The Collings Foundation’s 2019 “Wings of Freedom Tour”

In a few weeks, the familiar and unmistakable drone of World War II heavy bombers will be heard once again in the skies over-head. I am already getting excited! It is time for the annual reappearance of the Wings of Freedom Tour at nearby Moffett Field. Moffett will be one of many stops across America for the tour and its priceless collection of beautifully restored, vintage aircraft.

The stated mission of this annual tour is two-fold: first, to restore and preserve vintage aircraft in flying condition; second, to pay tribute to those who flew in the war while insuring that future generations will be reminded of those veteran’s experiences and sacrifices. The war years of 1941-1945 were, on balance, undoubtedly the worst of times; yet in many smaller ways, they were also the best of times for this country. The book, The Greatest Generation, by Tom Brokaw reflects the uniqueness of the times and the generation who lived them.

While I have no personal affiliation with the Collings Foundation, whatsoever, I wholeheartedly support their mission to insure that the contrasts and the color of those times are never lost to future generations. I write this endorsement of their tour strictly as an act of appreciation and thanks.

I especially look forward to re-visiting the Wings tour this year because I had the great, good fortune last Memorial Day to fly the Foundation’s most iconic warbird, the P-51D Mustang. For one glorious half-hour, I had the ability to take the rear seat controls of that beautiful bird under the watchful eye of pilot Nick, seated up-front. I posted, here, on that experience last year: it and other related posts can be located by entering “Mustang” in the search box on the top right of my home page.

My flight in Toulouse Nuts was the thrill of a lifetime for someone like me interested in aviation – especially the warbirds from World War II. The Collings tour offers anyone the chance to go up in one of several iconic airplanes that played a pivotal role in the war. A half-hour ride in the P-51D will cost you $2400, but a half-hour adventure aboard the B-17 Flying Fortress or the B-24 Liberator bomber runs $450. A nominal fee of $15 for adults and $5 for children, enables you to crawl at your leisure through the bombers mentioned for an up-close-and-personal ground adventure!

If you have not visited the Collings Wings of Freedom Tour, Google it on the internet to see if it will be coming your way this summer. Take your children and treat them to an eye-opening reality-experience that will make a lasting impression. The following photo says it all for me:

A veteran who flew on B-24’s provides a living link to hundreds of kids who are learning that a knowledge of history has far more to offer them than spending still more social media time on the internet. If you visit the tour this year, chances are that you will still encounter a veteran volunteer docent who was there decades ago and can relate, first-hand, what it was like to fly these great warbirds which won the war for freedom. Sadly, as each year passes, fewer of these folks are still with us who can pass on their memories and their realities to the next generation.

The B-24 Liberator, Witchcraft – the last one flying

The airplane in the background of the above picture is the very last of its kind still flying: The storied B-24, Witchcraft. The B-24 Liberator had the highest production run of any airplane in history – approximately 18,500 were built! Such a large number supports two facts: first, the importance of this, our largest, long-range bomber; second, the huge losses suffered during countless bombing runs over Germany. Given these facts, I deeply appreciate that the Collings Foundation does what it does to “keep ‘em flying,” as they say, while preserving this precious heritage for future generations to experience.

Go hear for yourself the sound of the B-24’s four piston engines coughing, smoking, and belching to life during engine startup. See for yourself that big bird lift off the runway, straining for altitude. Go crawl through the belly of the beast and see what its crews faced at thirty-thousand feet with freezing cold during six-hour missions into Germany and back (if lady-luck was with them that day)!

While you are at it, check out the signature, raspy/throaty roar of the twelve-cylinder, 1600+ horsepower Rolls-Royce Merlin engine as it catapults the P-51D Toulouse Nuts into the air on take-off. The P-51D was the greatest fighter of the war, bar-none! Its introduction to service as a long-range bomber escort in late 1943 saved countless bomber crews who would otherwise have gone down at the hands of German pilots. Aside from its unmatched ability to escort the bombers deep into Germany and back again, the P-51 proved superior to any fighter/interceptor in the German arsenal. Many nine and ten-man bomber crews developed a great fondness and admiration for their P-51 escorts – their “little friends,” as they called them.

Go catch the tour and see for yourself: you won’t be sorry that you did!

My Father’s Enduring Legacy: A Love of Aviation…And a Prized Painting on Glass

My father was a most remarkable man. Today, at seventy-seven years of age, I have surpassed his longevity by one year. Even at this advanced age, my appreciation of him and his legacy continues to grow with passing time. There is much I could say about my father’s innate personal honesty, integrity, ambition, and commitment to excellence in all things, but I choose to dedicate this post to one particular aspect of his life and passion: His love of aviation and airplanes.

Here is the most important, early manifestation of that legacy for me, personally: a painting of his which is prominent in my earliest recollections of childhood.

I can still visualize this painting hanging on my bedroom wall in Chicago, Illinois when I was a youngster of six or seven. Today, this brilliantly created image hangs proudly in my den, high on the wall. Often, when in a pensive mood, I look upward and turn toward this painting for reflection, inspiration, and a renewed sense of longevity and permanence, qualities so absent in today’s peripatetic world. Few memories of mine go further back in time than this depiction of a furious World War I dogfight painted by my teen-age father around 1934/35. Correspondingly, few “things” in my life have been with me for as long as this little gem, painted on the back of glass using ordinary house-paints! My father’s family had no money for artist’s materials, so he did the best he could with what he had. His life-long ability to produce exceptional results in any endeavor is already evident in the clean, precise lines and brilliant images he produced while painting on the back of glass – a very difficult medium, indeed.

A Longing on My Part for “More”

As I matured into my teen-age years, I quizzed Dad about the painting – how old was he when he painted it, where he got the idea, etc. He told me that the individual images he painted were taken from “aviation pulp magazines,” inexpensive adventure accounts of the colorful aviators who flew in World War I, typically printed in slim, inexpensive monthly issues. These were targeted at and very popular with young boys in the nineteen-thirties. In my middle-age years, prior to the advent of the internet in the nineteen-nineties and prior to Google, I could only wish that I also had in my possession the original magazine issues whose colorful, eye-catching covers were depicted on Dad’s painting. Alas, even with the growth of computer technology and improved search engines, the dream seemed beyond the pale of possibility so many decades after the fact. Of all the depictions Dad chose for his picture, the brilliant red German Pfaltz airplane in the lower right-hand corner always intrigued me most as a youngster. A close examination reveals a trail of bullet-holes in the side of the red fuselage from the machine guns firing below. Clearly, the German pilot is “dramatically dead” based on the trajectory of fire!

Even though World War I aviation with its colorful dogfighting occurred well before Dad entered his teen-age years in 1929, he knew the stories and he knew about the aces and heroes, men like Captain Eddie Rickenbacker flying for the Allies, and “The Red Baron,” Manfred Von Richtofen, on the German side. Along with millions of Americans, Dad was captivated in 1927 by young Charles Lindbergh and his daring trans-Atlantic flight from New York to Paris. Lindbergh was clearly both a catalyst for my father’s life-long interest in aviation and an inspiration to him. Dad was eleven years old in 1927, and Lindbergh epitomized what an underdog can accomplish through intelligent dedication to a clearly defined goal. And dad did begin life as a definitive underdog, necessarily dropping out of high school after one year to support his struggling parents and siblings during the Depression. It was in the early nineteen-thirties when my father began to compile his aviation scrapbook, a serious collection of magazine and newspaper articles covering all aspects of the subject, meticulously assembled – as usual. Many of the entries have notable historical significance in aviation history: General Billy Mitchell’s analysis of the autogiro is present as is a photo/clipping of Jimmy Doolittle standing next to his bumble-bee-like Gee-Bee racer after setting an astounding new world speed record of 309 miles per hour! Dad had told me of his scrapbook early-on in my youth, but it had not been seen for decades, apparently lost in our move to California in 1948. “If only Dad’s scrapbook were not lost,” I often mused.

The Scrapbook Surfaces and Dad’s Aviation Legacy Grows

Miraculously, that very scrapbook surfaced in the early nineteen-sixties. I detailed the circumstances and the scrapbook itself in an earlier post which I attach in its entirety at the end of this post. Amazingly, loosely tucked between the pages were the pulp magazine “cutouts,” the very images Dad used for his dogfight painting on glass. These were taken directly from the aviation pulp magazine covers that he owned. For me, this was a dream-come-true, to possess not only this scrapbook, but the actual image-sources used for my prized painting.

 

It eerily seemed almost pre-destined that this should happen, that these objects, so strongly coveted in my imagination, should materialize out of the blue like that. Pasted within the book itself, are several other cut-outs from aviation magazine covers similar to those depicted in my painting.

Noteworthy, and not surprising given Dad’s aptitudes, many of the newspaper and magazine articles chosen for the scrapbook focus on technical aspects of the newest improvements in aviation and aeronautical engineering. The choices Dad made for inclusion in his book clearly reflect his early interest in mechanical engineering. In 1943, he left the production lines of the Schwinn bicycle company in Chicago to join United Air Lines as a draftsman and, later, as an employee in United’s Radio Laboratory. I recall him telling me many years ago that he just wanted to be around airplanes and the airline industry in some capacity or another – even if it meant washing airplanes!

Dad was transferred by United Air Lines in 1948 from Chicago to United’s maintenance base in San Francisco, California. My first-ever airplane flight was on a United DC-4 which took several hours to fly our family of four to SFO. As teenagers around our family dinner table listening to our parents re-living their day, my younger sister and I learned first-hand of the many workplace experiences (and frustrations) Dad encountered at United as he worked his way up through the ranks from draftsman to mechanical design engineer and ultimately to hands-on engineering manager of a ground-equipment design group in 1969. Achieving corporate recognition of his talents by United in the form of that last promotion was Dad’s ultimate professional goal. From 1969 until his retirement from United in 1981 after thirty-eight years, he was responsible for major portions of the ground equipment required to support United’s flight operations. He did major design work and structural analysis on jet engine maintenance scaffolding, food trucks, lavatory trucks, and baggage transporters used to efficiently load and unload United’s “Mainliners” on the tarmac. Quite a remarkable achievement for a self-motivated man who only had one year of high school! The lack of a college degree in aeronautics or engineering was a show-stopper at United even back then for anyone with significant engineering design aspirations. I often wonder how many of Dad’s colleagues, who realized he had no engineering degree yet came to appreciate and respect his mechanical engineering aptitude, had any idea of his lack of even a high school education! With each promotion and advancement, Dad had to prove and re-prove himself on the job, over and over again. Night classes in calculus, physics, and engineering at the local College of San Mateo fortified his innate abilities and enabled him to ultimately achieve the position and recognition he deserved at United. Dad was also very good at expressing his logical thought processes in clear, tautly-written memos – a must for any managerial candidate. Where he acquired his fine ability for written expression is still a puzzlement.

A few weeks ago, while cleaning out some cabinets, I came across a photo album which I had practically forgotten. The nicely displayed photos and memorabilia therein were of my father’s retirement party from United in 1981. My wife and I were present that night as were many of Dad’s colleagues and close friends from United. Some of the friendships present that evening spanned most of Dad’s thirty-seven years at United. What a contrast to today’s workplaces!

I noticed two UAL envelopes tucked into the front of the album. The typewritten, personally signed letters inside were on UAL letterhead stationery and dated 1969. One was from the corporate vice-president of base maintenance at UAL/SFO who knew Dad and took the time to personally congratulate him on his appointment in 1969 to engineering design manager. He knew and appreciated what Dad had achieved and how deserving he was of the promotion.

The other letter was from a long-time friend and colleague of Dad’s from the early Chicago days at UAL. Like my father, Duane Buckmaster was deeply rooted in aviation and on a steady-track of self-improvement. I will never forget the time he came out from Chicago to SFO on UAL business and came by our little San Mateo home to join the four of us for a home-cooked meal. This was around 1956/57. Dad gave me a heads-up prior to Mr. Buckmaster’s arrival that evening. He said, “You should know that Duane flew B-24 Liberators over Germany on bombing raids during World War II. His plane was shot down on June 6, 1944 (D-day) by German fighters during the famous Ploesti oil field raids. After parachuting with the rest of the crew from the doomed plane, he was captured by the Germans and held prisoner. He eventually escaped and found his way back across the enemy lines.” I recall Buckmaster’s story that evening and his detailed responses to the many questions from myself, my sister, and my parents. Needless to say, I was mesmerized by his story, and I have never forgotten that evening over all these years. Here is his congratulatory letter to Dad, dated July 7, 1969:

I especially appreciate his vivid comments about “our mutual struggles with the calculus” during “those nights at College of San Mateo.”

Duane Buckmaster was a good friend who, like Dad, also left his mark on United Air Lines, eventually becoming Executive Vice-President of Human Resources based in United’s Chicago offices. Predictably, Duane Buckmaster made it a point to be here, in California, to honor Dad at his retirement party in 1981.

United Air Lines runs deep in my veins for so many obvious reasons. It was and is a major part of my father’s aviation legacy. Dad and “Buck” Buckmaster worked for the airline during its glory days, days when flying was more than merely a quicker option to get from point A to point B. From United’s inception in 1926 and well into the nineteen-sixties, flying the “Friendly Skies” meant just that – an enjoyable, special experience – an event. Times and circumstances change, however, and not always for the better. United’s foundational president, W.A. Patterson ran United with a sure and steady hand for many years.

Patterson always valued United’s employees and their contributions as evidenced by the book High Horizons which he commissioned and gifted to every employee in 1951, on United’s twenty-fifth anniversary. The book is a revealing, well-illustrated history of United Air Lines over its first quarter-century. I remember my father’s copy which arrived at our house in 1951 and remained housed in our small dining room bookcase for many decades. Alas, it disappeared after my parents died. Such is the importance of United Air Lines and aviation in my life and recollections that I recently searched for and found a like-new copy of High Horizons on the internet. It arrived in the mail just days ago. Tucked inside is the original silver card insert that carried president Patterson’s personal thanks and best wishes to each employee – a class act. Employee regard for W.A. Patterson was high for obvious reasons. Patterson made United a great airline.

My father’s retirement years were heavily tinged with his continuing love of aviation. He obtained his private pilot’s license and became heavily involved with building and flying radio-controlled model airplanes. I have written about his RC flying in previous blog posts about him and his dedication to excellence. He and my mother, who was always by his side through forty-nine years of marriage, spent several very happy years enjoying the retired life together before she passed away in 1989. Life was not the same for Dad or for us after she was gone; he followed her in 1992 leaving my sister and I and his grandchildren a fine legacy of remembrance, a special part of which I highlight, here, in this post/tribute.

The aviation bug, planted by my father, has been in my system for as long as I can remember. It periodically goes dormant for a while when one of my many other interests flares up yet again to reclaim its periodic turn in the spotlight of my attention. However, none of these is as deeply rooted in my consciousness as is aviation, thanks to Dad.

Pushing Hard to Complete the Arc of Dad’s Legacy

Two weeks ago, and after all these decades, I resumed my quest to learn still more about the aviation painting that hangs in my den. What were those magazines whose covers are depicted? Enlisting the aid of Google search, I was finally able to identify the specific aviation pulp magazines whose covers grace my father’s painting. Furthermore, I found the actual 1931 August and September issues of Battle Aces for sale on the internet. The cover artwork of the September issue carries the red German Pfaltz airplane so dramatically pictured by Dad in his painting. The August issue’s cover is not depicted in the painting; the July issue is.

 

This, and the image which follows are two of the covers which captured my father’s fancy as a young man. Finally, after decades of mystery and intrigue, my quest to intimately know the details pertinent to my prized painting has been satisfied. The cover art on all but four of the twenty-seven issues of Battle Aces which ran from October, 1930 through December, 1932 were painted by Frederick Manley Blakeslee at the beginning of his notable career as illustrator for early aviation publications, and later, railroading magazines.

As a final chapter to this part of my story, I also discovered that the original Blakeslee oil painting commissioned for the September, 1931 issue of Battle Aces was sold at auction in 2012 for $2200! The only thing better than having the magazine cover would be to own the original painting commissioned for it!

In 1988, my dad created an oil-on-canvas re-visitation of his early painting on glass. A few aspects of the aerial battle were modified in his new effort, but the red Pfaltz was depicted as before, only headed now in the opposite direction!

Aviation in World War II: The Latest Installment of the Legacy

There is one final chapter (at least for now) of the aviation legacy I inherited from my father. Conditioned by my lifelong involvement with Dad’s legacy and artwork which began with World War I, I have more recently taken note of today’s many fine artists and their fabulous work portraying airplanes and aviation history in the World War II theatre. I find particularly interesting the stories of wartime flyers like Duane Buckmaster who have incredible tales to tell. Fascinating, too, are the aces and the airplanes they flew that saved the western world from Hitler’s Germany and the Luftwaffe.

One of my earliest literary entries into World War II aviation is represented by this excellent book on the Air Force and air power published by Martin Caidin in 1957. I was a high school junior at that time, well into my aviation legacy and already a veteran when it came to building model airplanes. I recall seeing this book displayed in the window of a small bookshop in downtown San Mateo. When I asked to see it, the ten-dollar price on the jacket meant leaving without it, but the photo/text of the book proved fascinating. Every time I passed that bookstore window, the book beckoned. Finally, I had mowed enough neighborhood lawns to save the ten dollars and the book was mine. It seemingly was meant to be that I should have this book. In fact, at the very moment I write this, it occurs to me that perhaps Duane Buckmaster’s visit to our house in the month’s prior precipitated my burning desire to have this book – very possible, even likely, and interesting to contemplate! Today, I have assembled a small but meaningful reference library on aviation, airplanes, and aces – a collection which began with Caidin’s book, Air Force.

I published a previous post (see my archives) highlighting the fascinating story of A Higher Call, as portrayed in the book of the same title and depicted by the artwork of Florida artist, John D. Shaw. Shaw recently completed his most recent artistic rendering of the event in a new limited print edition titled Prey for Mercy.
Shaw’s artwork gives us a wonderful portrayal of the opening moments of a most improbable and unforgettable interaction between a B-17 bomber pilot and crew and a multiple ace of the German Luftwaffe on the threshold of earning the coveted Luftwaffe Flying Cross, needing just one more “kill” to his credit. I was taken with this limited-edition offering and recently received my print along with accompanying material and the actual signature card of the German flyer who was involved, Franz Stigler. Shaw’s earlier artistic rendering of the event is also beautifully done, but long sold-out and very hard to find on the secondary market.

The Legacy Continues!

My enthusiasm for aviation is hardly satisfied at this late date; there are still so many books on my shelves and stories waiting in the wings. Most significantly, both my curiosity about and my fascination with this life-long legacy of aviation gifted to me by my Father, Alfred Chester Kubitz, are still running strong. Time is running short, now, but the skies still beckon!

The Iconic P-51 Mustang: The Fighter That Destroyed Hitler’s Luftwaffe and Won the War

Last month, I had yet another opportunity to ride in and fly one of the most iconic military aircraft of all time, the North American P-51 Mustang. Sadly, it did not happen. Maybe next year!

The chance to ride in a P-51 materializes yearly when the Collings Foundation and its “Wings of Freedom” nationwide tour of restored World War II aircraft lands at nearby Moffett Field. For nearly a week, the public has the opportunity of getting up-close-and-personal with several “survivors” from the mass post-war scrapping of airplanes which defeated Hitler and Japan not so long ago.

The Betty Jane P-51 is a flying survivor from 1945, one of the very few Mustangs outfitted with two seats and dual flight controls (that’s her pictured above in a Collings Foundation photo and below, in one of mine). For $2200 along with a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity” attitude, a visitor can reserve a half-hour ride over the San Francisco bay area in that venerable war-bird along with the opportunity of briefly guiding her through a gentle turn or two.

Linda and I took our two young grandsons to Moffett for an afternoon of gawking at and clambering through the foundation’s B-17 Flying Fortress and B-24 Liberator bombers. These two aircraft were the major weapons used to dismantle Hitler’s war machine by destroying German factories, airfields, and infrastructure. Implementing a revamped allied strategy in late 1943, these four-engine airplanes commenced attacking the civilian populations of Berlin, Hamburg, and Dresden in a successful effort to erode the German people’s support of Hitler’s war effort. The Collings Foundation’s B-24, Witchcraft, is the lone remaining flying example of its genre (close to nineteen-thousand of them were built during the war)!

The B-17 Flying Fortress was the more storied of the two workhorse bombers early in the war, and the Foundation’s Nine O’Nine is a beautiful example. It was anticipated that the multiple 50 caliber machine guns protruding from the aptly named “Fortress” would provide an adequate defense against German fighter-interceptors. That soon proved to be misplaced idealism as the Luftwaffe and flak from the ground took its toll on the “heavies.”

But the airplane on the tour that, as in years past, captured my imagination even more than the others, was the Betty Jane. The P-51 Mustang rapidly became the best friend of the B-17 and B-24 bomber crews who flew mission after mission in large formations from their airfields dotting Great Britain’s countryside. Their destination: Targets deep into German airspace. Earlier in the war, the slow-flying four-engine bombers and their deadly cargo were initially escorted during the long flight into Germany by allied fighter planes like the Republic P-47 Thunderbolt, a plane of limited flying range and mediocre maneuverability. Typically, well before the heavy bombers reached their targets over Germany, the fighter escorts were forced to break-off and return to base due to their limited range (fuel). At that point, the bomber formations became sitting ducks for the agile and deadly German fighter planes which came up to meet them.

The P-51 Mustang: Just-In-Time Delivery to Allied Fighter Groups

The deeper the penetration into German airspace, the greater the allied bomber losses. The turning point came during the infamous raid over Regensburg, Germany, where 60 bombers were lost, each with a ten-man crew – 600 men. Just at this critical point, the newly-developed P-51 Mustang reached operational status and became available to the fighter groups based in England. Designed from the get-go to be a superior fighter, the P-51 was just that. With its fine maneuverability and the powerful, in-line, twelve cylinder, liquid-cooled engine conceived by Rolls-Royce but built under license by the Packard motor car company in the United States, the Mustang was superior to its German counterparts, the Messerschmidt Me 109 and the Focke-Wulf 190.

 A German Me 109 caught in the gun cameras of a P-51

 Critically important was the Mustang’s superior range, aided by external, under-the-wing, drop-tanks carrying fuel. Now, the bombers had an escort fighter which could not only accompany them deep into German territory in a defensive, protective posture, but could inflict losses on the Luftwaffe as its pilots attacked the bomber formations. In this dual sense, it can justifiably be said that the P-51 both destroyed the Luftwaffe and won the war by allowing the “heavies” to reach and destroy their targets.

At about that time, allied commanders expanded bombing targets to include the populations of Berlin, Hamburg, and Dresden. Late in the war, General Jimmy Doolittle also famously altered the successful defensive role of the P-51 from solely  a long-range bomber escort by ordering the fighter groups to adopt a more offensive posture, attacking Luftwaffe fighters wherever they could be found. The mandate was to leave the bomber formations, when feasible, and destroy the German interceptors before they could locate and reach and the bombers. Doolittle wanted to strafe and destroy German planes on the ground – at their airfields – when possible. The goal: To gain complete air superiority prior to the planned ground invasions central to D-Day. The Luftwaffe was nowhere to be seen by D-Day, thanks in large part to the effective dual role of the P-51 both as bomber escort and Luftwaffe killer.

Firing-Up the Big Packard Engine of Betty Jane

As my grandsons and I stood outside the roped area, a mere 50 feet from Betty Jane, the pilot fired up the big Packard-built twelve-cylinder engine sporting a large, four-bladed propeller. The pilot yelled “clear” from the cockpit, the big prop started to turn, and the engine came to life after belching smoke and the usual series of backfires. The engine sounded a throaty roar as Betty Jane moved out toward the taxi-way. My grandsons held their ears…I did not and drank it all in. In my mind’s eye, I could imagine the emotions of a pilot on the flight line at Leiston, England, bringing that big engine to life en-route to yet another bomber escort mission over Germany in 1944/45. Despite the huge war effort and all the backing provided by the allies for combat flight operations, out there on the flight line, as the engine coughed, sputtered, roared to life, and the canopy closed, it was one man in one machine – very far from home. The pilot was about to face the uncertainties of weather, navigation, and his enemy counterparts who would be out there, somewhere, waiting for him and the opportunity to shoot him and his machine out of the sky.

For me, it is difficult to conjure up a more daring and exhilarating human experience than that encountered by those flyers in World War II. For them at the time, there surely seemed nothing “romantic” about the deadly task they faced – only a sense of high adventure and “what the hell, I hope I come back from this one!” I have read the late-life accounts of some who flew Mustangs against the German Luftwaffe and lived to tell about it. Despite some surely ugly recollections of killing and death which stubbornly remain, time dulls many of the sharp edges – as it always does – for these men. These flyers are revered by the public for their courage, daring, and skill during wartime, and that is appropriate. Despite old age and the challenges of settling down after flying, these warriors possess indelible and precious memories of that time in their young lives when they and their machines defied the great odds stacked against them. Those who flew the P-51 Mustang, to a man, relate their admiration of and gratitude to the airplane that saw them through.

Lt. Jim Brooks and his P-51, February – 1945

Perhaps next year, when the Collings Foundation tour returns, I will have an extra $2200 to go up in Betty Jane as well as the requisite moxie to do so. I cannot think of a greater, more meaningful thrill.

A Higher Call : Humanity Trumps Hate in the Skies Over Germany

The immense canvas of World War II serves also as a mirror on the attitudes and behavior of us human beings. That viewpoint motivates me to read more of the history surrounding the conflict – as I wrote in a recent blog post, here. Almost before that new quest began, a World War II story came to my attention (via a recent Facebook post) which relates a fascinating encounter in the skies over Germany on December 20, 1943. I post this account as a prime example of the complex human attitudes and emotions exhibited in all-out warfare.

 A sure “kill” is spared: Aviation artwork by John Shaw

The main characters: A German fighter pilot on the hunt for another “kill” to add to his already burgeoning total and the pilot of a crippled and hapless B-17F “Flying Fortress” bomber, barely able to fly and struggling to reach friendly territory. Pilot Charles (Charlie) Brown, his crew, and his torn and tattered plane quickly found themselves in the gunsight of German Luftwaffe ace, Franz Stigler. One press of the “fire button” and Ye Olde Pub and its crew of ten would be history – torn apart by 20 mm cannon shells from the Messerschmitt Bf 109 fighter.

Charles Brown and Franz Stigler

Pilot Brown and his nine-member crew were flying their very first mission together on that twentieth day of December, 1943. The target: A German aircraft factory in Bremen, Germany. As the B-17 was preparing for its bomb-run on the target, German anti-aircraft fire and its exploding shrapnel found the aircraft and quickly left its deadly imprint upon Ye Olde Pub.

With its Plexiglas nose-dome shattered and its number two engine disabled, the bomber fell out of formation and became a straggler – an easy target for the swarms of Bf 109 and Focke-Wulf 190 fighters which came up to defend the German target area.

While being harassed in retreat for several minutes by German fighter aircraft, the venerable Flying Fortress suffered considerable additional damage. Now flying alone over German territory, the B-17 could barely stay aloft. One of her engines was out, half of her rudder was shot-off, and most of her left horizontal stabilizer (tail) was gone. Most of her guns were disabled and some of the crew badly wounded. The tail gunner was hunched dead and bloody behind his downward-facing guns.

As the B-17 lumbered precariously at low altitude, struggling to make it home back in England, she was spotted passing over a small airfield by a German crew on the ground which was refueling and re-arming the Bf 109 fighter of Franz Stigler. At first surprised by the low-flying bomber, Stigler instinctively jumped into the cockpit of his aircraft and took off after the crippled B-17. In no time at all, the German ace settled in on the tattered tail of the bomber and prepared for the kill. He could afford to take his time in that position, for the tail-guns of the Fortress remained pointed downward during the entire encounter – a sure sign that the gunner was dead or the guns disabled. Pilot Stigler already had 22 air “victories” to his credit; one more and he would earn the coveted Luftwaffe award, the Knight’s Cross.  Maneuvering to several vantage points around the lumbering bomber, the German ace could see, through a few gaping holes in the fuselage, that there were badly wounded fliers in the belly of the aircraft. He also sensed that he was relatively safe from any rash behavior on the part of the surviving crew and the one or two operational gun stations, but he was taking a chance, nevertheless, by closing in for a better look.

A German Messerschmitt Bf 109 fighter like that of Franz Stigler

As Stigler trailed the hapless bomber while considering his options, he recalled a comment made by Gustav Rodel, his Luftwaffe Commanding Officer: “If I ever hear of any of you shooting at someone in a parachute (a helpless flyer who had bailed-out), I’ll shoot you myself.” Rejecting his inbred instincts as a fighter pilot, Franz Stigler heeded a higher call – namely, his personal humanity. Stigler slipped into a “10 o’clock” position over the B-17, and proceeded to escort the bomber over hostile territory toward open water. He gestured from his cockpit to the astonished bomber pilot to turn and head for Sweden and safe, neutral territory. Instead, Brown opted to continue on the longer course to England, hoping to make it back home. At that point, Stigler saluted to Charles Brown and peeled off, leaving the bomber and her crew in the hands of fate.

It is that moment which is so beautifully captured in the aviation artwork of artist John Shaw. Given the quality of the piece and its depiction, it is no wonder that limited editions of those prints sold out and are hard to locate, today.

Franz Stigler answered “a higher call” in showing mercy to the hapless bomber and its helpless crew. Despite the obvious difficulties one has with the nature of Nazi Germany, we are reminded that many who fought on that side earnestly felt they were defending the motherland – an essentially patriotic attitude. Franz Stigler assumed huge personal risk in not summarily dispatching the helpless bomber. His was an action for which he could have been executed had it been reported to German authorities. One could easily imagine a second German fighter pilot happening upon the scenario described and formulating many pointed questions! At an altitude of only a few thousand feet, the incident could have been observed on the ground, as well.

Second Lieutenant Charles Brown went on to complete a full tour of duty as a bomber pilot. After the war, Brown returned home to West Virginia, went to college, and – following stints in the newly created Air Force and the U.S. State Department – retired in 1972. The harrowing episode of Ye Olde Pub and its crew remained indelibly etched in Brown’s memory, and, in 1986, he decided to try to find the German pilot who spared the lives of him and his crew.

After numerous efforts, Brown finally received a letter responding to his outreach attempts. Stigler, living in Canada since 1953, wrote that he was the one, and he verified his claim by describing the entire episode in detail – right down to the departing salute to Brown and his hapless bomber. The two met, and developed a great, ongoing friendship from 1990 until 2008, the year in which they both passed away within several months of one another.

Franz Stigler’s enlistment in the Luftwaffe began in 1939. In 1940, his brother was killed in action, an event which he hoped to avenge through his personal wartime contributions. Long after it was all over and the two protagonists of this story were reunited, Stigler inscribed a book to his former enemy, Charles Brown:

In 1940, I lost my only brother as a night fighter. On the 20^th of December, 4 days before Christmas, I had the chance to save a B-17 from her destruction, a plane so badly damaged it was a wonder that she was still flying. The pilot, Charlie Brown, is for me, as precious as my brother was.

Thanks Charlie,
Your Brother,
Franz

I have seen the YouTube video account of the story, including film footage of the reunited flyers reminiscing together at the time of their initial meeting. In one touching scene with Franz, the stoic German fighter ace, visibly struggling to hold back multiple emotions which had suddenly descended upon his brow like a dark cloud, he turns to Brown and blurts out, “I love you Charlie!” A higher call, indeed, and such a poignant commentary on humans at war.