Veteran's Day
November 11, 2007
My dad, Sgt. Charles M. Trippe, Army Air Corps, a wing gunner on a bomber in the Pacific Theater from 1943-1945. The picture is inscribed, “As ever, Charles, 5-7-44.” His squadron was making their way across the Pacific as the Japanese retreated. I will have to look at the records I have to figure out whereabouts he was in May 1944. It looks like a studio picture, and was either colorized from black and white or the color was enhanced. Maybe they were in Hawaii on some R&R? Maybe, though my recollection is that his unit took a much more southerly route, down near Australia and of New Guinea.
My father would have been just over 18 in this picture, but he already looks older, doesn’t see? He saw a lot of action in the war, and it didn’t sit well with him. I wonder how much he had seen by this point. Like a lot of veterans, he rarely spoke about it. I only remember two stories, both quick and offbeat and funny and a little scary. One was when his bomber hit what he described as an air pocket and he found himself plastered to the roof of the plane. Only as I write this does it occur to me that maybe the air pocket was enemy flak or an evasive maneuver. The other story was about having to eat bugs for food in the Phillipines. Kind of a cool story when you are a kid, but not so cool thinking about it as an adult.
Posted by Bill Trippe at November 11, 2007 8:30 PM
