Winnie,
A simple Google search works miracles sometimes.
Major Richard Ira Bong
The first of nine children, born September 24, 1920 to a Swedish immigrant father and American-born mother (Carl and Dora Bong).
Richard was captivated by flying as a small boy. He would watch planes fly over the family farm carrying mail for President Calvin Coolidge's summer White House in Superior. He learned to fly in the Civilian Pilot Training program, as a college student. At the age of 20 he became a cadet in the US Army Air Corps. Around this same time America entered into World War II. Richard was the first fighter pilot handpicked by General George C. Kenney in the fall of 1942 for a P-38 squadron designed to strengthen the Fifth Air Force in Australia and New Guinea. Richard became America's all-time Ace of Aces, downing 40 enemy planes in the Pacific theater of the war while flying P-38 fighter planes.
In 1944 Richard Bong was awarded the nation's highest honor by General Douglas MacArthur, Commander of all U.S. Army units in the Far East, who said: "Major Richard Ira Bong, who has ruled the air from New Guinea to the Philippines, I now induct you into the society of the bravest of brave, the wearers of the Congressional Medal of Honor of the United States."
General Kenney pulled Richard Bong out of combat when his score reached 40 and sent him home to "marry Marjorie and start thinking about raising a lot of towheaded Swedes." Richard "Dick" and Marge Vattendahl were married February 10, 1945 in Superior, an event attended by 1,200 guests and covered by the international press. The couple honeymooned in California for several weeks before reporting to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio, where Richard began training for a new assignment in Burbank, California: testing the plane that would take the Air Force into the jet age - the Lockheed P-80 Shooting Star. On August 6, 1945 (the day the Enola Gay dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima) Richard was killed when the P-80 stalled and crashed on take-off. He died at the age of 24 six months after his marriage to Marge.
Major Richard I Bong wore the following ribbons and medals: Medal of Honor, Distinguished Service Cross, Silver Star with one Oak Leaf Cluster, Distinguished Flying Cross with 6 Oak Leaf Clusters, Air Medal with 14 Oak Leaf Clusters, Pre-Pearl Harbor Ribbon, American Defense Ribbon, Asiatic-Pacific Ribbon with 2 battle stars, Presidential Citation, and Distinguished Air Medal From Britain.
Excellent Post Blender Pilot....you are a real helicopter pilot in my book.....seems we have walked the same trail....must be the Fort Wolters education!
Last edited by SASless; 30th Jun 2003 at 00:33.