OUR DEAR PRECIOUS AMERICAN BOYS

My wife and I experienced the vacation of our lives this past May when we journeyed to Ireland and Scotland.

One of my most memorable experiences of the entire trip lasted all of ninety seconds. We had checked into a hotel in Glasgow, Scotland the day before, and as I getting on the elevator to return to our room, another man joined me for the ride from the first to the third floor.

No sooner had the middle-aged man stepped into the elevator, and the door closed behind him, he spoke to me in English, (but in what seemed be a Polish accent) and asked,

“Where are you from?”

To which I responded,

“I’m from Florida, USA.”

When the foreigner discovered I was from the United States, he uttered the most poignant phrase I may have ever heard.

“Oh, those dear precious American boys who died for us!”

And while the man didn’t elaborate, it was obvious he was referring to our brave American soldiers, airmen, sailors and marines who surrendered their lives for the sake of the freedom of Europe during WWI and WWII.

I merely nodded, and said something like,

“Yes, they were the best America had to offer, and they have not been forgotten.”

No sooner had the stranger and I exchanged these sentiments, than the elevator came to a stop, the door opened, and I stepped off on the third floor.

Pt. 2

Speaking about never forgetting, I was interacting on an instant message with one of my social media friends in France a few months ago, (I suppose it was the Memorial Day after we returned from our European vacation) and Marie told me,

“William, we still remember the sacrifices of the American troops who fought and died in France. Our public school teachers often escort their students to the American cemeteries, such as the one at Normandy, and lay roses on their graves.”

Her words caught me off guard. Had I been speaking, rather than typing Marie would have noticed the sob rising in my throat.

I found myself typing out a phrase which says it as well as I have ever heard it said.

“They gave their tomorrows for our todays.”

Allow me to share the story of one particular aircraft, and aircrew who experienced the worst possible circumstance during WWII.

The efforts to find and recover the Tulsamerican, a World War II-era B-24 bomber that was the last plane of its type to be built in Tulsa was the subject of “The Last B-24,” of the PBS series “NOVA.”

The Tulsamerican, built at Tulsa’s Douglas Aircraft plant, and personally paid for by the workers of that aircraft factory, suffered damage during an air battle with German planes in 1944.

Seven of the 10-man crew survived the plane’s crash landing in the waters of what is now the Croatian island of Vis.

Three crewmen, the pilot, Capt. Eugene Ford, flight engineer Charles E. Priest and navigator Russell C. Landry vanished with the plane and were officially listed as missing in action.

Pt. 3

Seven decades later, the Tulsamerican was discovered by amateur divers, nearly 135 feet beneath the surface at the bottom of the sea. The aircraft was almost unrecognizable broken in half, and covered in rust and silt. Serial numbers revealed it was, indeed, the Tulsamerican.

The NOVA program recounts the efforts of the U.S. Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency which is tasked with searching for and identifying the estimated 82,000 missing American service members still unaccounted for and bringing them home.

The Croatian government agreed to provide a Croatian navy vessel as the base of operations for the expedition to recover the three men, but only gave the searchers 19 days to finish their arduous task.

While the team did not find any military remains in the severely damaged cockpit, the searchers managed to recover remains a collection of bones under a parachute on the ocean floor. As the result of DNA testing the bones were determined to be those of the pilot, Captain Eugene Ford.

Interestingly enough, before the remains of the pilot were discovered, scuba divers located a wedding ring on the sea bottom. And since among the three missing Army Air Corps crew only the pilot was married, it was easy to determine that the ring was his. Even after three quarters of a century the gold was as shiny bright as it was when it was fashioned.

Suddenly, a black and white picture of Captain Ford flashes on the screen. In the photograph he is standing in front of his B-24 aircraft. Now, the camera zooms in on the pilot’s left hand. I choke up when I see this very same piece of jewelry, which has been brought up from the depts of the ocean, encircling his ring finger.

The television program included an interview with 1st Lt. Val Miller, the plane’s bombardier, who was interviewed days before his death at age 94. In an especially poignant scene, a member of the POW/MIA Defense Accounting Agency sits down with Norma Beard, Captain Ford’s aged daughter, and informs her that the remains which were found next to the sunken aircraft are that of her father, and his wedding ring is returned to her.

Captain Ford will be buried in Arlington National Cemetery sometime this year.

(Portions of Chapters Two & Three are taken from the PBS NOVA website. Edited by William McDonald, PhD)

Afterward

My mind goes back to that stranger on the elevator in Glasgow, Scotland, a man whom I am unlikely to ever see again, (nor would I recognize him if I ran into him on the street).

“Oh, those dear precious American boys who died for us!”

I think we are too close to forgetting the inestimable sacrifice of the multiplied thousands of military men and women who have laid down their lives on the field of battle. Memorial Day, the Fourth of July and Veteran’s Day are simply insufficient to conjure up the memories and the thankfulness which accompanies these holidays.

Every time we see the American flag waving above our local post office, every time we see a POW/MIA sticker on the bumper of the car in front of us, every time we witness one of the few remaining WWII veterans struggling to cross a busy intersection in his wheelchair, and every time we take a random moment to look at one of those white marble headstones bearing a cross and an American name, we should remember those dear precious American boys who unselfishly laid down their lives so that we might live.

They gave their tomorrows for our todays.

by William McDonald, PhD. (Mc)Donald's Daily Diary. Vol. 85. Copyright pending

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