May 2021 – History, at Random

Random Flights II: Aviators from NARA’s Photo Collection of Aviators – Hank Greenberg, Grover C. Hodge, Jr., Ben Kuroki, and Harvey J. Scandrett. Plus, Eugene W. Roddenberry.

The “second” post comprises photos from NARA RG-18 PU, this time of specifically aviators who served in the United States Army Air Force of World War Two…

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Hank Greenberg (Henry Benjamin Greenberg)

“Nicknamed “Hammerin’ Hank”, “Hankus Pankus”, or “The Hebrew Hammer”, was an American professional baseball player and team executive. He played in Major League Baseball (MLB), primarily for the Detroit Tigers as a first baseman in the 1930s and 1940s. A member of the Baseball Hall of Fame and a two-time Most Valuable Player (MVP) Award winner, he was one of the premier power hitters of his generation and is widely considered as one of the greatest sluggers in baseball history. He had 47 months of military service including service in World War II, all of which took place during what would have been prime years in his major league career.”

A candid shot of Hank Greenberg in NARA RG-18 PU.

Here’s an official Army Air Force photo of Greenberg, image 69033AC (A2336). Caption? “Captain “Hank” Greenberg, famous baseball personality, pauses a minute before continuing through the chow line at a 14th Air Force base in China.” The actual date of the photo is unknown, albeit text on the photo card states, “Orig. 4×5 neg rec’d 27 August 1946 from 14th Air Force thru AAF Historical Office.” However, VintageDetroit states that Greenberg reenlisted in the Army seven weeks after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, “…accepting a position as a sergeant in the Army Air Force, and a few weeks later he finished officer training school and was commissioned a first lieutenant. He stayed in the uniform of the United States military for the next three and a half years. His last position was in the China/India/Burma Theater of Operations where he scouted bombing targets for B-29s. In all, Greenberg served 47 months in the service during World War II, the longest tenure of any ballplayer.”

Hank Greenberg, at Wikipedia

Hank Greenberg, at FindAGrave

Baseball Reference

National Baseball Hall of Fame

Video

The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg, at Keith’s (Mr. Sports Historian) YouTube channel

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Grover Cleveland Hodge, Jr.

Of the five aviators whose images are presented in this post, the names of two – Hank Greenberg (above) and Gene Roddenberry (see below…) – are known to a lesser or greater degree by the general public, while knowledge of another – Ben Kuroki – is probably limited to WW II aviation buffs, historians of American aviation, and scholars of Japanese American history. But, here’s a fourth personality – or much more aptly and succinctly phrased, a person – knowledge of whom is probably limited only to historians of aviation, those knowledgeable about Canadian history, and (especially?) students of wilderness exploration and outdoor survival: First Lt. Grover C. Hodge, Jr.

Lt. Hodge was the pilot of B-26B Marauder 41-17862, otherwise known as “TIME’S AWASTIN”, an aircraft of the 440th Bomb Squadron of the 319th Bomb Group, which crashed near Saglek Bay, Labrador on December 10, 1942, during a planned flight from Narsarsuaq, Greenland to Goose Bay, Labrador. The plane’s compliment of seven crewmen (including Hodge) survived the crash-landing entirely uninjured. But alas, they did not survive.

A few links to information about this story are given below.

Grover C. Hodge, Jr., at FindAGrave

B-26B 41-17862, at Aviation Safety Network

Here’s the accident report for B-26B 41-17862: Accident Report 43-12-10-501. Note that relatively little of the report focuses on the fate and experience of the crew between the time they crash-landed, and, their discovery by an Eskimo several months later. Instead, most of the document is comprised of descriptions of flight activity on December 10, and, weather conditions.

Grover C. Hodge, Jr.’s Diary, at B-26.com

Saglek Airport, at Wikipedia

Crash in the Wilderness, at The DEWLine

Clarence Simonsen has done extensive research about the loss of 41-17862, his lengthy write-up exploring the event in great detail, with tact and sensitivity. He presents the intriguing (and haunting) possibility that Janssen, Josephson, and Nolan may actually have survived their life-raft journey along the Labrador coast, landed in the vicinity of Nain, and hiked into the Canadian wilderness for an unknown distance. Well, we’ll never know. His essay about 41-17862 is “Smilin’ Jack and the “Twin Engine Queenie”, while his blog is “Preserving the Past II – 50 Years of Research About Aviation“)

Oyster, Harold E., and Oyster, Esther M., The 319th in Action (Records of the 319th Bombardment Group as Recorded by Lieutenant William B. Monroe, Jr., Public Relations Officer, and Others), 1976

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Here’s the Historical Record card for B-26B 41-17862. The aircraft was received by the Army Air Force on August 24, 1942.

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Here are images of three of TIME’S AWASTIN’s crew members. For those who already know this story (and others who have yet to become familiar with it), Janssen and Josephson (with Sgt. Charles F. Nolan, a passenger) left the crash site in the aircraft’s life raft on December 23, in search of help; in search of anything. The three men – alluded to just above; their fate yet and perhaps forever unknown – were never seen again. Their names are engraved upon the columns of the East Coast Memorial, in Manhattan.

Co-Pilot: 2 Lt. Paul W. Janssen, at FindAGrave

Tribute page by Mrs. Bernice Ulrich, at National WW II Memorial

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Navigator (Bombardier): 1 Lt. Emanuel J. Josephson, at FindAGrave

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Gunner: Cpl. James J. Mangini, Jr, at FindAGrave

Corporal Mangini remained at the crash site with Lt. Hodge, Cpl. Galm (radio operator), and Sgt. Weyrauch (flight engineer).

Tribute page by Mrs. Lorraine Suter, Cpl. Mangini’s sister, at National WW II Memorial

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Here are links to FindAGrave biographical profiles for the three crewman for whom photographs are unavailable:

Cpl. Frank L. Galm, at FindAGrave

Sgt. Charles F. Nolan, at FindaAGrave

Sergeant Russell Weyrauch, at FindAGrave

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The below image, probably taken by Lt. Josephson, shows three unknown aviators standing before an B-26, at an unknown location.

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These two topographic maps, prepared by the Mapping and Charting Establishment, Canadian Department of National Defence (both 1968 editions) are (upper map) “Cape Uivak – Fish Island – Labrador North District (14L/7.8, Edition 2)”, Newfoundland, and (lower map) “Hebron – Labrador South District (14L/2, Edition 1)”, Newfoundland. The scale of the maps is 1:50,000 and the contour interval 100 feet.

Though I haven’t digitally “connected” images of he two maps to one another via Photoshop, you can see that the lower image, showing Hebron, is geographically continuous with and therefore cartographically “connected” to the upper image. As such, what immediately stands out is that a fjord – the Iterungnek Fjord – lies between the peninsula where Hebron is situated (in the “lower” map) and the peninsula where Cape Saglek and Saglek Airport are situated (in the “upper” map), 41-17862’s crash location being in the vicinity of that present-day airport.

As is immediately obvious, though the straight-line “as the crow flies” distance between the Saglek Lighthouse, south-southeast to Hebron, is a little over 20 miles, that relatively short distance does not at all reflect the topography, the nature of the intervening terrain, or especially – when those two factors are weighed in combination – the obvious lack of any direct path between the crash site and Hebron. Also, given the snow cover when 41-17862 crashed in mid-December, the safest (a very relative term) route between the crash site and Hebron would probably have involved following the highly irregular coastline east and south, along the Labrador Sea. Even if this could have been done, such a journey would have entailed the crew hiking a distance far, far beyond a mere 20 miles, and finally, finding some way to cross the Iterungnek Fjord to reach – on the adjacent peninsula – the village of Hebron.

So, even in the very best of circumstances… If the crew definitely knew their position; if they were all uninjured (well, they were uninjured to start; that’s true); if they were in good health (they seemed to have been in good health, to start); even if they had wilderness training and experience in outdoor survival during winter months in the Canadian North, the prospect of reaching Hebron – in the dead of winter over snow-covered terrain, or, along an icy coastline – would I think have been far more daunting than initially apparent from viewing small-scale maps of the area.

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Dating from November of 2010, here’s a song; a ballad – with kind of an air of Gordon Lightfoot’s The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald (in which you know the outcome of the story beforehand, wish that the outcome would have been entirely different, yet are still “drawn” to the story by its haunting and symbolic nature…) about the crew of “TIME’S AWASTIN”, by Ellis Coles, at the YouTube channel of Traprocker123. The song is based upon the diary kept by Grover Hodge from October 15, 1942 through February 3, 1943, while its title, “Diary of One Now Dead”, may (?), have been inspired by the title given to the diary transcript as published in The 319th in Action, in 1976, where Hodge’s diary comprises the final section of the book: “DIARY (BY ONE NOW DEAD).”

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Ben Kuroki

“The only American of Japanese descent in the United States Army Air Forces to serve in combat operations in the Pacific theater of World War II. He flew a total of 58 combat missions over Europe, North Africa, and Japan during World War II.”

Here’s Ben Kuroki’s quite candid image in NARA RG 18-PU.

In 1985, Ben’s recollections of his experiences in the 20th Air Force appeared in Chester Marshall’s The Global Twentieth – An Anthology of the 20th AF in WW II. A complete transcript of Kuroki’s essay, as well as its accompanying photo, showing Kuroki in the tail gunner’s position, follows…

THE STORY OF DETERMINATION BY A JAPANESE-AMERICAN TAIL-GUNNER

By Ben Kuroki, Tail Gunner 484th Squadron, 505th Bomb Group

Preface

Ben Kuroki was the only Japanese-American to fly combat missions with the Army Air Force in the Pacific Theatre of War during World War II. And he did it only by sheer determination and persistence – going all the way to the top to get permission. A personal letter to him from Secretary of War Henry Stimson struck down the Air Force regulation prohibiting Japanese-Americans from flying combat missions in the Pacific thus allowing Ben to remain a B-29 crew member.

“Influential friends went to bat for me and I was granted an exception which allowed me to be accepted in the 505th Bomb Group as a tail gunner on a B-29,” Ben said. “Army intelligence officers twice tried to remove me from my crew before we departed the U.S. for the Pacific, making it necessary for me to show my special letter from Secretary of War Stimson.”

In preparing this article, I asked Ben if we could publish the letter from the Secretary of War along with his story. Ben replied: “Much to my dismay, I let my daughter use it in an art exhibit at the University of California at San Diego, and since then, we have not been able to find it.”

Chester Marshall

Here’s Ben’s story:

When I returned to the United States after completing thirty missions in B-24’s in the European Theatre, I was sent to Santa Monica, California for rest and recuperation. Because of a few discriminatory actions against me soon after arriving there, I decided to go to any length to get into B-29’s and the Pacific War.

At Santa Monica I was asked to appear on an NBC radio program featuring the noted singer Jenny Simms. My appearance was cancelled because NBC officials said the Japanese-American issue was too controversial. Later, I was in Salt Lake City, and a man refused to share a taxi with me, saying, “I won’t ride with no damned Jap!” This happened while I was in uniform and wearing the Distinguished Flying Cross with oak leaf cluster and other ribbons.

When my assignment came through placing me in the 48th Bomb Squadron, 505th Bomb Group, 313th Bomb Wing, I was a happy soldier again. I was assigned to a B-29 crew as tail gunner. After training at Harvard, Nebraska, we were scheduled to deploy to Tinian Island in the Marianas where we would join in the great air assault then in progress against the Japanese homeland.

Aerial combat was not new to me. I had completed thirty missions – the twenty-five required plus five – as a tail gunner with the 409th Bomb Squadron of the 93rd Bomb Group in Europe. The 93rd Group, the first B-24 Group to be stationed in England, was known as Ted Timberlake’s “Flying Circus.” One of our toughest missions was the historic low-level attack on the Ploesti oil refineries in Romania. That one still makes the hair rise on the back of my neck!

For my upcoming Pacific tour, I was assigned to Crew Number 84-10 as tail gunner. Other members of my crew were: 1st Lieutenant James Jenkins, airplane commander; 1st Lieutenant Harold B. Wilson, pilot; 1st Lieutenant Joseph Pope, navigator; 2nd Lieutenant Kenneth Neill, bombardier; M/Sergeant Paul Hughes, flight engineer; S/Sergeant Warren Sheck, radioman; Sergeant William Shaffer, radarman; S/Sergeant Bernard Endler, central fire control; Sergeant Jerome Karnoff, right gunner; and Sergeant Leroy Kirkpatrick, left gunner.

We named our plane “The Honorable Sad Saki,” which was a sort of take off on the names of the “Sad Sack” cartoon character and a Japanese drink.

My most unforgettable experience came soon after we landed in Tinian. The ground crews had arrived on the island earlier, and rumors were rampant of enemy stragglers infiltrating the camp. Few of our GIs had previously been in combat, and they were extremely trigger happy. After dark they would open up with their carbines and rifles at the slightest noise, sending bullets whizzing all around the camp. The next day they would find dead pigs and other domestic animals that belonged to the natives. These animals, crunching around in the nearby cane fields, triggered a lot of gunfire from our “protectors” and caused us to fear for our lives. Since I was of Japanese ancestry, I was so worried that one of the trigger happy GIs would take a shot at me that I was afraid to even go to the latrine after dark, preferring to anxiously wait for the sun to rise. I felt that I deserved the Purple Heart for bladder damage!

The rumors also indicated that some enemy stragglers were wearing GI uniforms so I stuck real close to my other crew members – even in chow lines during the day.

During the first couple of weeks when the trigger-happiness was at its worst, I actually felt safer when I was flying combat missions over enemy targets. Although the Japanese anti-aircraft fire and fighter opposition were lighter than I had encountered over Europe, no mission was a milk run. When my buddies kidded me about being my bodyguards back at the base, I sorta got even when we were airborne by joking, “You guys had better be good to me, because if we get shot down, you’ll need my help. I’ll even bring you rice and fish heads.”

Ben and his crew completed 35 missions against the Japanese homeland making him one of the elite few who accomplished the feat of completing a combat tour of duty in both the European Theater of operation and the Pacific Theater of operation.

Here’s Ben Kuroki in Army Air Force photo +58171AC (A39047): JAPANESE “AMERICAN TAIL GUNNER OVER TOKYO – American born Japanese T/Sgt. Ben Kuroki, Hershey, Nebraska, a tail gunner with 30 ETO missions, is interviewed on Tinian after completing his 27th mission in the Pacific, by T/Sgt. Hal Brown, Bakersfield, Calif., combat photographer for Gen. H.H. Arnold’s official Army Air Forces weekly radio show, “The Fighting AAF”. Kuroki wears Distinguished Flying Cross and the Air medal with four Oak Leaf Clusters.”

Ben Kuroki, at Wikipedia

Ben Kuroki’s Family Tree

Ben Kuroki, at FindAGrave

Air and Space

American Air Museum in Britain

Ben Kuroki’s Bloot Chit, at National Museum of American History (Behring Center)

And, Chester Marshall’s book…

Marshall, Chester, The Global Twentieth – An Anthology of the 20th AF in WW II, Apollo Books, Winona, Mn., 1985

Here’s a snippet of what is (presumably?!) a much lengthier interview of Ben Kuroki, via the National Japanese American Historical Society.

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Gene Roddenberry (Eugene Wesley Roddenberry)

“Television screenwriter, producer and creator of Star Trek: The Original Series, and its sequel spin-off series Star Trek: The Animated Series and Star Trek: The Next Generation.”

Gene Roddenberry, long before the advent of Star Trek, in his photographic portrait from NARA RG-18 PU. Note the white-ink label at the bottom of the photo with the abbreviation “(42-G) KF”. Though I think (?) that would imply graduation from Class 42-G at Kelly Field, Roddenberry actually graduated with Class 42-G at Goodfellow Field, San Angelo, Tx. …

… and, via Army Air Forces Collection, here’s the front cover of his class graduation book, CAVU, Class 42-G, Goodfellow Field, San Angelo, Tx. …

… where his portrait appears on page 69.

As described at Pacific Wrecks, Roddenberry served in the Southwest Pacific with 394th Bomb Squadron of the 5th Bomb Group, eventually retiring from the military with the rank of Captain.

On August 2, 1943 he piloted a B-17E Flying Fortress – 41-2463, “Yankee Doodle” – which crashed on takeoff from Guadalcanal or Espiritu Santo, with the loss of two crew members, Sgt. John P. Krueger and navigator 1 Lt. Talbert H. Wollam. The aircraft can be seen below in Army Air Photo Photo 22847AC (A45620). Caption follows:

“B-17E – “Yankee Doodle”

“Members of a heavy bombardment squadron in the South Pacific have a novel method of chalking up their victories. On the noses of their B-17s they paint Jap flags to indicate planes shot down. Some have downed as many as 15 zeros.

Miniature destroyers or cruisers or transports signify a ship of that class officially sunk. The torpedoes indicate the number of striking missions in which the plane has had a part. A striking mission in the combat area is an attack on a specific enemy target.

Standing under the nose of their Flying Fortress, these two men [names unknown] of the ground crew pause to pose for the Army photographer in the South Pacific. These men are extremely proud of their planes and their victories. Note the string of shells for the machine gun in the nose.”

“Rec’d 1/9/43 thru Director of Photography from South Pacific Theater. Copied 2/16/43.”

Gene Roddenberry, at Wikipedia

Gene Roddenberry, at FindAGrave

Pacific Wrecks

B-17E 41-2463 – 13th Air Force, 5th Bomb Group, 394th Bomb Squadron, (Lost August 2, 1943)

Roddenberry.com

Talking About Gene Roddenberry, at Television Academy Foundation

Internet Movie Database

Memory Alpha Fandom

Internet Speculative Fiction Database

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Harvey Jackson Scandrett

“The sun glinted off the fuselages of the silvery Mustangs and from my vantage point, they seemed to stretch to the horizon to the front and sides of me. Between 350-400 miles north of Iwo we ran into a gigantic weather front with a solid squall line of cumulonimbus clouds blocking our path. These immense thunder-heads were too high for us to surmount. After we had circled for some time looking for holes without finding a trace of any, I heard Col. Scandrett say over the radio “Proceed with the mission; I take full responsibility.” At this my heart stopped and I know that I was not alone.”

“I realize now that Scandrett had to make a difficult decision without benefit of accurate weather information. He gambled and lost everything.” – Leonard A. Dietz, July 6, 1986

Enlisted in the United States Air Force in 1940, graduating from Randolph Field as a fighter pilot. By 1945, commander of the Headquarters Squadron (Deputy Group Commander) of the 506th Fighter Group. On June 1, 1945, commander of the three 7th Air Force Fighter Groups (15th, 21st, and 506th) assigned for B-29 Superfortress escort mission to Osaka, Japan. One of the 24 7th Air Force P-51 pilots lost that day.

One of the links below will take you to a PDF with the names of the 24 pilots lost on this mission, as well as the three other pilots who – having parachuted over the Pacific Ocean – were rescued. The list also includes aircraft serial numbers and MACR numbers for the aircraft flown by the 24 pilots who didn’t survive. The only similar incident that I’m aware of from the European Theater involved the loss of eleven P-51B Mustangs and pilots – no survivors – of the 363rd Fighter Group (five from the 381st Fighter Squadron, and six from the 382nd) over the English Channel on March 4, 1944, almost certainly caused by a combination of pilot inexperience and (very) bad weather.

Regarding 7th Air Force P-51 losses on the June 1, 1945, mission, unfortunately, aircraft nicknames and plane-in-squadron numbers are known for only a few of these P-51s (and this, it seems, only from private photographs!), for MACRs filed for 7th Air Force fighter losses did not record such information. To be specific, the “space” for aircraft nicknames in such MACRs doesn’t include the individual planes’ actual hand-painted-and-sometimes nose-arted nicknames, the simple and generic word “Mustang” appearing in that data field instead. (?!?)

Missing Air Crew Report 14653

Harvey J. Scandrett, at FindAGrave

Harvey J. Scandrett, at Pacific Wrecks

7th Air Force P-51D Pilot Losses – June 1, 1945

P-51D 44-72607, Madam Wham-Dam / 550 – 7th Air Force, 506th Fighter Group, 458th Fighter Squadron (Lost June 1, 1945), at Pacific Wrecks

506th Fighter Group – Iwo to Japan

506th Fighter Group – 1 June 1945 Black Friday

A book! (A good book, at that…)

Lambert, John W., The Long Campaign – The History of the 15th Fighter Group in World War II, Sunflower University Press, Manhattan, Ks., 1982 (see pages 121-126)

A magazine (…from years ago…)

Blake, Steve, “The 363rd Fighter Group in WW II – Part I”, Fighter Pilots in Aerial Combat, Summer, 1982, Number 5 (pp. 15-22)

A Path in the Sky: A Navigator’s Log from a Downed B-17 [Revised post…]

[And now, the post is “new and improved”!…

When I created this post in late 2016 (has it been that long?!) its “raison d’être” was to display images of an aerial navigation log from a 15th Air Force B-17 Flying Fortress that crash-landed in Poland on December 26, 1944.

That purpose, in this now-updated post, remains much the same. But, with a difference. Though the initial version of the post featured black & white images of the navigation log – those images having made from reduced-size photocopied scans of the log – this updated version features full-size “first generation” color scans of the log, which I found by searching the website of the United States National Archives (NARA).

As such, these NARA 300 dpi scans present the log in its near-original color (which I well remember from physically examining the document during a visit to NARA some years ago!), and better resolution than the scans of the black & white paper photocopies originally featured in this post.

So, if you’ve visited this post before, you’ll see the new images below.

If you’re new here, you’ll see these NARA scans for the first time.

In either case, the scans of these documents (and two other scans) provide a fascinating view into a little remarked-upon (well, not nearly as dramatic as fighter planes) aspect of WW II military aviation: Navigation. Getting “there”. And, getting “back” again.

Specifically, the new items comprise two scans from Luftgaukommando Report ME 2620, which are typical of documents that can often – not always, but pretty often – be found incorporated within MACRs for aircraft of the USAAF 8th, 9th, 12th, and 15th Air Forces, specifically lost over the European mainland: Crew lists, composed by the Germans, after individual aviators had been captured and / or identified, with their names correlated to a specific aircraft and crew. The heading of the “first” document is “Meldung über den Abschuss eines US-Amerikanisch Flugzeuges” (Report about the downing of an American airplane). The “second” document is an abbreviated version of the crew list, and includes specific information about the plane in question (“…337”) and crew positions of each aviator.]

In prior posts, I presented photographs from German Luftgaukommando Reports – in the United States National Archives – concerning a P-51D Mustang fighter, and, a B-17G Flying Fortress, which were lost in combat missions over Germany in late 1944. For the former, a series of technical intelligence photographs taken by the Germans upon recovery of the crash-landed fighter. For the latter, a remarkable “in-plane” / “in-flight” photograph carried by and captured from one of the B-17’s crewmen.

This post – covering another Luftgaukommando Report – is a little different, for it shows a find of a different sort: An intact and complete Air Corps Navigator’s Log retrieved from a crash-landed Flying Fortress, which has survived in much the same condition as when the last notations were recorded upon it a little over 72 years ago.

The story behind the Log?

It began at 8:03 A.M. on Tuesday, December 26, 1944, when B-17G 44-6337, Kandy, of the 32nd Bomb Squadron, 301st Bomb group, piloted by 1 Lt. Harry Owen Filer, departed for a mission to the oil refinery complex at Blechhammer South, Germany.

Missing Air Crew Report 10746 carries three accounts of the plane’s disappearance.

1 Lt. Charles A. Dews, navigator, reported, “Right after bombs away, Plane No. 6337 started falling back from formation. Number 3 or 4 engine had been hit by enemy flak. My pilot reported that it was losing altitude and that either smoke or gas vapor was coming from 3 or 4 engine. Just before we rallied at Ciezyn we lost sight of 6337 who was lagging back and losing altitude but under control. We last saw Plane No. 6337 at 1250 hours, 26 December, 1944, location of 50/01 N – 18/27 E. The weather was CAVU and no chutes were seen.

Another navigator, 2 Lt. Joseph I. Laird, recounted, “Just after we dropped our bombs on the target, I noticed #4 engine smoking on Plane No. 6337. The plane peeled out of formation taking a heading of 45 degrees and slid down to the left smoothly, losing altitude but under control. The #4 engine was probably hit by flak over the target. The plane dropped back from the formation but was still under control when I last saw it at 1250 hours, 26 December, 1844. It was at 50/01 N – 18/27 E, the weather was CAVU and no chutes were seen.

Tail gunner S/Sgt. Harry P. Hale described the following: “Shortly after bombs away, Plane No. 6337 fell out of formation, losing altitude and dropping back. Smoke was coming from either No. 3 or 4 engine which was apparently hit by flak encountered over target. The plane seemed to be under control when I last saw it at 1250 hours, 26 December, 1944, and saw no one bail out. The weather was CAVU and our Navigator gave the coordinates of 50/01 N – 18/27 E when I last reported seeing aircraft No. 6337.

As in many Missing Air Crew Reports, eyewitness statements account for the plane’s loss only up to the time it disappeared. But, as in (also) many other Missing Air Crew Reports, an explanation of the plane’s loss is presented in postwar Casualty Questionnaires. In Kandy’s case, these were filed by pilot Harry Filer, navigator Gilbert Nesch, and radio operator Earle Cochrane.

The following is a summary of information in the Questionnaires: The plane was struck by flak, and left formation while southeast of the target, shortly after 12 noon. Not long after, Kandy was crash-landed near Krakow, Poland. The entire crew survived uninjured and were captured, all returning to the United States after the war’s end.

Some decades later, co-pilot Alfred Cryer’s brief account of the plane’s loss has now appeared at the website of the 301st Bomb Group, under the heading “My First Mission“, giving the story of the plane’s loss “from the cockpit”:

The crew that I was flying with, the day I was shot down, was not my crew. It was my first mission and I guess it was a crew made up from the pool. The reason we came down near Krakow, Poland was we were heading to a field in Russia. On the second bomb run on the target our ship and the lead ship were hit by anti-aircraft fire. We took hits in the number two and number four engines. Orders were if you were not able to make it back to Italy, you could try for this field in Russia. Our navigator told us when we should be able to see the field, after making a couple of circles and not seeing a field we decided a wheels up crash-landing was the way to go. Only it was occupied Poland, about 35 miles from the front lines.

The names of the crew, their next of kin, and their wartime home addresses – derived from information in the MACR, and the Luftgaukommando Report – follow below:

Pilot: 1 Lt. Harry Owen Filer
Mrs. Alice B. Filer (wife), 510 NE 56th St., Miami, Fl.

Co-Pilot: 2 Lt. Alfred James Cryer (Born in Illinois, in 1922)
Mrs. Gladys M. Cryer (wife), 141 South Prairie St., Batavia, Il.

This portrait of Lieutenant Cryer, added by researcher Kathy, is from his FindAGrave biographical profile.

Navigator: 2 Lt. Gilbert Theodore Nesch (Born December 6, 1917)
Mr. Frank F. Nesch (father), 1105 Yout St., Racine, Wi.

Togglier: T/Sgt. William Eugene Nassif (Born April 2, 1922)
Mr. Otto Nassif (father), 613 40th Avenue North, Fargo, N.D.
Mrs. Bessie Nassif (mother), Pollock, S.D.

Flight Engineer: T/Sgt. Ernest Mario Anticola (Born 1921)
Mr. Natale Anticola (father), 564 Hopkins St., Buffalo, N.Y.

Radio Operator: T/Sgt. Earle James Cochrane
Mrs. Kathleen G. Cochrane (wife)
Mrs. Blanche E. Haislip (mother), 49 Oak Ridge Ave., Schoolfield, Va.

Gunner (Ball Turret): S/Sgt. Edward Anthony Codo (Born June 30, 1925)
Mr. Edward C. Codo (father), 213 Sherman St., Joliet, Il.

Gunner (Waist): S/Sgt. Philip Shlom (Born 1922)
Mrs. Marion V. Shlom (wife), 3435 Richton St., Apt. 112, Detroit, Mi.
Mrs. Libby Shlom (mother), 2017 Clairmount Ave., Detroit, Mi.

Gunner (Waist): S/Sgt. Franklin Junior Elmen (Born 1915)
Mrs. Hazel B. Elmen (wife), 1112 Spruce St., Leavenworth, Ks.
Mr. Walter F. Elmen (father), 1315 South State St., Salt Lake City, Ut.

Gunner (Tail): S/Sgt. Patrick Marvin Nicks (Born 1925)
Mrs. Margurite Goeden (mother), South 523 Washington St., Spokane, Wa.

Here are some pages from the MACR for 44-6337…

First page of MACR 10746: Information about the crew and plane, and summary of data about the circumstances of its loss.

A map of the plane’s last reported position.

Crew roster, another (usually) standard document in MACRs covering multi-place aircraft.

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Oogle Map showing southeastern Germany, Czechia and Slovakia (then Czechoslovakia) and southern Poland, with Oogle’s red position indicator superimposed on Krakow.

Southern Poland, zooming in on Krakow.

The southern part of Krakow.

Oogling even closer… The plane was crash-landed somewhere in the vicinity of the communities of Kobierzyn and (Lagiewniki) Borek-Falecki, shown in the right-center portion of this map.

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Remarkably, at the website of the Polish Aviation Museum a photo (actually, a composite of three photos) exists of the crash-landed B-17. The same image – and much more – can be found at the “intheair” website, which features extensive information about contemporary interest by the local community (most recently as of January, 2016) in the history of Kandy’s loss.

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“Meldung über den Abschuss eines US-Amerikanisch Flugzeuges” (Report about the downing of an American airplane)

Abbreviated report. Given the absence of first-name information for three crew members, this document was presumably completed prior to the report above, which itself was completed on January 9, 1945, fourteen days after the crash-landing of 44-6337.

But, what of the Navigation Log?

Rectangular in format, the dimensions of the Log are 20″ by 26″. The upper half is subdivided into two rectangular areas of roughly equal size (which I’ve dubbed the “first” and “second” sections), while the lower half (which I’ve dubbed the “third section”) has the general format of a spreadsheet.

So, here’s the log in its “fullness”. It’s pretty big: 7,900 by 6,200 pixels.

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The “first” section of the Log (13″ x 10″) covers:

Information about the plane, date of mission, and target.
Mission Orders
Weather (General Forecast)
Flight Plan
Flight Crew
Winds
Memoranda

This section appears below:

Here’s the first section, as a scan from a paper photocopy:

Here are highlights of the information that Lt. Nesch recorded in this section of the Log:

Plane Number (last three digits of serial): 337
Plane Type: B-17G
Date: 26 Dec 1944
Place of Departure: Base
Destination: Bleichammer [sic] South

Mission Orders

Target: Bleichammer [sic] South
IP (Initial Point): Jagendorf
Axis: 060
Rally: Right
Guns (anti-aircraft at target): 153
Weather (General Forecast) (lots of data recorded here…)
Latitude / Longitude
Dist: Distance (elapsed)
TC: True Course
TH / MH: True Heading / Magnetic Heading
Alt / Temp: Altitude / Temperature
IAS / TAS: Indicated Airspeed / True Airspeed
GS: Ground Speed
Time: Time of record

Flight Crew

P – Filer – 1 Lt.
CP – Cryer – 2 Lt.
N – Nesch – 2 Lt.
B – Nassif – T/Sgt.
E – Anticola – T/Sgt.
R – Cochrane – T/Sgt.
BT – Codo – S/Sgt.
WG – Schlom [sic] – S/Sgt.
TG – Nicks – S/Sgt.
WG – Elmen – S/Sgt.

Winds

Memoranda

Flak: Csehi, Gor, Bratislava
Fighters: 50-80 Vienna, 40-50 Target, 120-130 Total
Escort
50 P-51s
66 P-51s 49-35, 17-43 12:56
60 P-51s 49-28, 18-00 12:50
Station: 0730
Takeoff: 0800
Rend (Rendezvous): 0857
Target: 1245
ETR (Estimated Time of Return): 1540
(other notes)
Mielec 50-19, 21-48
Rzeszow 50-07, 22-03
12 – 500 RDX (bomb load)

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The “second section” (12 1/2″ x 10″) covers:

Celestial Data
Fuel Consumption
Colors of Day
Memoranda
Radio Bearings

This section of the Log also includes pre-printed formulas and geometric reminders for calculating Interception, and, radius of action, and also conversion scales for temperature (C / F), and, barometric pressure (millibars / inches).

Here’s the second section:

And, here’s how this document appeared in the “original” version of this post:

Here are highlights of the information that Lt. Nesch recorded in this section of the Log:

Celestial Data

No such data is actually recorded! Instead, under the heading “Charts“, appears a list of aerial navigation maps carried aboard Kandy. These covered Naples, Chieti, and Fiume (Italy), Graz and Vienna (Austria), “Taby” [sp?], and, Krakow (Poland).

Fuel Consumption (lots of data recorded here…)

Colors of Day:
GRR (probably green-red-red)
YY (likely yellow-yellow)
RGG (presumably red-green-green)

Memoranda
Wing: C
Group: B
Bomber: Schoolroom #1
Escort: Rubbish
Recall: Frontier
Weather (nil)
Lake Lesina 0857 3500′
KP Split 0944 1100

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The third section (26″ x 10″) occupies the “bottom” half of the Log, and in tabular format, provides fields for entry of data relevant to aerial navigation, as the mission progressed. The fields comprise the following:

Aircraft position (Latitude / Longitude)
Time
True Course
Drift Correction
True Heading
Variation
Magnetic Heading
Deviation Correction
Compass Heading
Temperature (Celsius!)
Airspeed (Indicated, Calculated, and True)
Winds
Ground Speed
“Run” (?)
“To Next Check Point” (Distance, Time, and Estimated Time of Arrival)
Meteorological Observations (Weather, Visibility, and Clouds)

An area to the right of these entries, entitled “Remarks”, allows the navigator to write notes about significant events as the mission progressed. A scan of this section is presented below:

Here’s the original image from the paper photocopy:

A transcription of the above notes follows:

ENGINES STARTED: 0803 (handwritten note at top of log)

ENGINES STOPPED: (…no entry would ever be made…)

08:57 GP. REND. 1 MILE WEST OF RD PT. 0903 HEADED EAST ALONG COAST, AT 48-07 N, 15-30 E (altitude 4000)

09:15 TAKING UP HEADING FOR SPLIT (altitude 9000)

11:32: LIGHT FLAK 47-43 N, 17-42 E (altitude 21000)

12:00: CIRCLING IP MADE 360 TURN JUST WEST OF IP. (altitude 24000)

12:29: OILFIRES FROM PREV. WAVE. BOMBS AWAY SMOKE SCREEN, BARRAGE TYPE FAIRLY HEAVY (altitude 25000)

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Another document in Luftgaukommando Report ME 2620, not shown in the earlier version of this post, is this combination Flight Log / Flight Plan of a much simpler format. Though the sheet has tables and data fields on both sides, it’s obvious that Lieutenant Nesch only utilized one side; specifically to record flight plan and mission data. Notice that unlike the Flight Log, the Flight Plan includes data fields for geographic locations, latitude and longitude information. Notice Lt. Nesch’s arithmetic calculations on the right.

Here’s the “blank” side of the document.

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Corroborating and reflecting the information in the Navigator’s Log is Luftgaukommando Report (KSU / ME 2620), a translated page of which – from the MACR – is shown below:

As listed above, the following material was retrieved from the aircraft:

1 folder-form with course calculation (Navigator’s Log)
1 radio key
1 plane instructions
1 package with optical lenses
1 radio handbook
2 sheets of radio instructions (secret)
1 (aerial)?) map of each of following cities: Chieti, Vienna, “Naples, Krakau” (Krakow), Taby (?), “Graz” (Gratz), and Fiume. This list is identical to the list of maps in the Navigator’s Log.

Of the above items, the only material that was actually retained to become part of the Luftgaukommando Report was the Navigator’s Log. This is consistent with Luftgaukmmando Reports covering American heavy bombers, which may list all manner documents and material (such as cameras, electronic, and navigation equipment) salvaged from downed warplanes, where – upon examining the actual Luftgaukommando Report – such items are unsurprisingly (!) not present. I would suppose this was due to the sheer physical size and weight of these items, and, the probability that they were analyzed (if not disassembled?) for intelligence purposes. Above all, (im)practically speaking, a B-17 pilot’s manual, the manual for a BC-348 radio, or a reflector gunsight, cannot readily be stuffed into an 8 1/2″ x 10″ file folder!

Thus, what is present in Luftgaukommando Reports – at least sometimes – are letters (V-Mail and handwritten), dog-tags, and personal documents (such as driver’s licenses, military “calling cards”, or Officer’s Identification Cards), and – in rare instances, like this – a Navigator’s Log.

Items that, given the anonymity and chaos of war, are striking reminders of the very human side of history.

So, though Lt. Nesch reported that Kandy’s engines were started at 8:03 in the morning, but never quite had the opportunity to record the return of his crew to Lucera, Italy, at least they did return, albeit some months later.

As did his log, which seven decades later exists as a reminder of a war ended long ago.

Mission, complete.

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December 6, 2016

May 18, 2017

May 20, 2021

Random Flights I: Aviators from NARA’s Photo Collection of Aviators – Paul F. Baer, Italo Balbo, Amelia M. Earhart, Anthony Fokker, Ployer P. Hill, Ruth R. Nichols, Philip A.G.D Sassoon, and Lawrence B. Sperry

Proud
pilots
photographed
professionally –

– pictures
preserved
in perpetuity?

(Possibly. (Possibly.))

A particular aspect of this blog being historical photography, one of my first posts – Five Pilots in December: Photographic Portraits of American Fighter Pilots Who Lost Their Lives at Pearl Harbor – dating from November of 2016 (gadzooks, has it been that long?!) focused (* no pun intended *) on photographic portraits of Army Air Corps pursuit pilots Samuel W. Bishop, Hans C. Christiansen, John L. Dains, Gordon H. Sterling, Jr., and George A. Whiteman. The five images featured in that post are among the many, many such images in the collection Photographic Prints of Air Cadets and Officers, Air Crew, and Notables in the History of Aviation – NARA RG 18-PU, at the United States National Archives.

Though the overwhelming majority of these portraits and images in that collection directly pertain to members of the United States Army Air Service, the United States Army Air Corps, and its successor, the United States Army Air Forces, a few of these images are of personalities in aviation history who are either American civilians, or (even fewer in number) citizens of other countries, who had interaction with or relation to American aviation, or who were simply prominent in the field of aeronautics, per se. As such, “this” post displays images of the following aviators: First Lieutenant Paul F. Baer, Marshal Italo Balbo, Anthony Fokker, Major Ployer P. Hill, Ruth R. Nichols and Amelia Earhart, Philip A.G.D. Sassoon, and Lawrence B. Sperry. More such posts will follow.

Given the prominence of these individual in the field of aviation – let alone history in general for Fokker and Earhart – and the abundance of information about them, I’ve decided not to “reinvent the wheel” and write lengthy essays about them, recreating what’s been written previously. Rather, each image is simply followed by links to relevant sources of information. These references are primarily Wikipedia (yeah, I know, I know … it’s Wikipedia, but still, you can find valid information there) and FindAGrave, the latter site often featuring valuable genealogical information and photos. The photographs of Frank F. Baer and Ployer P. Hill are supplemented by images of newspaper articles, while the portraits of Balbo, Nichols, and Sassoon feature videos.

I hope you find these images interesting.

More to follow!

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First Lieutenant Paul Frank Baer

“American World War I flying ace credited with nine confirmed victories and seven unconfirmed victory claims. He was the first ace flying for [specifically] American military aviation. He also scored the initial victory for an American military unit.”

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Here’s a document about Paul Baer’s military training and service in the Service Aéronautique of the French Army during World War I. The document can be found at the Database of Military aircraft personnel for WW I, within the Database of navigators and ground personnel of the air force during the Great War, of the SGA (Secretary General for Administration), at – Mémoire des hommes – Portail Culturel du Ministere Des Armees. (“Memory of men – Cultural Portal of the Ministry of the Armed Forces”).

The Illustrated Daily News

September 27, 1919

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Body of Ft. Wayne War Ace Arrives Home From China

The Muncie Morning Star

December 31, 1930

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Bury World War Ace at Ft. Wayne Today

The Muncie Morning Star

January 3, 1931

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Last Rites for American Pilot This Afternoon

Following Services At Chapel Body Starts Journey to France

The China Press

December 11, 1930

Full military honors will be paid today at 3 p.m. to Pilot Paul F Baer, American aviator and a distinguished member of the famous Lafayette Esquadrille, who met his untimely death Tuesday morning when the Hankow plane of the China National Aviation Corporation crashed into the mast of a junk.

Shanghai military units will say their last goodbye to an honorary soldier in the form of guard of honor contingent of French troops, ordered out of the French commandant delegation from the Royal Air Force Association and the American Legion.

The body is now lying in state, draped with the flags of three nations, at the International Funeral Directors’ Establishment, 71 Kiaochow road.

High officials of foreign and native military forces will pay their last respects to the gallant aviator this afternoon. After the funeral the body will be taken aboard the President McKinley, which will convey Pilot Baer on the first leg of his journey to his last resting place.

LAST RESTING PLACE

The body will be taken to Fort Wayne, Ind., where friends and relatives will pay respects before it travels to Versailles near Paris. There the Lafayette Memorial will lay claim to Pilot Baer, wherein a permanent niche has been awaiting him since his release from the Lafayette Esquadrille. The Memorial has a tomb for every member of the Esquadrille, and only a few of these still remain unoccupied. One of the surviving members of the famous fighting group. Mr. Bert Hall, author of the book “One Man’s War,” is in Shanghai at present.

Baer, ranking No. 4 in the Esquadrille, was showered with all the honors the French Government could confer upon him. He was also decorated by the United States. The aviator possessed the Distinguished Service Cross, with Bronze Oak Leaf; Legion d’Honneur, and Croix de Guerre with seven Palms.
Pilot Baer, a daring and fearless fighter, was born in Fort Wayne, Indiana. He was commissioned First Lieutenant in United States Aviation, November 5, 1917, and was soaring over the roaring cannon at the front from February 18 to May 22, 1918, flying for the 103rd Pursuit Squadron. On May 22 he was shot down and wounded in combat, and from that time was held a prisoner in Germany until the Armistice was signed.

FLEW SPAD 80

Enlisting in the French Aviation Service February 20, 1917, Baer was in the French aviation schools until August 12 of that year, when he was given a Spad 80 and started his maneuvers at the front. He fought for the French until January 14, 1918, and during that time brought down nine enemy planes. Baer showed such daring and skill in all his combats that France conferred numerous honors upon him.

During his service in United States Aviation at the front, the D.S.C. was given him by command of General Pershing, for bravery in March, 1918.

Baer, alone attacked a group of seven enemy pursuit machines, destroying one which crashed to the ground near the French lines.

____________________

Impressive Tribute Paid Distinguished Airman In Military Rite Yesterday

United States Marines Present For Funeral Of Pilot Paul F. Baer, Victim Of Air Crash Here On Tuesday

The China Press

December 12, 1930

In a simple but impressive manner Shanghai yesterday paid a final tribute to the distinguished airman, Pilot Paul F. Baer, American aviator and ranking member of the famous Lafayette Esquadrille, who crashed to his death here Tuesday morning when the Hankow plane of the China National Aviation Company failed to gain altitude and was cracked up.

Funeral services for the ill-fated aviator, at the International Funeral Directors were attended by [company] of United States Marines as well as numerous French officials. The Rev. Emory Luccock was the minister in charge.

Following the playing of “Nearer My God to Thee,” by the military band. Rev. Luccock delivered a brief euology over the bier. Three volleys from the firing squad followed. “Lead Kindly Light” was the second and final rendition by the band.

FLYER BEARERS

Pall bearers were made up entirely of fellow airman including Mr. Bert Hall, one of the few surviving members of the famous French squadron. The others, all of the China National Aviation Company, are: M.S. Halin, H.G. Smith, M. Hamilton, James Hayden and M. Hamill. Captain Lawson was in command of the marine company.

Although little information is available here concerning Baer’s relatives, he is believed to be survived only by his mother, Mrs. Emma Shroyer of Fort Wayne, Indiana.

The casket was draped with an American flag on all sides by numerous floral wreaths. Indicating high regard on the part of his flying colleagues, many of these came from those who had soared through the clouds with Pilot Baer. Included among the large wreaths were those from the Pilots of the China National Aviation Company, the Mechanics of the C.N.A.C., the Royal Air Force of China, United Services Association of the Great War.

TO FRANCE

From the funeral parlor the body of Pilot Baer was removed late yesterday to be placed aboard the President McKinley, which will convey the airman on the first leg of his last journey. The body will be taken to Fort Wayne, Ind., where relatives and friends will pay respects before it is carried on to Versailles, France. There Pilot Baer will find his final resting place in the Lafayette Memorial, where a niche has been reserved for him as a result of his distinguished war service. The Memorial has a tomb for every member of the Esquadrille.

During and after hostilities in the Great War, Pilot Baer was showered with honors by both America and France. High decorations came from both governments including the Distinguished Service Cross, with Bronze Oak Leaf, the Legion of Honor and the Croix de Guerre, with seven palms. He ranked No. 4 in the Lafayette Esquadrille.

Following his services with the French, Pilot Baer fought with the American air forces on the Western Front. He was awarded the D.S.C. by command of General Pershing, for bravery in March, 1918. He attacked a group of enemy planes while flying alone over the French lines. Fire from his guns brought down one of the German planes. On March 15, bare attacked two enemy planes, sending one of the pair to the ground in flames.

FROM FT. WAYNE

Baer was born in Fort Wayne, Indiana. He was commissioned First Lieutenant in the U.S. Air Force, November 5, 1917, and by the following February he was in the thick of the fighting in France as a member of the 103rd Pursuit Squadron. On May 22, 1918 he was shot down and wounded during combat. From that time on until the Armistice was signed in November, he was a prisoner in Germany.

In addition to the wreaths from the close association of Pilot Baer were a large number bearing the names of prominent institutions and individuals. The complete list of wreaths which decked the casket follows: China National Aviation Company, Anciens Combattants Francais, United Services Association of the Great War (1914-1918), Royal Air Force Association of Shanghai, Association Nazionale Combattenti, Les Aviateurs Francaise de Shanghai, American Legion, Shanghai, General Frederick Townsend Ward Post No. 1, Pilots of the C.N.A.C., Mechanics of the C.N.A.C., Nan and Blanche, Officers and men of the 4th U.S. Marines, American Foreign Insurance Association, Standard Oil Company of New York, Amicale des Anciens Combattants Francaise, Douglas Jenkins, Mrs. Douglas Jenkins, H.B. Longfelloy, the S.E. Gale Company, The Staff of the Young Men’s Christian Association, Louis Ladow, Mr. and Mrs. E. Tollefsen, George Sellett, Mr. and Mrs. W.W. Ritchie, Alfred Pandely Patterson and numerous Chinese friends.

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Paul F. Baer, at Wikipedia

Paul F. Baer, at FindAGrave

The Aerodrome

First World War

China National Aviation Corporation

Book: Hoosier Aviator Paul Baer: America’s First Combat Ace, by Tony Garel-Frantzen

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Italy: Maresciallo dell’Aria (Marshal of the Air Force) Italo Balbo

“Italian fascist politician and Blackshirts’ leader who served as Italy’s Marshal of the Air Force, Governor-General of Libya and Commander-in-Chief of Italian North Africa. Described as the “heir apparent” to Italian dictator Benito Mussolini, often seen as one of his most probable successors.”

Note Marshall Balbo’s signature and salutation at bottom left.

Italo Balbo, at Wikipedia

Italo Balbo, at FindAGrave

Newspaper Clippings about Italo Balbo, in 20th Century Press Archives of the ZBW

Italian Air Armada Stirs New York Aka Balbo Arrives In New York (1933), at British Pathé YouYube Channel

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The Netherlands: Anthony Gerard Fokker

“Dutch aviation pioneer, aviation entrepreneur, aircraft designer, and aircraft manufacturer. Most famous for the fighter aircraft he produced in Germany during the First World War such as the Eindecker monoplanes, the Dr.1 triplane and the D.VII biplane.”

Note that both of these images bear Anthony Fokker’s signature.

(Image 18-PU-137-1)

“Anthony G. Fokker in one of his airplanes about 1911-1912.” (Image 18-PU-137-2)

Anthony G. Fokker, at Wikipedia

Anthony G. Fokker, at FindAGrave

The National Aviation Hall of Fame

Newspaper Clippings about Anthony G. Fokker, in 20th Century Press Archives of the ZBW

At Oogle Books:

“Tony Fokker Wizard Of Flight“, Popular Science, May 1931

“Tony Fokker And The World War“, Popular Science, June 1931

“Tony Fokker Captures America“, Popular Science, July 1931

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Major Ployer Peter Hill

“Pilot and an officer with a varied career, best known for his abilities as a test pilot. In an aviation career that spanned eighteen years, Hill piloted nearly 60 of the Army Air Corps’ newest aircraft, testing and evaluating their capabilities for service.”

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Army Assignments

The Washington Post

May 29, 1925

____________________

Big Bomber Falls in Ohio, Killing 1

Major P.P. Hill Dies As the Boeing ‘Fortress’ Crashes at 200 Feet in Tests

The New York Times

October 31, 1935

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Bomber’s Crash Laid to Locked Controls

Albuquerque Journal

November 13, 1935

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Boeing Test Chief Dies Of His Injuries

Leslie Tower Was in Crash of Army Bomber on Experimental Flight at Dayton Oct. 30

The New York Times

November 20, 1935

Leslie Ralph Tower, at FindAGrave

Ployer P. Hill, at Wikipedia

Ployer P. Hill, at FindAGrave

Model 299 (NX13372) Crash, at National Museum of the United States Air Force

Model 299 (NX13372) Crash, at Aviation Safety.net

This Day In Aviation

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Ruth Rowland Nichols (and Amelia Mary Earhart)

“American aviation pioneer. The only woman yet to hold simultaneous world records for speed, altitude, and distance for a female pilot.”

“Miss Amelia Earhart Putnam and Miss Ruth Nichols. Taken at National Air Races – Los Angeles, Cal. July, 1933.” (Image 18-P-228, 267)

Ruth R. Nichols, at Wikipedia

Ruth R. Nichols, at FindAGrave

Ruth NIchols Home Movies 1935 – Women Pilots Ruth Elder Aviatrixes 70390 HD, at Periscope Film

Ruth Nichols reaches Valley Stream from Los Angeles in 13 hours and 22 minutes, at Critical Past

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Amelia Mary Earhart

Amelia Earhart, at Wikipedia

This image of Amelia Earhart (28987AC) is dated July 30, 1936. The serial number of the Boeing P-12C behind Amelia, painted on the aircraft’s propeller blade, is 31-156. According to Aviation Archeology, this aircraft was assigned to first the 95th, and then the 43rd, Pursuit Squadrons, in which it was involved in landing accidents on December 24, 1930, and November 26, 1935, the pilots having been Carl B. Fry and Jerome E. Blair, Jr. (eventually Colonel Jerome Edward Blair, Jr.), respectively. The aircraft in the background is probably a Consolidated PB-2. (Image 18-P-228266)

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England: Philip A.G.D. (Albert Gustave David) Sassoon

“Sir Philip Albert Gustave David Sassoon, 3rd Baronet, GBE, CMG (4 December 1888 – 3 June 1939). British politician, art collector, and social host, entertaining many celebrity guests at his homes, Port Lympne Mansion, Kent, and Trent Park, Hertfordshire, England. Secretary of State for Air, Sassoon was Honorary Air Commodore of No. 601 (County of London) Squadron. “

Philip A.G.D Sassoon, at Wikipedia

Philip A.G.D. Sassoon, at FindAGrave

Sir Philip Sassoon (1925), at British Pathé YouYube Channel

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Lawrence Burst Sperry

“Third son of the gyrocompass co-inventor, Elmer Ambrose Sperry and his wife Zula. Sperry invented the first autopilot, which he demonstrated with startling success in France in 1914. Sperry is also credited with developing the artificial horizon still used on most aircraft in the early 21st century.” (Image 5913 AS)

Lawrence B. Sperry, at Wikipedia

Lawrence B. Sperry, at FindAGrave

Lawrence Sperry: Genius on Autopilot, at History.net

A Book in Memory, A Book of Memory: Fighter Pilot, by 1 Lt. Levitt Clinton Beck, Jr. [Updated post, updatingly updated…]

(“This” post, having been created in February of 2019, is now slightly updated: Included below is a photographic portrait of 1 Lt. Levitt Clinton Beck, Jr., from the National Archives’ collection Photographic Prints of Air Cadets and Officers, Air Crew, and Notables in the History of Aviation – NARA RG 18-PU. Though I don’t know the Advanced Flying School from which Lt. Beck graduated and received his commission as a Second Lieutenant, the large pin that he’s wearing, bearing the abbreviation “43-B”, indicates that he received his wings in February of 1943. Lt. Beck’s pride and determination are obvious.)

[May 20, 2021: Updating the update!…

From Missing Air Crew Report 6224, covering the loss of Lt. Beck’s P-47D Thunderbolt, this post has included a copy of the “Meldung über den Abschuss eines US-Amerikanisch Flugzeuges” (Report about the downing of an American airplane) from German Luftgaukommando Report J 1582, which pertains to the capture and identification of Lt. Beck, and, the eventual “correlation” by the Germans of Lt. Beck to his specific Thunderbolt.

I’ve now updated this post (I prefer to “stick with the same post”, rather than make a succession of brief additional posts) to include 300 dpi color scans, from the United States National Archives, of the two sheets comprising J 1582. One scan is of the above-mentioned “Meldung”, and the other is a list – compiled on July 7, 1944 – of destroyed Allied airplanes, with the names (where known) of pertinent dead or captured Allied airmen lost on June 28, 1944.

Both of these documents are displayed “lower” in the post, just “below” the MACR…]

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“On the other hand,
if I don’t make it,
everything I have written will be here for anyone to read,
and I feel it will make a better ending to my life than just to be
“missing in action.”

“When you read all this I shall be right there looking over your shoulder.”

________________________________________

Among my varied interests is a fascination for literary art. That is, art, appearing as cover and interior illustrations upon and within books and magazines, examples of which are displayed at one of my brother blogs, WordsEnvisioned. My interests in literary art encompass a wide variety of subjects, such as science fiction (the latter especially as “pulp” science fiction, and fantasy, from the 1940s through the 1960s), many aspects of history, aviation, literature, and many other areas.

Within the world of aviation, the book Fighter Pilot, created by the parents of First Lieutenant Levitt Clinton Beck, Jr. in honor and memory of their son, at first seemed to be a most fitting subject for WordsEnvisioned. On second thought, I realized that the book’s literary and historical significance and its relation to military aviation make it a more suitable subject “here”, at ThePastPresented.

So…

______________________________

Military literature from all eras is replete with autobiographical accounts of the wartime experiences and postwar reminiscences of its participants. Such narratives, whether published during the immediacy of a conflict, or afterwards – years, and not uncommonly decades later – are typically based upon combinations of official documents, letters, diaries, photographs, illustrations, and above all, human memory, however fickle, imperfect, or uncertain the latter may be. The commonality of most such accounts, regardless of the era; regardless of the war; even regardless of the identity of the soldier and the nation for which he fought; is that the participant of the past, would become the chronicler, creator, and literary craftsman within the present, for the future.

Among the vast number of books and monographs presenting the story of a soldier’s wartime experiences, is another kind of literature, bearing its own nature and origin. That is, stories about the lives and military experiences of servicemen who never returned from war, created by family members – typically parents – sometimes by former comrades – as living memorials that exists in words, and grant indirect testimony of and witness for those who can no longer speak.

A striking example of this genre of military literature is the book Fighter Pilot., created and published in 1946 by Levitt Clinton and Verne Ethel (Tryon) Beck, Sr., of Huntington Park, California. The book is a posthumous autobiography of their son, First Lieutenant Levitt Clinton Beck Jr., who served as a fighter pilot in the 514th Fighter Squadron of the 406th Fighter Group, of the 9th Air Force. Centrally based upon the thoughts, musings, retrospectives, and then-undelivered “letters” penned by their son, and including transcripts of correspondence several photographs, Fighter Pilot is historically fascinating, detailed, and from a “human” vantage point, a literary work that is best termed reflective – for the reader, and, by Beck, the writer.

Shot down during a brief encounter with FW-190s of JG 2 or JG 27 on June 29, 1944, Beck crash-landed his damaged Thunderbolt (Bloom’s Tomb; P-47D 42-8473) south of Dreux, France, near Havelu. His loss is covered in MACR 6224.

Taken to Les Branloires by Roland Larson, he was given civilian clothes by a Mr. Pelletier, and then taken to the town of Anet, where he remained for three weeks, hidden by Madame Paulette Mesnard, in a room above her restaurant, the Cafe de la Mairie (on Rue Diane de Poitiers). There, while safely hidden (Fighter Pilot reveals that Madam Mesnard insisted that Lt. Beck remain there until Anet’s liberation by Allied troops…) he would compose the writings that would eventually become Fighter Pilot.

Three weeks later, Lt. Beck was taken to the home of Mr. Rene Farcy, in Les Vieilles Ventes.

One week further, Beck was picked up by a certain “Jean-Jacques” and the latter’s female companion, “Madame Orsini”. Ostensibly a member of the Underground, Jean-Jaques was actually Jacques Desoubrie, a double agent who worked for the Gestapo. Desoubrie took Lt. Beck to a hotel in Paris, on Boulevard St. Michel.

The next day, the Lieutenant was arrested by the Gestapo and taken to the prison of Fresnes.

From there, in accordance with German policy (as of the Summer of 1944) towards Allied aviators captured while garbed in civilian clothing and without military identification (dog-tags), and, in association with resistance networks in Belgium, France, and the Netherlands, Beck was one of 168 captured Allied aviators sent to the Buchenwald Concentration Camp.

A very detailed account of the mens’ experiences at Buchenwald can be found at the Wkikipedia biography of RNZAF pilot Squadron Leader Phillip John Lamason, DFC & Bar, who became the senior officer of the group. As quoted, “Upon arrival, Lamason, as ranking officer, demanded an interview with the camp commandant, Hermann Pister, which he was granted. He insisted that the airmen be treated as POWs under the Geneva Conventions and be sent to a POW camp.The commandant agreed that their arrival at Buchenwald was a “mistake” but they remained there anyway.The airmen were given the same poor treatment and beatings as the other inmates.For the first three weeks at Buchenwald, the prisoners were totally shaved, denied shoes and forced to sleep outside without shelter in one of Buchenwald’s sub-camps, known as ‘Little Camp’.Little Camp was a quarantine section of Buchenwald where the prisoners received the least food and harshest treatment.”

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

“As Buchenwald was a forced labor camp, the German authorities had intended to put the 168 airmen to work as slave-labor in the nearby armament factories.Consequently, Lamason was ordered by an SS officer to instruct the airmen to work, or he would be immediately executed by firing squad. Lamason refused to give the order and informed the officer that they were soldiers and could not and would not participate in war production.After a tense stand-off, during which time Lamason thought he would be shot, the SS officer eventually backed down.

“Most airmen doubted they would ever get out of Buchenwald because their documents were stamped with the acronym “DIKAL” (Darf in kein anderes Lager), or “not to be transferred to another camp”.At great risk, Lamason and Burney secretly smuggled a note through a trusted Russian prisoner, who worked at the nearby Nohra airfield, to the German Luftwaffe of their captivity at the camp.The message requested in part, that an officer pass the information to Berlin, and for the Luftwaffe to intercede on behalf of the airmen.Lamason understood that the Luftwaffe would be sympathetic to their predicament, as they would not want their captured men treated in the same way; he also knew that the Luftwaffe had the political connections to get the airmen transferred to a POW camp.”

Eventually, the men were transferred out of Buchenwald, with 156 going to Stalag Luft III (Sagan). Ten others were were transported from the camp over a period of several weeks.

Two of the 168 did not survive: They were Lt. Beck, and, Flying Officer Philip Derek Hemmens (serial 152583), a bomb aimer in No. 49 Squadron, Royal Air Force. Hemmens’ Lancaster Mk III, ND533, EA * M, piloted by F/O Bryan Esmond Bell, was shot down during a mission to Etampes on the night of June 9-10. Ironically, Hemmens was the only crew member to actually escape from the falling plane. His fellow crew members were killed when EA * M was shot down.

Lt. Beck, weakened from an earlier bout of illness from the conditions in the concentration camp, died from a combination of pneumonia and pleurisy while isolated in the camp’s “hospital”, on the evening of September 29-30, 1944.

He has no grave. His name is commemorated on the Tablets of the Missing at the Luxembourg American Cemetery.

Similarly, the name of F/O Hemmens, who died on October 18, is commemorated at the Runnymede Memorial.

Well, there is at least some justice in this world, even if that justice is not speedy: Jacques Desoubrie, whose infiltratation of two French Resistance groups eventuated in the arrest of at least 150 Resistants, fled to Germany after France’s liberation. He was, “…arrested after being denounced by his ex-mistress, and executed by firing squad as a collaborationist on 20 December 1949 in the fort of Montrouge, in Arcueil (near Paris).”

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For one so young at the time (Beck was 24), the overlapping combination of seriousness, introspection, contemplation, and literary skill (and, some levity) in his writing are immediately apparent.

A central and animating factor in Beck’s words was the realization of the danger of his predicament, and the possibility that – however remote, at the time; for reasons unknown, at the time – he might not return. He was realistic about this. Whether this feeling arose from a premonition, or objective contemplation of the danger of his situation, either and both motivations spurred him to record thoughts and create letters for two eventualities:

His return, and the creation of a permanent record of his experiences, perhaps for the sake of reminiscing; perhaps for eventual publication.

His failure to return, and a document by which he could be remembered by his parents and friends. (He was an only son.)

As he recorded:

“The idea has been growing within me these last few days that I should like to take all these experiences and others I have had, and have my book, “Fighter Pilot,” published after the war is over. There is the thought, too that “Lady Luck” may not be able to ride all the way with me. So, while I have a few days to wait for the French Underground to complete their plans for my escape back to England, I see no reason why I shouldn’t write every day, all that I can, so that just in case my luck has run out, you will know what has happened to your wandering son.”

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I obtained a copy of Fighter Pilot some years ago. The book was republished in Honolulu by “Book Vompay LLC” in 2008, with the book’s Worldcat entry stating that, “This edition is a revised and corrected version of the original, which was first published in 1946.” As of this moment – early 2019 – copies are available from two eBay sellers, each for approximately $50.00.

Some extracts from the book’s text, as well as some images, are shown below. These will give you a feel for the book’s literary and historical flavor.

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The book’s dust jacket bears an image of a bubbletop P-47D, almost certainly sketched by Beck himself. Though the canopy frame bears a kill marking denoting a destroyed German plane (see account below), this aerial victory was not confirmed: USAF Credits for the Destruction of Enemy Aircraft, World II, contains no entry for this event.

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A poem by Beck, composed at the age of twenty.

I SEE IT NOW

(Written in 1940)
By L.C. Beck, Jr.

I WATCHED the day turn into nite,
Creeping shadows reached the sky;
Birds flew to their nests,
Still singing as they went;
All mankind lay quiet at rest,
As though to heaven sent.
Quiet ne’er before was like this –
Even wind hung softly about the trees,
As is afraid of waking birds,
Sleeping in their nests;
‘Twas like another world to me,
And I found myself wishing –
Wishing it were true.

I’ve suffered – and have hated it,
But in my mind a thought was born,
Making a new path for me –
On which I now find my way.

I see it now –
While I suffer here
I must not question of it;
It is the way of life –
Too much happiness would spoil me;

I’d grow too fond of life on earth
And the after life I seek
Would not be so sweet -.
We must have our troubles here;
Our hearts torn by loss,
Our hands made bloody by war,
Our future left unknown.

Once again the time has come
When day and night do meet, –
But all are going in ways apart
And but touch here in their passing;
I’m glad that God mas made it so
For it thrills me to my very soul
To see so bright a luster of the day
Meet the sweet sereneness of the night.

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The book’s simple and unadorned cover.

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1 Lt. Levitt Clinton Beck, Jr., in an undated image taken in the United States.

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Pilot, propeller, and power. Given Beck’s rolled-up sleeves and the intense sunlight, this picture was probably taken somewhere in the southeastern United States. Another clue: 406th Fighter Group P-47s did not have white engine cowlings.

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Dated March 8, 1944, this picture is captioned “Officer’s Party, AAF”.

Fighter Pilot lists the names of the men in the photo. They are (left to right):

Front Row

Billington, James Lynn 2 Lt. (0-810463) – Queens County, N.Y.
KIA June 24, 1944, MACR 6346, P-47D 43-25270
Dugan, Bernard F. 2 Lt. (0-811868) – Montgomery County, Pa.
KNB April 15, 1944 (No MACR)
Born 8/16/19
Arlington National Cemetery; Buried 7/19/48
Beck, Levitt Clinton, Jr., Lt.

Middle Row

Long, Bryce E. Lt. (0-811938) – Edmond, Ok. (Survived war)
Van Etten, Chester L. Major (0-663442) Los Angeles, Ca. (Survived war)
Gaudet, Edward R. 2 Lt. (0-686738) – Middlesex County, Ma.
KIA June 29, 1944, MACR 6225, P-47D 42-8682
“Atherton”
Benson, Marion Arnold 2 Lt. (0-806035) – Des Moines County, Ia.
KIA June 17, 1944, MACR 6635, P-47D 42-8493

Rear Row

Cramer, Bryant Lewis 1 Lt. ( 0-810479) – Chatham County, Ga.
KIA August 7, 1944, MACR 7405, P-47D 42-75193
Cara Montrief (grand-daughter) According to Fighter Pilot, Cramer’s daughter was born three weeks after her father was shot down.
Dorsey III, Isham “Ike” Jenkins – Opelika, Al. (Survived war)
David “Whitt” Dorsey (brother)

Note that Major Van Etten is wearing RAF or RCAF wings.

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A review of Missing Air Crew Reports yields a huge umber of accounts for which an aircraft went missing, and, the pilot did not return. This is so for MACR 6224, which covers Beck’s loss. However, within Fighter Pilot appears Beck’s own account of his last mission, writing in hiding at Anet, which provides the “other side” of the Missing Air Crew Report. Beck’s final radio call, “Eddie, I think I may have to bail out,” – probably to 2 Lt. Edward R. Gaudet – was heard and reported as “My airplane is hit. I think I’ll have to bail out,” by 1 Lt. Bryant L. Cramer, who himself was shot down and killed less than two months later.

Lt. Gaudet was shot down and killed during the same engagement, while flying P-47D 42-8682 (covered in MACR 6225).

Beck’s account, and images of MACR 6224, follow below:

CHAPTER TWO

My First “Victory”

WE WERE TO fly the “early one” that morning of June 29th. We dashed down in the murky dawn, that only England can boast about, for breakfast and briefing. Both very satisfying, we took off and headed for our target, just a few miles south-west of Paris, along the Seine river. My flight carried no bombs, as we were to be top cover for the squadron on their bomb run. It was a group (three squadrons) mission.

Just before we reached the first target, a bridge, the flak opened up and we did some evasive action to go around it. None of it came very close to my flight, but we were not giving them very much of a target to shoot at, I guess. The clouds made it rather hard to keep the others down below in sight, so I dropped down to about 12,000 feet. We lost the rest of the squadron for a while and then I spotted them to the west, being shot at. I started over there with my flight and as we neared the others, someone in my flight called:

“Break, Beck, flak. Break left!”

I did, and then, Eddie, I believe, said: “It’s a 190.”

I turned 180 degrees and saw the 190 in the middle of three 47s — Cramer, Eddie and Unger. I gave it full boost and started back after the little devil. He looked very small among the Thunderbolts and I had no trouble recognizing him as a 190. He was breaking up and then I think he saw me coming after him as he turned around and we were then going at each other head on. For a brief second I thought of breaking up into a position where I could drop on his tail, but he was the first Jerry I’d ever seen and I wasn’t going to let him live that long if I could help it.

I knew, however, that his chances of shooting me, at head on, would be just as good but I was a little too eager and mad to give a damn. I squeezed the trigger and I think the first round hit him because I saw strikes on his cowl, wing roots and canopy all the way in. I guess I’d have flown right through him, but he broke up a little to the left and I raked his belly at very close range. I thought to myself:

“Becky, there’s your first victory.”

Just to make sure, though, I turned with him and started down but I didn’t seem to be going very fast. I rammed the throttle with the palm of my hand but was rather astonished to feel it already up against the stop. I flipped on the water switch but that didn’t seem to do any good either. I looked down at my instruments and then it was very clear. My engine had been shot out. I felt a little panicky at first but settled down and started “checking things.”

Nothing I did seemed to have any effect, so I called:

“Eddie, I think I may have to bail out.“

Oil started licking back over the cockpit. Here we go again, I thought. Just like Cherbourg. She is even worse this time, I guess. The damned engine was just turning over and that was about all. I knew I could never make the channel but I was still trying, I guess, because I was messing around with the throttle and everything I could get my hands on … 6000 feet now.

I still had my eye on my “victory”, though. He was going down in a spiral to the left, smoking very badly. Wham! Something hit me in the back and threw me forward. I didn’t need to look to know what it was. I broke to the left pulling streamers off everything and there he was. A sleek little 190 sitting on my tail – gray and shiny, spitting out flames of death up at me. It wasn’t a very pretty sight, I must say — looking down his cannons — I knew then that I was no longer fighting to get the ship running again. I was fighting for my life!!

I was pretty scared for an instant, but it seems that just when I get that feeling inside and almost think I’m a coward, something snaps. It did, and I was once again the mad fighting American I had been, with an engine. I forgot for the time being that my engine was dead, I guess, because I watched him flash past and then jerked my kite around to the right to a point I knew he would be. I hadn’t looked out the front of the canopy for some time and now as I did, all I saw was the reflection in the glass, covered with oil, of my gun-sight. I cursed and pulled the trigger, shooting in the dark, but at least I felt better. I kicked the ship sideways to have a look out of the side and there was Jerry — just a hundred yards up front. I swung the nose around to about the right position, I thought, and fired. I don’t know whether I hit him or not, but he seemed in pretty much of a hurry to get the hell away.

I pressed the “mike” button and said:

“I’m bailing out.” But all I heard was deathly silence. I knew then that my radio had been blown to bits by the Jerry on my tail.

I thought that I’d better jump at about 4000 feet, so I undid my safety belt and just then my ship shuddered and I heard terrific explosions all around me. I looked out of the only clear space left in the canopy, and saw more flak than I’d ever dreamed possible in one small area. I couldn’t see which way to break so I just went to the right, because the ship did, I guess. I knew then that to bail out would mean sure capture and I still had just a wee bit of hope left for my chances of getting away. I decided to stick with the ship and try a trick that “Benny” and I had talked about one night before he was killed.

I opened the canopy a crack so I could see the ground and when I did, I saw the longest clear stretch of land I think I ever saw in France. It was just about the right distance away, I thought, for me to make my dive to the deck and then scoot over there, at tree top level, and belly in.

I remembered that I had taken my safety belt off, so I started trying to put it on and still keep my eye on Jerry at the same time — also fly the ship— without an engine. Some fun, and if you want to try your ability at being versatile, it is a good trick.

I got under Jerry without his seeing me, I guess, and then down among the trees; I had to keep a keen eye out of the cockpit, so I gave up the idea of buckling my belt again, and decided that I would stretch my luck a bit more, by doing the impossible. I really had no choice, but to hell with the belt. Here comes Jerry again. I had about 275 MPH, so I felt pretty “safe”, you might say. I would wait until he got in range, then break and throw off his aim and then belly in. It was very simple, when you happen to be the luckiest guy in the whole air force. I put one hand on the instrument panel and waited until I got slowed down a bit. I eased her down slowly and was just about ready to touch the ground when I realized that I had not put my flaps down and my stalling speed would be much too fast. I pulled up, but just before I did, I felt my prop hit the ground. I pushed the flap handle down and then watched the grass go by on either side. It seemed as though I’d buzzed half way across France by now and I must be running out of field. I kicked the ship sideways and looked. The trees were still quite some distance ahead, so I eased the old girl down and then I was sliding. I put my “stick hand” on the panel, too, and just braced myself and waited. It shook me around quite a bit, but as I had ridden quite a few rough roller coasters without a safety belt, I was doing pretty well without one now at 100 MPH or so in a 7 1/2-ton hunk of metal. Just before the last few feet, the ship turned to the right and threw me crashing into the left side of the cockpit. It was then that I realized that my back and ribs were already sore from the shock I’d received from the 190’s cannon.

Flames were licking up over the cowling of my ship and I had no more than enough time to get out. I knew I wouldn’t have to destroy my ship. I jumped out, parachute and all, and again hit on my left side, on the wing. I was pretty sore around that part of me by now, also quite excited and too mad to care much.

A few yards from the ship I stopped long enough to take off all the equipment strapped to me. I considered taking the escape kit out of my ‘chute pack, but there wasn’t time.

When you are 100 miles inside enemy territory, naturally one has the feeling that every bush hides a German. I was quite inexperienced in ground fighting, so I didn’t look forward to shooting it out with the Germans with my .45 pistol.

Thoughts were running through my mind about just what to do and how, all during those first five or ten seconds. I even thought about hiding my ‘chute as we had been instructed in a lecture, but I looked back at my airplane and almost laughed.

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At approximately 0815 on 29 June, I was flying the wing of Yellow Flight Leader, Lt. Beck, at 13,500 ft. on a heading of 260^o over Dreux. The flight was jumped all too effectively at this time by four FW-190s, who came out of the clouds directly over us. Lt. Beck and I broke left, bit one of the 190s got hits on Beck’s airplane before I could get it off his tail. His engine was smoking rather badly, and as I followed the enemy aircraft down in a dive, attempting to close into effective range, I heard Lt. Beck call on the radio and say, “My airplane is hit. I think I’ll have to bail out.” I can not say for sure whether he made the jump successfully or not, nor am I positive he did jump. It is quite probable, however, that he did jump, and successfully. A pilot from the 513th Squadron, flying below us at the time of the encounter, reported seeing an unidentified, black fighter dive into the ground, and saw a chute open up above it. The Focke-Wulfs were silver.

Missing Air Crew Report 6224

Here’s NARA’s digital version of the original “Meldung über den Abschuss eines US-Amerikanisch Flugzeuges” (Report about the downing of an American airplane) for Lt. Beck and his Thunderbolt. Note that though Lt. Beck was shot down on June 28, 1944, this document was actually compiled only a little over four months later: November 2, 1944. Lt. Beck had died two months before.

Here’s a list (list number 28, to be specific) of four of the Allied warplanes shot down in France on June 27-28, 1944. Data about the losses appears as black typed text, while identification numbers of pertinent Luftgaukommando Reports has been inked in, in red. The Luftgaukommando Report numbers are KE 9108, KE 9065, J 1582 (Lt. Beck’s plane), and KE 9064. Note that Lt. Beck, name then unknown, is reported as “flüchtig”: close translation “fugitive”.

I’ve been unable to correlate KE 9108 to any aircraft, but KE 9064 definitely pertains to Lancaster III JB664 (ZN * N) of No. 106 Squadron RAF, piloted by P/O Norman Wilson Easby, and KE 9065 covers Lancaster I LL974 (ZN * F), piloted by F/Sgt. Ernest Clive Fox. Of the seven men in the crew of each aircraft – both of No. 106 Squadron RAF – there were, sadly, no survivors.

As described in W.R. Chorley’s Bomber Command Losses, Volume 5:

JB664: T/o 2255 Metheringham similarly targeted. [To attack rail facilities at Vitry-le-Francois.] Crashed 2 km E of Bransles (Seine-et-Marne), 16 km SE of Nemours. All [crew] were buried in Bransles Communal Cemetery.

LL974: T/o 2255 Metheringham to attack rail facilities at Vity-le-Francois. Shot down by a night-fighter, crashing at Thibie (Marne), 11 km WSW from the centre of Chalons-sur-Marne. All were buried locally, since when their remains have been brought to Dieppe for interment in the Canadian War Cemetery.

Though KE Report numbers – covering British Commonwealth Aircraft losses – appear in NARA’s master list of Luftgaukommando Reports, I don’t know if (well, I don’t believe) they’re actually held at NARA.

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This is a (postcard?) view of the main street of Rue Diane de Poitiers in Anet. Lt. Beck lived on the third floor of the building on the right, in a room with the window directly below the small “X” symbol.

And below, a 2018 Google Street view of Rue Diane de Poitiers, which (well, to the best degree possible) replicates the orientation and perspective of the above 1940s postcard image. Akin to the postcard, the view is oriented south-southeast.

What was Madame Mesnard’s restaurant is now occupied by a branch of the Banque Populaire, while the business to the right (_____ Centrale“) is now the Pressing Diane Anet laundary service.

Above all, hauntingly, the similarities between the view “then”, and the view “now” are striking. The window of Lt. Beck’s hiding place is visible directly beneath the leftmost of the two television antennae.

Below, another Google view of 16 – 18 Rue Diane de Poitiers.

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This is a very different view of Rue Diane de Poitiers: The drawing, sketched by Lt. Beck, shows buildings directly across the street from the window of his room. His self-portrait appears as a reflection in the lower right windowpane, with his initials – “By LCB” – just below.

And below, a 2018 Google street view (albeit at ground level) of the building directly across the street from Lieutenant Beck’s room. In 2019, it’s the home of the Boulangerie pâtisserie chocolaterie à Anet (Chocolate Bakery Pastry Shop in Anet).

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Here are Lt. Beck’s last diary entries and final words to his parents, composed just prior to his departure from Anet and his ill-fated attempt to return to Allied forces:

It’s a very beautiful day today, the first nice sunny one in over a week. I shall just have to lie in the sun awhile, even though I won’t get much written. As I said previously, I was to leave at 8:00 o’clock at night. That was wrong, I find, after talking to Paulette about it. It was at 8:00 o’clock in the morning. That means that I don’t have tomorrow to write and so today must wind up my writing from France.

It has been lots of fun writing all this. I guess that I am just halfway glad that I got in on this part of the war. Just a few hours after I set my plane down in France, I thought to myself:

“Boy, what a story this will make.”

Even if I don’t get out of France, ever, this will, by mail, and that is one reason why I have taken it so seriously. Had I felt that it never would be read I should not have written so much.

Writing something like this that will not be mailed right away gives me a chance to say just anything I feel. If I get back to England and finally to America again, I can just tear up anything that was meant to be read if I were killed trying to get back. On the other hand, if I don’t make it, everything I have written will be here for anyone to read, and I feel it will make a better ending to my life than just to be “missing in action.”

No one wants to die like that — just without anyone knowing what happened. I feel then that I have really accomplished a great deal in leaving these passing thoughts behind. Hoping with all my heart that they will be of some comfort to all my friends, and especially to my Mom and Dad.

When you read all this I shall be right there looking over your shoulder. (You may not see me but I am here.) You can feel that I have not gone away, but have, instead, come back to you. (I am so much closer than I was in England and France.)

You should see my tan now. I’m either mighty dirty or very tan, one or the other. At least I like it and feel much more healthy when I’m brown, as I have told you before.

I’ll be darned if Larson didn’t bring me two packages of cigarettes. He must have killed two Jerries to get them. What a guy!!!

How can a guy feel sad and lonely with someone doing everything in the world for you – ?

Mom, if you will, I’d like you to write a letter to Paulette and to Larson. They can get the French lady I spoke of, to translate it for them. You can write two or just one letter — suit yourself. Address it to Larson Roland, Anet, France.

He has lived here all his life and everyone knows him. Also, if you like, you can ask them to write and tell you just what happened. You will want to know I am sure and if there is any way humanly possible, they will find out and write you.

So, as this lovely day draws to an end, so does my writing. Always remember this saying which you put at the bottom of so many of your letters. It is truly a short, sincere, and very simple statement but holds a world of comfort and thought:

“Keep smiling.”

I have kept smiling every day and it has made each day of my life joyously happy. Just remember me as always smiling, Mom. And now it is you and Dad who must, “Keep your chin up” and “Keep smiling”, always.

I shall always be, Your loving son

— L.C.—

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And, earlier in the text, a letter to an unknown “Helen:

Helen,

You didn’t think I would forget you, did you?

After knowing a girl as lovely as you, for twelve years, a guy would be absolutely a “dope” if he did!

Thinking of all our wonderful times together is easy but to forget them would take more than a lifetime.

I guess something must have gone wrong with the machine that “puts names on bullets”. We both were quite sure, weren’t we? I really felt that I would live to be a hundred, but I suppose I can say, quite safely, that in my 24 years I have had my share of living.

It’s always nicer, anyway, to end a story at its best climax. My story ends just as I like it. Full of thrills and excitement and with the blood tingling in my veins — Fighting.

I guess there isn’t much else to say. You know how I always was about such things. Perhaps leaving things unsaid at times is better. Just now, anything I say might sound foolish or untrue. Perhaps it would be, but when a person writes a note of this type he doesn’t very often say things he doesn’t mean.

If you can see my point I shall only say this and no more.

I loved you dearly when we were at our best. You must have known. Surely you could tell. As for some of the time, I will admit that I wasn’t sure.

Our love affair was, ’tis true, quite irregular and although it might have been better, I shall always think of it as a very wonderful part of my life.

Perhaps had we been a bit older when we met and I a bit more settled, as well as you, we would have been married.

As it turned out you are much better off as you would be a widow now instead of a beautiful young girl, with a fine future ahead of you.

Well, “Sweet Stuff,” I shall say Byeeeee now, with a kiss for old times.

I want to wish you every happiness that can be yours.

Until we meet again — I shall be waiting.

Love, L. C.

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Finally, just before his departure from Anet:

If anything happens to me, I hope that you can finish my story. It would be my last wish and I think a very nice way to end a thus far, perfectly swell life. Naturally, I truly hope that I shall be able to finish the story myself, but if not, the ending will be for you to finish. Paulette will have someone write you and tell you just what happened, if the French Underground can find out. This is quite an unhappy little note, isn’t it? I feel much the opposite, however.

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Here are images of four of the pilots mentioned by Beck, or, appearing in the group photograph above.

This is “Dorsey III”, namely, Isham “Ike” Jenkins Dorsey III, of Opelika, Alabama. He survived the war. Contributed by his brother, David “Whitt” Dorsey, this photo appears at Isham Dorsey III’s commemorative page at the Registry of the National WW II Memorial.

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“Unger”, mentioned in the account of Beck’s last mission, is listed in Fighter Pilot as “Lt. Edwin H. Unger, Jr., New York, N.Y.” His image, as an aviation cadet, appears in a composite of photographic portraits of servicemen from Nassau, New York, in the Nassau Daily Review-Star of May 26, 1944, accessed via Thomas N. Tyrniski’s FultonHistory website. (That’s where the “If you are reading this you have too much time on your hands.” is from!) Lt. Unger survived the war.

If You Are reading this you have to much time on your hands

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This is Major Chester L. Van Etten from Los Angeles, who’s seen (wearing RCAF or RAF wings) in the center of the group photo. This image, also at the Registry of the National WW II Memorial, appears in a commemorative page created by Chester L. Van Etten himself.

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Also appearing at the WW II Memorial Registry is this image of Lt. Bryant L. Cramer, appearing on a commemorative page created by his grand-daughter, Cara Montrief. I assume that this image was taken in the Continental United States.

Here’s Lt. Cramer’s portrait, taken in August of 1943, from the National Archives’ collection “Photographic Prints of Air Cadets and Officers, Air Crew, and Notables in the History of Aviation“.

References

Beck, Levitt C., Jr. (Beck, Levitt C., Sr.), Fighter Pilot, Mr. and Mrs. Levitt C. Beck, Sr., Huntington Park, Ca., 1946

Chorley, W.R., Royal Air Force Bomber Command Losses of the Second World War Volume 5 – 1944, Midland Publishing, Hinckley, England, 1997

USAF Credits for the Destruction of Enemy Aircraft, World War II – USAF Historical Study No. 85, Albert F. Simpson Historical Research Center, Air University, 1978

First Lieutenant Levitt Clinton Beck., Jr. – FindAGrave biographical profile

P-47D 42-8473 “Bloom’s Tomb” – at 406th Fighter Group

Lancaster ND533 – at Aerosteles

Lancaster ND533 – at North East War Memorials Project

Lancaster ND533 – at WW2 Talk

Jacques Desoubrie – at Wikipedia

Allied Airmen at Buchenwald – at Wikipedia

Allied Airmen at Buchenwald – at National Museum of the United States Air Force

Squadron Leader Phillip John Lamason, DFC & Bar – at Wikipedia

– Michael G. Moskow

2/26/19

1017

9/26/20

1651

Before The Web: Computation and Cybernetics in Astounding Science Fiction, May, 1949 – “Electrical Mathematicians”

From Astounding Science Fiction of May, 1949, the article “Electrical Mathematicians,” by Lorne Maclaughlan, focuses on the the use of computers – specifically, electronic as opposed to purely mechanical computers – as devices to perform mathematical calculations. It’s one of the four non-fiction articles pertaining to cybernetics and computation published by the magazine that year, the other three having been:

“Modern Calculators” (digital and analog calculation), by E.L. Locke; pp. 87-106 – January

“The Little Blue Cells” (‘Selectron’ data storage tube), by J.J. Coupling; pp. 85-99 – February

“Cybernetics” (review of Norbert Wiener’s book by the same title), by E.L. Locke; pp. 78-87 – September

The identity and background of author Maclaughlan remain an enigma. (At least, in terms of “this” post!) The Internet Speculative Fiction Database shows only two other entries under his name, both in Astounding (“Noise from Outside” in 1947, and “Servomechanisms” in 1948, while web searches yield a parallel paucity of results. This absence biographical information, especially in light of the over seven decades that have transpired since 1949, coupled with the author’s distinctive writing style – combining clarity and economy of expression, and, an ease and familiarity with the language of technology – leads me to wonder if that very name “Lorne Maclaughlin” (note the lack of a middle initial?) might actually have been a pen-name for an engineer or academic. Given the somewhat ambiguous reputation of science-fiction in professional and credentialed circles (albeit a reputation by the 1940s steadily changing for the better) maybe “Maclaughlan” – assuming the name was a pseudonym – might have wanted to maintain a degree of anonymity.

Well, if so (maybe so?!) that anonymity has successfully persisted to this day!

Anyway, the cover art’s cool.

Depicting a scene from the opening of Hal Clement’s serialized novel Needle (the inspiration for the 1987 Kyle MacLachlan film The Hidden?), it’s one of the three (color, naturally) Astounding Science Fiction cover illustrations by Paul Orban, an illustrator primarily known for interior work, whose abundant output was only exceeded by his talent.

As for Maclaughlan’s article itself, it begins with a brief overview of the implications of the increasing centrality of calculating devices in contemporary (1949 contemporary, that is!) society, and the future.

This is followed by a discussion of the very nature of calculation, whether performed by mechanical or electronic devices, which then segues into a comparison of the similarities and differences between binary and decimal systems of counting and computation, and an explanation of the utility of the former in computing devices.

Next, a lengthy discussion of memory. (We’ve all heard of that…) note the statement, “Not only must we “teach” the machine the multiplication table – by the process of wiring in the right connections – but it may also be necessary to provide built-in tables of sine and cosine functions, as well as other commonly used functions. This is a permanent kind of memory – a fast temporary kind of memory is also needed to remember such things as the product referred to above until it is no longer needed. This memory has not been easy to provide in required amounts, but recently invented electronic devices seem to offer some hope that this difficulty can be overcome.” In this, author Maclaughlan is anticipating what we know today as ROM (read-only-memory) and RAM (random-access-memory), respectively. This is followed by the topic of data input and manipulation, in the context of Hollerith Cards and Charles Babbage’s “Difference Engine”. (For the latter, see “Babbage’s First Difference Engine – How it was intended to work,” and, “The Babbage Engine,” the latter at Computer History Museum.

From this, we come to computation in terms of the technology and operation of then-existing computers. This encompasses ENIAC (Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer), EDVAC (Electronic Discrete Variable Automatic Computer), and MANIAC (Mathematical Analyzer Numerical Integrator and Automatic Computer Model I), and briefly touches upon the Selectron tube, the latter device the subject of J.J. Coupling’s article in the February 1949 issue of Astounding.

The final part of Mclaughlan’s article is a discussion of the nature, advantages, and use of “analyzers” – Differential Analyzers, and Transient Network Analyzers – in computation: Specifically, in the solution of differential equations pertinent to scientific research, such as, “…the flow of microwave energy in wave-guides, the flow of compressible fluids in pipes, and even the solution of Schrodinger’s Wave Equation,” or military applications, such as aiming anti-aircraft guns or determining the trajectory of nuclear weapons, noting, “These latter-day buzz-bombs will be sufficiently lethal to warrant their carrying along their own computers.”

Prescience, or, inevitability?

And finally, the article concludes with a photograph.

And, so…

ELECTRICAL MATHEMATICIANS

“The differential analyzer is more versatile than the network analyzer discussed above because it can integrate, differentiate – in effect – and multiply, and thus solve rather complicated differential equations. These functions are performed by mechanical or electro-mechanical devices in the differential analyzer. If these things could be accomplished by purely electrical means, we would expect a great increase in speed, and some decrease in size and weight.”

To an extent none of us today can realize, these rapidly growing electrical calculators will become more and more important factors in ordinary life. So far, they are handling only simple, straight-arithmetic problems. They are brains, but so far they think only on low levels. Give them time; they will be planners yet!

In this machine age no one is surprised at the announcement of some new or improved labor-saving device. The scientists and technologists who design our new electronic rattraps, microwave hot-dog dispensers and atomic power plants have succeeded so well that they have created a serious manpower shortage in their own professions. This shortage, which is chiefly in the field of analysis has recently forced them to put an unprecedented amount of effort into the design of machines to save themselves mental labor. The results of their efforts are an amazingly variegated collection of computing machines, or “artificial brains” as they are called in the popular press:

The development of such machines took a tremendous spurt during the war, and today we can scarcely find a laboratory or university in the land which is not devoting some part of its efforts to work of this kind. Progress is so rapid that the machines are obsolete before they are completed, and thus no two identical machines exist.

We cannot say that the computing machine is a new invention – the unknown Chinese originator of the abacus provided man with his first calculating machine in the sixth century B.C. This would seem to make the machine nearly as old as the art of calculating, but man is equipped with fingers and toes which have always provided a handy portable computing device. In fact, as we shall see, the simple fact that we have ten lingers has a definite bearing on the number of tubes and the kind of circuits required in electronic digital computers.

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Kelvin Wheel-and-Disk integrator. This device, which gives the integral of a radial distance with respect to an angle, is the most important unit in a differential analyzer of the electromechanical type.

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It should be pointed out that there are two distinct types of computing machines in common use today. One type deals with discrete whole numbers, counting them off with the aid of teeth on a wheel, or electrical pulses in vacuum tube circuits. These numbers represent quantities, and they are added and multiplied just as numbers are on paper, but at a much higher speed. These machines called digital computers, range from the simple cash-register adding machine to the complex all-electric ENIAC, with its eighteen thousand radio-type vacuum tubes.

The other type of machine is the analogue type of computer, in which the number to be dealt with is converted into some measurable quantity, such as length along a slide rule, or angle of rotation of a shaft. The operations are performed electrically or mechanically, and the answer appears as a length, an angle, a voltage or some other quantity which must be converted back to a number. The ideal machine of the analogue type will accept mathematical functions, empirical curves and directions for mixing and stirring, and turn out results in the form of curves automatically.

The digital computer is much more accurate than the analogue type for the simple reason that is easy to extend the number of significant digits in such machines to something like thirty or forty. It is impossible to measure a point on a curve to anything approaching one part in 1040. However, the analogue computers are in many ways faster and more versatile, because they can perform certain difficult mathematical operations directly, while digital machines require that these operations be reduced to addition and multiplication.

One of the first things we must do to understand modern digital computing machines is to disconnect our minds from the decimal number system, and get a more basic concept of number representation. The decimal system of numbers is a natural choice, based on the fact man has that ten fingers. We would perhaps be more fortunate had evolution given us twelve, for then our number system would be the more convenient duo-decimal system. Let us examine this system as a starting point, by studying the table of numbers below.

1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	*	t	10
11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	1*	t	20
21	22	23	24	25	26	27	28	29	2*	t	30

The six-fingered man would count to six on one hand, and then continue, seven, eight, nine, star, dagger, ten on the other. His ten would be our twelve, of course, but it would be a resting point for him while he got his shoes off to continue to his twenty – our twenty-four – on his twelve toes.

If we continue the table for twelve lines of twelve numbers each we will get to his one hundred, which corresponds to our one hundred forty-four. This number is his ten squared – our twelve squared – as it would be, and is preceded by his daggerty-dagger, ††. This duodecimal system has the advantage that ten can be divided by 2, 3, 4 and 6, giving in each case whole numbers – 10/4 = 3, 10/6 = 2, et cetera – while our ten is only divisible by 2 and 5. The ancient Babylonians were fond of this system, and also used sixty as a number base. These systems remain today as the bases of our measurement of time in seconds, minutes and hours.

Now let us examine the binary system, based on two. In this system all numbers are made up of combinations of just two digits, one and zero. The simplicity of this system makes it possible to use simple devices such as electromagnetic relays to represent numbers. The simple relay has two possible positions, open and closed, and we can represent zero by means of the open position, and one by the closed position, and then build up any number as shown in the table below.

Decimal System	Binary System
1	1
2	10
3	11
4	100
5	101
6	110
7	111
8	1000
9	1001
10	1010

Computation is easy with this system, once we get the hang of it. Thus our two cubed becomes, 1011 = 10 x 10 x 10 = 1000, and our two times three becomes 10 x 11 = 110, which is our six, as it should be.

With our minds cleared for action on any number base let us consider the capabilities which are necessary in a digital computer. Digital computation requires that all operations be reduced to those of addition, subtraction, multiplication and division whether a machine is used or not. These operations involve certain reflex actions, such as the response “six” when presented with the numbers “two” and “three” and the idea “multiply.” The trained human mind possesses such reflex actions, and the machine must also possess them, as a first requirement. Simple computing devices such as the commercial accounting machine possess a few reflexes. It is necessary to build many rapid reflexes into mathematical computing machines.

The next “mental” capability the machine must possess is that of memory. When we must multiply two numbers together before adding them to a third, memory is needed to preserve the product until the second operation can be performed. Commercial calculating machines have limited memory – after multiplication, for example, the number appears on the output wheels, and the third number can easily be added. The memory requirements in a good mathematical machine are much, much more stringent, and provide some of the toughest problems in design. Not only must we “teach” the machine the multiplication table – by the process of wiring in the right connections – but it may also be necessary to provide built-in tables of sine and cosine functions, as well as other commonly used functions. This is a permanent kind of memory – a fast temporary kind of memory is also needed to remember such things as the product referred to above until it is no longer needed. This memory has not been easy to provide in required amounts, but recently invented electronic devices seem to offer some hope that this difficulty can be overcome.

There are still two capabilities left. These are choice and sequence. The computing machine should be able to choose between two numbers, or two operations it can perform, in accordance with certain rules. Sequence involves, as the name implies, the proper choice of order of numbers or operations according to some rule which applies in the particular problem being solved.

These last two capabilities are not found to any great extent in any but the most modern mathematical computing machines. On the other hand there are a multitude of other mental capabilities found in humans which are undesirable in mathematical machines. Emotion, aesthetics, creative ability and so forth are not desirable, for these help to make humans unfit for much routine computing work. What we want is perfect slave, fast, untiring and industrious, who will never embarrass or disconcert us with unexpected response. (Of course the engineers in charge of some of the complicated modern mathematical machines are quick to accuse them of temper tantrums and other undesirable emotions.)

Perhaps the fanciest digital computing machine today is the IBM Automatic Sequence Controlled calculator at Harvard. The letters IBM International Business Machines Corporation, which has developed a series of machines intended for use in accounting work. These machines use a punched card – a device with quite a history, as histories go in the computing field. It would seem that weaving machines which could be used to more or less automatically weave patterned cloth excited the imagination of a good many inventors in in the early eighteenth century. In such weaving it was necessary to sequence automatically the “shredding,” or controlling of the warp threads so that weft threads could be passed through them to weave a pattern. Punched tape and punched cards had already been by 1727. The punched cards we use today get the name Jacquard cards from the name of the inventor of an improved weaving machine around the year 1800.

This basic idea was good enough to attract the attention of Charles Babbage, an English actuary, who is regarded as the lather of the modern computing machine. His “difference engine” was designed, in his words, “to perform the whole operation” – of the computing and printing of tables of functions – “with no mental attention when numbers have once been fed in the machine.” When this “engine” was nearly complete the government withdrew its support of the Project, and Babbage began the construction of an analytical machine on his own. This machine, a wholly mechanical device, was to use punched Jacquard cards for automatic sequencing. In 1906 his son successfully completed a machine with which he calculated pi to twenty-nine significant figures.

Hollerith, in this country, made a great advance in the use of punched cards when he invented a card sorter to aid in classifying the results of the 1880 census. Most people today are familiar with the kind of things that a sorter can do. Thus if we have a sorter and a stack of cards with personal and alphabetical information punched thereon we can request the machine to pick out all left-handed individuals with cross-eyes and Z for a second initial, and bzzzzt, bzzzzt, bzzzzt – there they are.

The IBM Company, by catering to the needs of organizations which handle – and have – a good deal of money, was able to put the manufacture of computing machines on a paying basis. It need not be pointed out that it is much more difficult to produce profitably machines which will only be used for such tasks as the calculation of pi to umpteen places. However the punched card machines built for accountants have found their way into scientific computing laboratories, and the IBM Company has a research laboratory which is actively developing new machines for scientific use as well as for accounting.

A punched card machine operating on the Hollerith principle interprets numerical and operational data according to the positions of holes punched on cards, and then perform various mathematical operations. The cards, which are familiar to most people – postal notes, government checks, et cetera – have twelve vertical positions in each of eighty columns. The vertical positions are labeled y, x, 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. Thus an 80 digit or two 40 digit numbers can be set up on one card, and the y space, for example, may be used to indicate sign.

The cards are read for purposes of sorting et cetera by a simple mechanism involving a metal cylinder and sets of electrically conducting brushes. As the card moves between the rotating cylinder and the eighty brushes, one for each column, an electrical contact is made whenever a punched hole passes under a brush. The position of the cylinder at the time that the brush makes contact indicates the number, or letter, represented. Any number system could be used, but the decimal system is selected because of its familiarity. The various IBM machines now on the market include Card Punchers, Card Interpretaters [sic], Card Sorters, Collators and others, all operating on the same basic principles. The most useful machine to scientific workers is the Automatic Multiplying Punch. This machine will multiply factors punched in cards, and will automatically punch the product in a card, or even add and punch out products.

The computer lab at Harvard, mentioned above, uses a combination of these machines and a device for sequencing their operations – whence the name IBM Automatic Sequence Controlled. This calculator is one of the half-dozen large machines in this country which can be used to tear into a tough problem and quickly reduce it to a neat column of figures – or a stack of cards, in this case. Since it is a digital type of computer capable of great accuracy, but because it is partly mechanical in operation it is slow compared to the newer all electronic machines. The automatic sequencing apparatus is not easy to set up, and thus type of machine is best suited to the solution of repetitive types of problems, such as the calculation of tables. The punched card is a convenient form in which to store tables of simple functions, e.g. Sin x, Log x, which are often needed in computation of tables of more complicated functions.

Of course, if you want to prepare a table umpteen places Bessell Functions, or evaluate some determinants, or make some matrix algebra manipulations you will have to wait s time for your turn on this or any similar machine. You will have to have a pretty good story too, for these machines are at work today, and sometimes night as well with important problems. It must be realized too, that a problem be rather important and complex before it is even worthwhile to the labor of setting it up for solution in such a complicated machine.

Punched cards are often used to store scientific data other than tables with the advantages of machine sorting et cetera possible with IBM machines. Thus at the Caltech wind tunnel data from instruments is punched directly on cards. Astronomers locate star images by pre-computed co-ordinates on punched cards, and then measure the star positions accurately and record the new information on new cards. The Census Bureau makes a great deal of use of punched cards at present, but plans are being made to go over to the faster electronic computers for this work.

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Basic flip-flop vacuum-tube circuit used in the ENIAC and in other digital computers. Tube number 2 – shaded – is conducting, and tube number 1 is “cut-off”, in the diagram above. A positive pulse on tube 1 will cause it to conduct and the resultant drop in its plate voltage will cause tube 2 to cease conducting. This condition is stable until another pulse arrives, on the grid of tube 2.

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Shortly before the war, G.R. Stibitz and others at the Bell Telephone Laboratories developed a relay type of computer which could handle not only real numbers but complex numbers as well. The binary number system is convenient in a relay computer as we have pointed out. There is some difficulty entailed in the process of getting from a number expressed in the ordinary decimal system to the binary system and back again. For this reason Stibitz likes what he calls a bi-quinary system, which uses base 2 to tell if a number is between 0 and 4, or 5 and 9, and base 5 to tell which digit it is of the five. Early in the war the Army and Navy each ordered one of these relay computers, and machine computation was off to a flying start.

Dr. H.H. Aiken, who had built the IBM computer at Harvard has recently gone over to the relay type of computer, and his “Mark II” will soon be in operation on the complicated guided missile ballistics problems being studied at the Dahlgren Proving Ground. IBM has also been playing around with relay computers, and has delivered two sequence controlled machines of this type for ballistic research workers. Aiken does his sequencing with standard teletype tape, while some of the IBM jobs use plugboards.

An interesting example of a similar parallel development is the Zuse computer, named after its designer Conrad Zuse, who developed his machine in Germany during and since the war. Like the Bell Laboratories machine it uses a keyboard to feed numbers into its relays. The sequence is prepared in advance by an operator who punches instructions into a strip of film.

The art of machine computation took a tremendous jump ahead when in the fall of 1946 the ENIAC, the first electronic digital machine, was placed in operation. This machine was built for Army Ordnance at the Moore School of Engineering by J.W. Mauchly, J.P. Eckert and others. The ENIAC – Electro Numerical Integrator and Calculator – with its eighteen thousand tubes is over a thousand times faster than the relay machines, which in turn were twelve times faster than the original punched card machine at Harvard. This tremendous increase in speed is the result of shifting over from the use of one gram relay armatures to the use of 10^-31 gram electrons as moving parts. Of course a number of new problems appeared when this one limitation was removed. They are being cleared up one by one, chiefly by electronic means.

The ENIAC, despite the light weight of its moving parts, is no vest-pocket machine, as the number of vacuum tubes would indicate. The filaments of these tubes alone require eighty kilowatts of power, and a special blower system is needed to take away the heat. The whole machine occupies a space about 100 feet by 10 feet by 3 feet. Tube failures were a source of a good deal of trouble, because for while at least one of the eighteen thousand tubes burned out each time the power was turned on. This trouble was reduced by leaving the filaments of the tubes on, night and day, to eliminate the shocks involved in heating and cooling, so that now the ENIAC burn-outs at only about one per day, which take on the average of only fifteen minutes to repair. Experience with this machine has aided the design of a series of successors, such as the EDVAC, the UNIVAC, and the MANIAC – inevitable name.

The most important type of unit in the ENIAC is a device which uses two triode tubes, called a flip-flop circuit. These tubes will do electrically what the relay does mechanically. Normally one of the two tubes is conducting current, and the other is “cut off.” A very short – 0.000001 seconds long – pulse of voltage can cause this tube to cut off or cease to conduct, and the other to begin to conduct. Since only these two stable states are possible, we have the beginning of a binary computer. We must add a small neon bulb to indicate when the second tube is conducting, and then add as many such units in series as there are binary digits in the number we wish to handle. These circuits are used as a fast memory device. The ENIAC has a fast memory of only twenty ten-digit numbers, a serious limitation which can only be overcome by adding to the already large lumber of tubes, or by going to other types of fast memory.

Adding is accomplished by connecting flip-flop circuits in tandem so that they can count series of electrical pulses. This counting works in the same way that the mileage indicator works in a car, except that the scale of two is used. Thus, suppose that initially all our flip-flop circuits are in one condition – call it flip. The first pulse causes the first circuit to go from flip to flop. The next one will return it to flip, and this causes the first circuit to emit a pulse which sends the second circuit to flop. This continues on throughout the chain of circuits, all connected in tandem, as long as pulses are fed into the first circuit. When two series of pulses have been fed in we can get our number by noting which circuits are on flip – binary zero – and which on flop – binary one. The result may be converted back to pulses for use elsewhere. The speed per digit in the adding operation is a comfortably short ten microseconds.

The description of the adding scheme above has omitted one added complication in circuit design which gives a considerable simplification in reading of numbers. The binary system is used to count only to ten in the ENIAC and the number is then converted to a decimal number. This is a bit of a nuisance, circuit-wise, but handy – the decimal system is familiar.

The ENIAC also has electronic circuits for multiplying, dividing, square-rooting and so forth. The multiplier uses a built-in electrical multiplication table to aid it in its high-speed, ten digit operation. One very important unit in the ENIAC is the master programmer, which changes the machine from one computing sequence to another, as a complex computation progresses, in accordance with a pre-set plan. The master programmer even makes possible connections which enable the machine to choose the proper computing sequence when faced with the necessity for a choice. Thus it would almost seem that the machine does possess a kind of built-in judgment, and that there is some reason for the term “electrical brain.”

It was mentioned that the fast memory of the ENIAC was limited. The slow memory, using punch cards, and IBM machines causes a great reduction in speed when it must be used. Also, although computation is all-electronic, data is fed in and results are taken out by electromechanical means – punch cards again. The limitations incurred may best be realized if we compare the time for a punch, about half a second, with the unit time of a flip-flop circuit, ten microseconds. The ratio is fifty thousand times.

Even more serious is the problem common to all digital machines, namely the difficulty of setting up a problem. These machines are not easy to use, and the sequence of operations for an easy problem may be very involved. If the problem is difficult, then, of course, the sequence gets more difficult, but the use of machine methods is mandatory. So, when faced with a real stinger of a problem, the scientist gets down to work, perhaps for months, just to figure out how to set up the machine. Considerable time is needed for the physical setting up of sequence connections too, but after that – brrrrrrrrrrrrrp, and a solution which would take years by former methods begins to roll out in a matter of minutes.

Professor D.R. Hartree of England, who recently worked with the ENIAC, describes the solution of problem in which this machine had to handle two hundred thousand digits. Now try writing digits as fast as possible. At a rate which will lead to errors and writer’s cramp you may put down ten thousand digits in an hour. Even at this speed it will take twenty hours just to write down two hundred thousand digits – and no computation has been performed. The machine handled the numbers and performed the computation in this example in four minutes flat. It is not surprising that Professor Hartree is impressed by such speeds – he once spent fifteen years on the computation of the electron orbits of atoms. This is the kind of job that a machine calculator can be coerced into doing in a few hours, or days at most.

Their utility to science is obvious!

The ENIAC is only the first of its kind. The EDVAC – Electronic Discrete Variable Computer – is an improved machine, also built Army Ordnance at the r of Pennsylvania. One of the chief improvements is a larger capacity memory device, made possible use of acoustical delay lines for storage of numbers. Numbers get stored as trains of compression pulses is bouncing back and forth in a two-inch column of mercury. Each delay line of this type does the work of five hundred fifty electronic tubes in the ENIAC, so that a substantial saving results.

The MANIAC – Mechanical and Numerical Integrator and Computer – is another Army Ordnance computer. It is being built at the Institute of Advanced Study at Princeton under the direction of Dr. J. von Neumann and Dr. H.H. Goldstine. This machine is to use a new type of fast memory tube which is being perfected by Dr. Jan Rajchman of RCA. This tube, called the Selectron, is a kind of cathode ray tube which is designed to store four thousand ninety-six off-on or binary signals – equivalent to about twelve hundred decimal digits. The binary digits are to be stored as charge on points on a cathode screen which are behind the interstices of two orthogonal sets of sixty-four wires each. An ingenious method of connecting certain of these wires together will enable electric signals to be fed in to pull the electron beam to any position for purposes of reading” or “writing” with just thirty-two leads brought out. Even so a pre-production model of the tube looks a bit formidable, but it is phenomenally small for the memory it possesses.

Among some of the other schemes for digital memory being worked on are delay networks using loops of wire in wire recorders. This scheme may not be as fast as the acoustical delay line used in the EDVAC, but it has the advantage that the pulses do not have to be periodically removed for reshaping. One practical difficulty here is the necessity of waiting for the right point on the wire to come around before reading begins. Of course all memory of a number can easily be erased when need for it is finished, and the wire loop is ready to be re-used.

It seems that the Selectron is one of the best bets to speed up the operation of all-electronic computers. With its aid it should be possible to multiply two twelve-digit numbers in one hundred millionths of a second.

Such speeds may seem fantastic, but problems have been formulated and shelved because even the fastest present-day computing machines could not complete the solution in thousands of years.

The Bureau of Standards, aided by Mauchly and Eckert of ENIAC fame and others, is now constructing some new machines of a general purpose type. This new digital computer is called the UNIVAC – Universal Automatic Computer – and is to be of a general purpose type suited for Bureau of Census work as well as, Army and Navy ballistics and fire control research. The UNIVAC is to be very compact, using only about eight hundred tubes, and occupying only about as much space as five file cabinets.

It is rather interesting that one of the limitations of this and other digital machines is the slow rate at which numbers are printed at the output. This limitation may be overcome in future machines by the use of a device called the “Numero-scope,” recently announced by the Harvard Computation Lab. This device is nothing but a cathode-ray oscilloscope, which can trace the outline of any number, if the right signal is fed into its deflecting plates. This is no mean trick – it takes six vacuum tubes to make the numeral 2, for example, but it has been done, and numbers may now be flashed on the screen of a cathode-ray tube and photographed with exposures as short as one five-hundredth of a second.

The analogue computer, as we have stated works with analogous quantities rather than with whole numbers. Thus we may represent quantities by lengths, angles, voltages, velocities, forces and so on. Thus an electrical or an hydraulic circuit problem may be solved on a mechanical device, while an electrical problem may be solved on a mechanical device. One simple example of an analogue computer is the slide rule. Here quantities of any sort are converted into lengths and since a logarithmic scale is used it is possible to multiply by adding lengths. If a linear scale is used we can add by adding lengths. Division and subtraction are possible by simply subtracting lengths in each case.

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The basic mechanism in the punched-card machine is the brush and roller combination shown. As the card passes over a steel roller, metallic brushes make an electrical connection – between A and B in the diagram – and a signal can be produced to reject the card, or set a counter wheel, et cetera.

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If we use angles, or angular displacements, to represent quantities successive displacements readily add to give a total. We can also use a differential like the one in the rear end of a car to add the angular displacements in two different shafts. The answer in this case, or a constant factor – gear ratio – times the answer appears on a third shaft. Direct voltages add conveniently, and alternating voltages add like vector or directed quantities, and so are convenient in the solution of problems involving directed lengths or forces.

Before going any further into discussion of the specific details or these devices it might be well to examine the relative advantages and disadvantages of the analogue type of computer. In the digital computer the accuracy can usually be increased at the expense of speed, so that if we want to go from 10 digit to 20 digit accuracy we must suffer a decrease to half the original speed.

With the analogue type of computer it is only possible to increase accuracy if the lengths – or angles, or voltages, or whatnot – are measured with greater percentage accuracy. This may call for watchmaker techniques unless we can afford lengths or other analogous quantities. The difficulties encountered in any case are such that the accuracy is always much less than in any digital machine.

There are several advantages possessed by the analogue computer which tend to offset the decreased accuracy. One of these is its greater speed, which results partly from the fact that most problems are more easily set up for solution by analogue methods. Sometimes the analogue computer is used for a quick look at a problem, to narrow down the field which must be investigated with greater accuracy by the more involved digital computer. Another advantage possessed by the analogue computer is its ability – if the ability is built in – to perform certain mathematical operations in direct fashion. Thus, for example, a pivoted rod can be used to give the sine of an angle. This ability also accounts in part for the greater speed by the analogue method. Still another advantage is ease with which empirical data in the form of curves may be fed into an analogue machine.

The first successful large-scale analogue computer was the Differential Analyzer designed by Dr. Vannevar Bush and others at M.I.T. The same type of machine has also been built by General Electric for its own use and for use in various Universities. The latest and most highly improved of these machines was recently installed at the new engineering school at U.C.L.A.

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“1948-08-06: UCLA’s Differential Analyzer Begins Rise to Stardom“, at TomOwens YouTube channel.

Note that this YouTube clip shows the incorporation of the differential analyzer in the movies When Worlds Collide, from 2:00 to 4:13 (full length version here), and, Earth Versus the Flying Saucers, from 4:36 to end (in full-length version at Archive.org, from 59:28 to 107).

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The differential analyzer is used chiefly for the solution of differential equations. In view of this fact it is rather strange that the machine cannot differentiate. However it can integrate, and since this is the inverse of differentiation its mastery over the calculus is quite complete. (The inverse of an arithmetical process is commonly used by clerks in stores who count back our change, and thus use addition in place of subtraction). The integrators in a differential analyzer are of the Kelvin wheel-and-disk type in which an integrator wheel rides on a rotating disk, and is turned when the disk turns. The amount of angular rotation of the integrator wheel depends on its distance, R, from the center of the disk, and the angle the disk turns through, θ. This, by definition, is the integral of R with respect to θ.

The integrator is the most important device in the differential analyzer, and as such has received a great deal of attention. In 1944 G.E. engineers came up with a device in which troubles caused by slipping of the integrator wheel on the disk were virtually eliminated. This device was essentially a servo follow-up system in which light beams were passed through a polaroid disk attached to a very light integrator wheel. These light beams then went through other polaroid disks, then to phototubes, to an amplifier and a motor. The motor then caused the second and third polaroid disks to follow the disk on the integrator wheel with the customary boost in power level, or torque level.

Among other important components in the differential analyzer are the input tables. At these tables, in the older machines, operators followed plotted curves of functions which were to be fed into the machine with pointers, and thus converted distances on the curve sheets to angular rotations. In the newer machines light beam photocell servo-mechanisms accomplish the same thing without the aid of skilled operators. Known functions, of course, are generated by other and simpler means.

Because the differential analyzer handles quantities in the form of angular displacements the process of adding is accomplished by the use of differential gearing. To solve a differential equation the machine must first be set up so that the right shafts are connected together by the right gear ratios. When all is ready the data in the form of curves is fed into the machine at the input tables, the known functions are fed in from function generators, and the output pens are moved from left to right, all in synchronism. Adding wheels, integrators, input table lead-screws and so forth all begin to move and perform the operations required by the equation being solved. The totals of the quantities on each side of the equation are held equal by a servo-mechanism and the shaft which will give the function which is the desired answer moves the output pen up and down as it is pulled across a sheet of graph paper. Thus the answer appears as a curve, or a set of curves.

The accuracy of these results depends not only upon the accuracy with which these final curves can be read, but also upon the accuracy of the original data, and the accuracy of the various servos involved in the solution. Typically, about one-tenth of one percent, or three digit accuracy can be expected. If some of the components have been forced to accelerate too rapidly because of a poor choice of gear ratio, or if a lead screw has been forced to the end of its travel, the solution may be completely wrong – the analyst still has his headaches. These troubles are ordinarily avoided by making preliminary runs to determine the proper ranges of operation of all components.

Among the other types of analogue computers commonly used engineering work are the various kinds of network analyzers. A large electrical power network may be exceedingly complex, due to the more or less random geographical distribution of loads and generating plants. The effect of short circuits, arc-overs due to lightning, and load distribution must be studied with the aid of models, so that the design of circuit breakers, lightning arresters and so forth can proceed intelligently. Tests cannot be made on the actual power network, as they can on communication networks, because of the possibility that damage to large and expensive equipment might result.

The earliest type of power network model was the D-C Network Analyzer. The representation of three-phase alternating current systems by direct-current models of this kind has definite limitations, and the next step was the development of A-C Network Analyzers. These models, although they represent a three-phase system by a single system are much more versatile than the D-C Analyzers.

We may ask if such models should really be classed as computers. Fundamentally, these analyzers are merely models of systems which are too complicated for direct analysis, and too large for direct measurement of variables under all possible conditions. Much the same kind of model-making is carried on in the study of aircraft antennas using model planes and microwaves in place of short waves. However, if we examine some of the uses to which Network Analyzers have been put, it seems safe to class them as computers. Because of the use of electrical quantities in these devices and because of the flexibility of interconnections possible, they have been used for the solution of such problems as the flow of microwave energy in wave-guides, the flow of compressible fluids in pipes, and even the solution of Schrodinger’s Wave Equation.

Another type of network analyzer is the Transient Network Analyzer, which can show more clearly what happens in a power network when short circuits and overloads occur. This device may also be used to study analogous problems such as the amplitude of transient vibrations in mechanical systems when sudden shocks or overloads occur. The inverse of this kind of thing is the mechanical model used to study what goes on in a vacuum tube. In these models stretched sheets of dental rubber are used to represent electrostatic fields, and ball bearings serve as electrons.

The differential analyzer is more versatile than the network analyzer discussed above because it can integrate, differentiate – in effect – and multiply, and thus solve rather complicated differential equations. These functions are performed by mechanical or electro-mechanical devices in the differential analyzer. If these things could be accomplished by purely electrical means, we would expect a great increase in speed, and some decrease in size and weight. Such machines have been built by Westinghouse and Caltech, and seem to promise a fair increase in speed over the old differential analyzer. It seems inevitable that the use of many vacuum tubes will lead to somewhat lower accuracy and less dependability. Another difficulty with present types of electronic differential analyzers is that integration can only be performed with respect to time as the independent variable, so that the solution of certain problems is not easily possible.

Many other kinds of analogue computers have been perfected in the last few years – the field is definitely “hot.” Completed designs include such gadgets as the Bell Telephone M-4 Director, which used radar signals to figure out in a twinkling where an antiaircraft gun should be aimed so that the shell and a plane might meet. Undoubtedly work is in progress on computers which will make possible solution the “problem of delivery” of the modern atomic warhead. These latter-day buzz-bombs will be sufficiently lethal to warrant their carrying along their own computers.

Many scientists are disconcerted by the fact that by far the greater part of the computer research being carried on today is under the auspices of the Armed Forces. To be sure, we in the United States seem to be far ahead of anyone else in the world in computers. This may augur well for National Security if some desperate bludgeoning struggle is soon to occur. From the longer range point of view it seems that it is particularly desirable that the scientist whose pure research may lead him to yet undiscovered fundamental truths be also equipped with this new and powerful tool.

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Three types of computers. Top: General Electric’s A.C. Network analyzer. Middle: The differential analyzer – of the analogue computer group – at General Electric. Bottom: The Bell Laboratories relay-operated digital computer.

References and Suggested Readings

Network Analyzer (AC power), at Wikipedia

Differential Analyzer, at Wikipedia

The UCLA Differential Analyzer: General Electric in 1947, Video at Computer History Museum

“The Differential Analyzer. A New Machine for Solving Differential Equations”, by Vannevar Bush, at WorryDream

Differential Analyzer History, at LiquiSearch.com

A Brief History of Electrical Technology Part 3: The Computer, at Piero Scaruffi’s website