The US were also based out of Goxhill, P-51s for escort and protection of the Humber!

My father too, but I think a lot of distaste was dislike of Errol Flynn arose from his not enlisting to join the war, unlike David Niven etc. However Wiki says that Flynn was medically unfit and the studio would not release the facts as it would detract from his swashbuckling image.

Goxhill (USAAF Base No. 345) was Fighter Training Base.


From "The Airfields of Lincolnshire since 1912", Blake, Hodgson and Taylor - "Goxhill was established as a fighter training base to train pilots in the procedures they would need while operating in Europe, and the formal handover of the station [from the RAF] took place in August" [1942]...... "In late 1943 it was decided to form an independent unit to train all P-38 Lightning and North American P-51 pilots for both the 8th and 9th Air Forces. Designated the 496th Fighter Training Group...."
M-62A3

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode...-news-22022017

Watch from 13:20 onwards.

Yes, a test pilot (whose name escapes me) who had been carrying out comparative trials between the Allison-engined Mustang and a Spitfire wrote a recommendation for a Merlin-engined Mustang, though the people at NAA had thought about it as well, and trial installations were carried out independently in the UK and the US.

Edit: c/o Wikipedia

Tom Hanks people at Thorpe Abbotts yesterday........... home of the 'Bloody Hundredth'

Just 'having a look, soaking up the atmosphere' - Not commitment to filming or production in UK.

Arc

Yep that's it.

The old information office at Duxford (now converted to show the history of the station) was the old AFDU office. A lady popped in to visit us and when we asked if we could help she said 'yes you can show me where my old desk has gone!'

She was secretary to OC AFDU at the time. OC AFDU's office was our 'back office' at the time....

Remember the Memphis Belle was shot at that fenland airfield in Lincolnshire

I remember looking out of my MQ window at Honington in 1987/88 IIRC, watching a cricket match when the "Belle" and a fighter escort flew low over the station sports field - it was surprisingly emotional. Honington ATC had provided ATC services for some of the filming and we often saw fighter contrails as they fought the "war" above Suffolk.

What "U-571" and "Top Gun" weren't documentaries???? Next someone is going to tell me Captain America had no role in the battle against Hydra....;)


I imagine good things from any Spielberg/Hanks production....

S89, maybe our expectations were too high. I don't think we expected TG to be any more than Hollywood meets Heavy Metal and in the same vein as Blue Thunder and True Lies. For U571 I think expectations were more along the lines of a war drama. The Great Escape film was also fiction but included cameo scenes from other documented escape stories. U571 perhaps departed too far from its faction base for informed audiences.

Wouldn't it be good if, they could make a film as good as 12 O'clock high with modern film techniques? Hey, today there are real flying 109's and 190's to get the authenticity of the enemy/sound done properly! :ok:

OAP

Just been listening to Desert Island Discs with the military historian Sir Anthony Beevor. He said his wife refuses to watch war films with him because he is constantly "grinding his teeth" over the historical inaccuracies. He said a particularly bad example was Valkyrie, the film about the Hitler assassination plot, with Tom Cruise "saluting like a GI". He described the film as "dreadful"!

The new TV series has already completed some scenes, including an hour-long sequence depicting the infamous Schweinfurt/Regensburg mission in August 1943 and focusing on the action inside two B-17s of the 100th Bomb Group.
Expect it to be along the lines of the opening of 'Saving Private Ryan' – i.e., more action than words.
As far as I know, the name of the series has yet to be confirmed. 'The Mighty Eighth' was a term coined by British author Roger A Freeman in 1970 for his first book on the subject.

Does anybody else remember We'll Meet Again from the early 1980s? All available on YouTube, with some nice flying from an unpainted Sally B and rather a lot of actors who went on to bigger things.

Who remembers: "The Lives of a Bengal Lancer" (1935 film, saw it as a boy of 13-14. Very impressed). My Dad (an old soldier born in India) said the Army detail was mostly correct.

Was told that it was Hitler's favourite film (which is not much of a recommendation).

Wiki has all the detail.

D.

There are plenty of stories, I was fortunate enough to be at the 70th Anniversary of Stansted Airport in 2013 when Lt. Edward William Horn, who was one of the first based pilots spoke.

in the space of 15 minutes he described

being based at Stansted aged just 19,

being sick and missing a mission in which his aircraft was shot down with no survivors

being allocated another aircraft and crew and getting shot down over France

his time at Stalag Luft III which started two months after the "great Escape"

being force marched into Germany when Poland was liberated by the Russians

Being bombed by Allied forces who thought they were German Infantry.

Being liberated By General Patton.

He was only 21 by this stage and had more stories than most people would have in a lifetime.

344th bomb group : Lt. Edward William Horn 344th BG 497th BS

hearing him talk was a humbling experience and will be something that stays with me for the rest of my life.

I would have thought the difficulty would be cramming all that into 10 episodes.

'Masters of the Air' at Abingdon
 

It would appear that the former RAF Abingdon (Dalton Barracks) is being used for filming of the new Hanks/Spielberg-produced TV series Masters of the Air (or whatever it ends up being titled).

New structures include a period watch office, which will presumably replicate the OTU-spec tower at Thorpe Abbotts, where the series' subject unit, the 100th Bomb Group, operated from.

Anyone near Abingdon got any more gen?

The village of Bledlow is their current focus:
Eastern Daily Press

Wikipedia tells us:Bledlow is a village in the civil parish of Bledlow-cum-Saunderton in Buckinghamshire, England. It is about 1 1⁄2 miles (2.4 km) WSW of Princes Risborough, and is on the county boundary with Oxfordshire.

The toponym "Bledlow" is derived from Old English and means "Bledda's burial mound". A 10th century document records it as Bleddanhloew; the Domesday Book of 1086 records it as Bledelai. A more common derivation is from "Bled-Hlaw" meaning Bloody Hill which commemorates an undated battle between Saxons and Danes.

Local rag just says some footpaths around the airfield/barracks are being closed for the rest of the year, and they are constructing at least one replica B-17.

Thanks goldox. Realism seems to be an early casualty in the shooting: Norfolk's village direction/distance signs (Eastern Daily Press picture) would have been removed for the war's duration.

Drove past this morning, on way to Oxford. Certainly some temporary looking buildings on the near end of the runway (portacabins it seems) but nothing remotely resembling a bomber. :)

The Mail has now revealed a reconstructed communal and HQ site at Chalfont St Giles, Bucks.

They’ve been filming for it in a pub in Bray, Berkshire recently too. Signposts changed to say, eg. ‘Diss’

Dulce et Decorum Est
 

Way back in 1988, much of the Oscar Best Picture winner, Rain Man, was being filmed in Cincinnati. I lived a block away from the Vernon Manor Hotel, where the cast resided and several scenes were filmed. I visited "The Vernon" (where The Beatles/"Bayuls" stayed in their first American tour in 1964, but what of that?) almost every evening. The barmaid had become a friend and she made the dryest and best martini in the Midwest, and she poured me plentiful "mistakes". Can't beat free martinis, am I correct? The hotel also provided an unparalleled gratis hors d'oeuvres selection: barbecued pork ribs and chicken wings, numerous cheeses, cold cuts, crackers, and all the other things which put $$$ signs in your cardiologist's eyes. Enough for a complete dinner, and that it was for me most nights of the week.

One soft springtime eve I strolled into the hotel; Lori (my bartendress friend) had saved me my customary seat at the bar. As she shook my nectar so as not to bruise it, she gestured with her eyes and a nod of her head to look at the corner table, which was a banquet set up which might seat, say, six people. Only two were there in that darkened corner. Dustin Hoffman and Tom Cruise!

Shyness has never been my strong suit. I asked Lori to send the stars a drink and she complied, smiling with a mouth full of teeth. As she brushed against me on her way back behind the bar, she stuttered "They want you to join them for a drink!" And so I did, and not just for one.

Both men are short, five-sixish, I would guess. Both look very much as they do on celluloid. Both are intelligent and have great sense of humo(u)r. Both were generous and calm. It got drunk that night!

The high spot of the evening occurred when I excused myself and adjourned to the Gentleman's Room. As I was completing my (e)mission at the urinal, the floor above me buckled and collapsed. I was showered in gallons of malodorous liquid. Turns out that the room a floor above me was a duplicate bathroom and several of the urinals had been leaking, errr, human excretions for weeks or longer! Just my Irish luck, eh? (If it weren't for bad luck, I'd have none at all, sure an' doncha know?)

Having heard the cacophonous collapse, the management, including the very nice Orthodox Jewish brothers who owned the hotel, rushed to my aid. I was escorted to a room where I showered and changed into some decent clothing procured from the hotel's lost and found. I was offered free drinks for life! (Never a wise move if the promisee has Oirsh roots!) Before I decided on that kind offer, I returned to the banquet table and my 120 minutes of fame.

No one was there! My drinking companions must've smelled the disaster! All good things must come to an end.

Years before I had appeared in a 1983 Burt Reynolds flic. Unlike Dustin, I did not win the Oscar for Best Actor! Yet there is a moral to my tale and it is this: The population of Abingdon, Bledlow, and surrounds need to be very careful. Hollywood will tear a place up, and you never know what's gonna hit ya when the ceiling caves in! ;)

https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....24f09c0d3b.jpg

- Ed

One of Heston Blumenthal's, presumably? The Crown looks like it hasn't changed much in 80 years.

Filming for Masters of the Air has started ? Alert 5

Filming for Masters of the Air has started

The anticipated sequel for Band of Brothers miniseries, Masters of the Air, has started filming in Britain.

Director Cary Fukunaga disclosed on Instagram that the first week of filming was done on Apr. 23.

Executive producers Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg built an air base set in Buckinghamshire for the filming.

For more information, hit the Source below

Source

https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....e53a066be6.jpg
Searchlights over Abingdon.

Drove past old RAF Abingdon (Dalton Barracks) Friday evening on way home from oop north.
Saw powerful searchlights and flashes, by the time I got home there was qute a display going on.
Grabbed this pic from bedroom window!
Looked like they were also flashing bursts of light off of the clouds, I guess to mimic bomb explosions or flak?
Lots of bangs crashes and explosions Saturday evening too!

Spring premiere?
 

Playtone, the production firm behind the nine-episode series, says it will be shown on Apple TV "in the spring" – one insider suggesting it will run from the end of March till the end of May (possibly on Memorial Day).

Masters of the Air - new WW II TV Mini-Series
 

"Masters of the Air" - a nine-episode TV mini-series is scheduled to debut the 26th of January, 2024 on Apple TV.
Masters of the Air TV Series to Premier January 2024 on Apple TV (commemorativeairforce.org)
It's being done by the team of Steven Spielberg, Tom Hanks, and Gary Goetzman - the same team who did "Band of Brothers" and "Pacific".
IF it's half as good as "Band of Brothers" it should be a must see...

I’ve read the book, a very long book, a very good book. But there are many very difficult to read parts. It’s the fullest story of the Allied Air War I know of, including the bravery, the difficult moral decisions, the suffering, the deaths, the betrayals and brutality against them. Hard to imagine how everything could possibly be in the series, but the story of these courageous airmen deserves to be told.

I was unfamiliar with the book prior to hearing about this mini-series - good to hear they are using good source material.
I read the book "Band of Brothers" (granted, after I'd first seen the HBO mini-series). Although there are obviously a few discrepancies (and even with a 9-hour miniseries, they couldn't include everything), it's remarkably faithful to the book.
IMHO, "Band of Brothers" is one of the best - it not the best - WW II movie series ever. "Pacific" was good, but (again, IMHO) not nearly as good as "BoB".
I hope the team can return to their BoB form for this one.

One of the early trailers. They changed the name BTW.

​​​
That was just 'click bait' from a chancer hoping to cash in on the early curiosity about the TV series, which was first mooted by HBO several years ago.

The Apple TV series will concentrate mainly on the Eighth Air Force's 'Bloody' 100th Bomb Group (based at Thorpe Abbotts near Diss) during a period of heavy losses of its B-17Fs in the autumn of 1943.

Donald Miller's book, which concentrates on members of the 100BG, is published in the UK with the title Eighth Air Force and also covers the history of the whole force from its arrival in Britain in 1942 until VE-Day.
​​

It's been a long time coming to the screens, my youngest son was an extra in it and the filming was 2 years ago.

I think, like with many streaming services, they have been eking out their products due to the writers and actors strike in the US.

Big ol' production at Abingdon, wasn't it?

Have to say it doesn't look that promising from the trailer, gritty yes, but that CGI is gonna ruin it for me.

Yes, filmed at Abingdon and they built some replica B-17 too.

https://www.oxfordmail.co.uk/news/19...fordshire-set/

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbi...sters-Air.html

https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....d838128a7c.jpg
My buddy showed me this photo last week of the goggles his dad was wearing along with his flak helmet. Lt Alan Gould was a B17 bombardier with the 338th Bomb Squadron, 96th Bomb group. You can see a slight dent near the right bridge of the nose. An 8 mm round took out the right lens and was recovered in his helmet. Good illustration of what you see in that old trailer. They will eventually be donated to a museum.

Thank you but 8mm? I think not.

Some of the aircraft guns used as defensive were 7.9mm, so yes is possible LB

​​https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...g_World_War_II


https://www.historylearningsite.co.u...ight-fighters/