer, her two daughters and a son-in-law pleaded guilty to running a prostitution ring out of their Buffalo Grove home as part of a probe by the FBI and Internal Revenue Service called 'Operation Safebet.' 1988: Laurie Dann shot six children at Hubbard Woods Elementary School in Winnetka killing 8-year-old Nicholas Corwin, during a rampage that ended in her own death in the North Shore suburb. 1992: Chicago aldermen frustrated with the proliferation of graffiti in their neighborhoods banned the outright sale of spray paint cans in the city, branding them 'weapons of terror.' Ald. Richard Mell, 33rd, resurrected the long-dormant proposal, which won approval 38-1. Only Ald. Dorothy Tillman, 3rd, dissented saying that aldermen should be more concerned with problems of unemployment and housing than keeping spray paint cans out of the hands of vandals. The ban is still in effect. 1994: The Chicago Bulls played their last game at Chicago Stadium — a 93-79 victory over the New York Knicks in Game 6 of the 1994 Eastern Conference Finals. The Bulls lost the series on the road in Game 7. 2006: Chicago White Sox baserunner A.J. Pierzynski's shoulder block into Chicago Cubs catcher Michael Barrett spawned a second-inning, bench-clearing brouhaha at home plate. The fight boiled led to four ejections — including Pierzynski and Barrett. Pierzynski said he was simply trying to score and Barrett was in his way. Barrett conceded Pierzynski had 'every right' to slam into him and that he made a 'great play.' But he said he was 'irritated' when the Sox catcher walked toward him after the play. 'I hit Michael (who was blocking home plate) and I got up and my helmet was right behind him,' Pierzynski said. 'I went to get my helmet and the next thing I know I'm in a bearhug and he said, 'I didn't have the ball, b—.' The next thing I know I got punched.' The Sox wound up beating the Cubs 7-0. Barrett received a 10-game suspension and undisclosed fine, while Pierzynski received only a $2,000 fine. 2012: Though President Barack Obama relocated a planned G-8 Summit to Camp David, a NATO summit took place as scheduled in Chicago, drawing thousands of protesters to the city's streets. 2017: The Cubs postponed an afternoon game against the Milwaukee Brewers because of the threat of inclement weather. When it didn't rain, Brewers General Manager David Stearns suggested the Cubs had ulterior motives. Subscribe to the free Vintage Chicago Tribune newsletter, join our Chicagoland history Facebook group, stay current with Today in Chicago History and follow us on Instagram for more from Chicago's past.
Yahoo
17-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
World War II brought these top actors and spotlight of Hollywood to Fort Worth
Our Uniquely Fort Worth stories celebrate what we love most about North Texas, its history & culture. Story suggestion? Editors@ Hollywood was in Fort Worth news earlier this year with the nomination of Fort Worth's Abraham Alexander for an Academy Award for Best Song of the Year (from the 2024 movie 'Sing Sing'). The Nigerian-born Alexander attended Texas Wesleyan University before launching a musical career. Filmmakers' interest in Fort Worth might have originated in 1920 when the fledgling Lone Star Pictures announced plans to film its first motion picture here, 'a romance of the Texas oil fields.' It never happened, but in the years to come, some well-known Hollywood actors had a soft spot in their hearts for Cowtown. Gene Autry visited Fort Worth in 1936 and asked the manager of the New Liberty theater, 'Do they like my pictures here?' The manager assured him, 'Next to Buck Jones, you're tops!' Twenty years later, Fort Worth made Jimmy Stewart an honorary citizen and deputy sheriff. Fort Worth was also home to some top Hollywood talent during World War II. They were here because of Tarrant Field — renamed Carswell Air Force Base in 1948 — as part of the Army Air Forces Training Command. In the summer of 1942, the the command opened a combat training school at Tarrant Field for pilots on the heavy bombers being produced next door at the Consolidated Vultee plant (now Lockheed Martin). George Gobel was one of the Hollywood types who answered his country's call in 1942. At the time, he was a little-known singer-turned-comedian who had been performing since the age of 11. The military sent him to Fort Worth to teach men to fly the B-24 Liberator. When off duty, Gobel entertained the men on his guitar, weaving humor into his act. He got the nickname 'Lonesome George' for his low-key, self-deprecating humor. He also coined a catch phrase that would follow him the rest of his life: 'Well, I'll be a dirty bird.' After the war, Gobel performed in night clubs until in 1954 he got his own TV show. When that ended in 1957, he moved on to Broadway and the movies. In 1972, he became a regular on Hollywood Squares. Gobel attributed his success to compensating for what nature didn't give him and to luck. He told an interviewer years later, 'When I went into the Air Force, I was 5 feet 4½ inches. The limit was 5 feet 5. Life has always been like that.' Burgess Meredith may have been Fort Worth's favorite actor-turned-soldier and was certainly the biggest stage and screen star to come to town in uniform. Star-Telegram readers learned about him in 1937 when he was proclaimed 'the brightest young star on Broadway.' Five years later, he came through Fort Worth as a buck private on a troop train. In August 1942, he came back to Fort Worth, disembarking at the Texas & Pacific station as Lt. Burgess Meredith of the Army Air Forces. He was assistant public relations officer at Tarrant Field. He had spent the previous month making the training film 'Rear Gunner' with co-star Ronald Reagan. It was so good, the government released it in theaters. Lt. Meredith's work with the Air Training Command wasn't what intrigued readers after Fort Worth Press columnist Jack Gordon informed his female readers that the twice-divorced Meredith was available. In short order he was romantically linked with a Fort Worth woman, Mary Parker, though Meredith dismissed the rumors, saying, 'We're just good friends.' After the war, Meredith did not miss a beat resuming his film career. Eventually, he created the acclaimed roles of 'The Penguin' on the 'Batman' TV series (1966-68) and Mickey, Rocky Balboa's crusty trainer, in three Sylvester Stallone movies. William Holden was the third Hollywood star to 'play' Fort Worth during World War II. Born William Franklin Beedle, he took the stage name he is known by when he first began acting. In August 1942, he left behind a budding acting career to enter the Army, showing up in Fort Worth that fall as a private working behind a desk at Tarrant Field. He was soon off to Air Force Officer Candidate School in Miami. When Holden came back to Fort Worth he was wearing the gold bars of a second lieutenant. No flier, Holden was assigned to the public relations office, serving as liaison with the city of Fort Worth while doing weekly radio broadcasts of 'The Army Air Force Show' over the Mutual Broadcasting network, which included KFJZ. Rather than tell his listeners about the war in the abstract, he told human-interest stories about servicemen who had performed heroically. The broadcasts from (Will Rogers) Municipal Auditorium proved hugely popular with the local audience. And as an officer Holden got to move out of the barracks, initially into the Worth Hotel, then into an apartment near TCU. In January 1943, Holden was joined by his wife, actress Brenda Marshall, who had North Texas roots, having been a student in 1936 at Texas Women's College (Denton). Her latest movie, 'Life Begins at 8:30,' was playing at the Hollywood theater when she got to town. In May 1944, she was back in Fort Worth visiting her husband and appearing with him on his radio show. Holden's official duties took him out into the community doing public relations for the Army Air Forces. He was elected executive vice president of the Chamber of Commerce and coached third base for a Fort Worth Cats exhibition game. When not doing his military duties, Holden could be seen playing the drums, jamming with fellow musicians in the Den Room of the Hotel Texas. In 1959, while promoting his latest movie, 'The Horse Soldiers,' Holden cane through Fort Worth for the first time since the war. He reminisced with reporters about his two-year stay in Fort Worth during the war, mentioning sharing an apartment with big-league baseball player Hank Greenberg, another enlistee with the Air Training Command. Holden recalled how they hung out their wash on the railing of their second-floor apartment, much to the dismay of the owner. When the Army sent Holden back to California to work with the Motion Picture Unit making training films, he was replaced on the Army Air Forces radio show by another actor-turned-soldier, George Montgomery. Often compared to Clark Gable, Montgomery had worked steadily in Hollywood right up until 1943, when he joined the Army Air Forces' First Motion Picture Unit, a U.S. Army unit made up entirely of film professionals. Cpl. Montgomery came to Fort Worth for a month in January 1944 to be 'guest host' for the radio show while Holden was away. After the war, Hollywood seemed to have fallen completely in love with Fort Worth. In 1951, the major studios had three movies in production about our city: Warner Brothers' 'Fort Worth' with Randolph Scott, RKO's 'High Frontier' with Anne Baxter, and Twentieth Century Fox's 'Follow the Sun' with Glenn Ford. Only the Warner Brothers and Twentieth Century Fox films reached the screen, but Hollywood was not done with Fort Worth, nor Fort Worth with Hollywood. Author-historian Richard Selcer is a Fort Worth native and proud graduate of Paschal High and TCU.
New Indian Express
15-05-2025
- New Indian Express
Modern warfare: How they shrunk the drones
Reams have been written about the strategies in the recent India-Pakistan border conflict. But fewer words have been expended on a core aspect of this war: drones—their use; their different deployments by the two countries; the cost to each country centred on the kinds of drones used; and, most importantly, how the war drones in this conflict fit into various streams of global developments in warfare. The credit for 'the first drone war' goes to the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian conflict. The India-Pakistan faceoff was just another bead in a long chain that began 176 years ago, when pilotless hot-air balloons bombed Venice during the 1848-49 Italian revolution. It took 68 years to progress from the wind to radio-control—an 'aerial torpedo' against zeppelins and submarines designed by Archibald Low, the 'father of aerial guidance systems'. In 1935, the de Havilland DH.82 Queen Bee made its debut—a yellow-and-black liveried, radio-controlled biplane that not only became a testbed for future designs but also fathered the appellation 'drone'. During the Second World War, the US Navy converted four-engined B-24 Liberator bombers to radio-control for bombing missions. During the Cold War, the US used AQM-34 Firebee for photography missions over China and Vietnam, with China shooting down one in 1964. Iraq first used its ubiquitous Mohajer-1 for battlefield surveillance in 1986, explosively multiplying the use of drones in West Asia. But these were large and spottable, and therefore more stoppable. Today, drones come in all shapes and sizes, from palm-width playthings to quadcopters and hexacopters that can be assembled by non-state actors—such as guerrillas in Myanmar and insurgents in Syria. In Myanmar, the Karenni Nationalities Defence Force uses drones made with 3D printers and mechanics stripped from Chinese pesticide-sprayers. In Syria, the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), now in power, began producing winged drones in 2019. In Gaza, Hamas used hobbyists' first-person-view (FPV) drones to scope out Israeli border posts.
