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Using The Writing 69th Home Page

If this is your first visit to The Writing 69th Home Page, you should start with The Story of The Writing 69th, which will guide you through some key aspects of the story. For those interested in more detail there are selected chapters from the book, The Writing 69th, at Green Harbor Publications.

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If you like this site, you might also enjoy The Free Fall Research Page, which is dedicated to recording the stories of a select group of people have survived a fall of thousands of feet without a working parachute

The Book

Andy Rooney's Stars and Stripes Articles on the February 26, 1943 Wilhelmshaven Mission

November 2011: Recently I saw an Internet posting by the niece of Bill Casey, the pilot of the 306th Bomb Group B-17 that Andy Rooney accompanied to Wilhelmshaven on February 26, 1943. She was looking for information on her uncle and I had microfilm printouts of Rooney's Stars and Stripes articles about the mission so I scanned them for her. I am sure that others would be interesting in seeing those articles too so I am posting a PDF of them here.

Andy Rooney, the Last of the Writing 69th, Dies at 92

November 2011: Andy Rooney died on Friday, November 4, 2011, a few weeks after complications following surgery. His death came a month after he gave his last Sixty Minutes commentary for CBS. Here's a quote from the article he wrote for Stars and Stripes after the Writing 69th's only mission:

Peeling out of the sun came shining silver German fighter planes, diving at one bomber in the formation and disappearing below the cloudbanks as quickly as they had come. They seemed tiny, hardly a machine of destruction, and an impossible target…From that time until three and one-half hours later, when we were half way home, no one had to look far to see a German fighter.

I will always be grateful to Andy Rooney for the marvelous letter he sent in reply to my inquiry about Bob Post and the Writing 69th. Another fond memory: He gave me the greatest compliment that a proofreader can hope for, that is, “a good catch” for spotting an obscure error in the first edition of his book, “My War.” He was also the one who put me in contact with Paul Manning, another Writing 69th member, who I might never have met otherwise. Thank you, Andy!

More Thoughts on the Crash Site Photos

October 2011: The photos that we believe to be crash site images of the B-24 that Robert Post was in (see below) have been examined by researchers at the U.S. Air Force Museum in Dayton, Ohio and they cannot confirm that the aircraft in the pictures is a B-24. They believe that the images of the wings are from a B-24 yet they strongly suspect that the photo of wreckage that looks like a B-17 tail is in fact a B-17 tail. Still, they admit that they cannot conclusively state that it is a B-17 tail. Though this is not the conclusion we were hoping for, we thank the researchers for taking the time to review the images.

As you look at the last photo, consider these points:

On the left you can see what appears to be the trailing edge of an elevator with the fabric burnt or torn off. This would tend to support the theory that this is the trailing edge of a B-17's left stabilizer. Or could it be an aileron from the right wing of a B-24 twisted back on itself?

The vertical stabilizer (if it is that) would seem to have lost the rudder. Where would the rudder attach? Are any of those marks visible? If this is in fact the left wing of a B-24, the metal ends abruptly right about where the left inboard engine would be.

A description written by the German pilot who shot the aircraft down suggests that the aircraft blew apart in mid-air and that the pilot's seat was found a distance away from the rest of the wreckage (see Heinz Knoke's account). Therefore could we be looking at just the remaining right half of the cockpit windows? If so, why doesn't this aircraft have the long horizontal right hand window like other B-24D's we've seen?

Where did the top turret go? Would it fit where there is a slight curve in the metal above the cockpit?

What is sitting on the wreckage at the bottom center of the photo? Is that identifiable wreckage? Could it be another aileron or elevator?

The trees in the background of this image are very similar to those in the background of the other two photos. The lighting also suggests that these three images were taken at the same time. Is there anything in any of these photos that confirms that this wreckage is a B-24 (or for that matter, a B-17)? Are the oxygen tanks in the wing photos identifiable as B-17 or B-24 tanks? (Note: The researchers at the Air Force museum believe that both aircraft would use the same type...)

If you have any ideas about how to identify the aircraft in these photos, please send an e-mail to jim@greenharbor.com.

Andy Rooney's Last Regularly Scheduled '60 Minutes' Commentary

October 2011: Sunday October 2nd was Andy Rooney's last scheduled '60 Minutes' commentary. CBS did a retrospective on Rooney and then he did his commentary. Some interesting points:

Rooney said that he doesn't sign autographs and rarely responds to reader letters. It was basically out of character then that the responded to my letter about Robert Post and the Writing 69th (even more surprising, he called me). This was likely a matter of good timing, since my letter arrived as he was working on his memoir, "My War." It was more in character that he ingored my more recent letter about the training photographs (see below).

CBS showed a photo of Rooney with three or four airmen in front of a bomber called 'Mission Belle'. This aircraft appears to be a 385th Bomb Group B-17 and the picture was likely taken later in the war, though prior to April 1944 when this aircraft flew its final mission.

The CBS release about his retirement (though they didn't call it that) said that Rooney was on the first American bombing mission over German soil. I don't think that's true, though it is frequently repeated. I believe that the first American bombing mission over Germany was a January 1943 mission to Wilhelmshaven. The celebrated mission that he definitely was on was to Wilhelmshaven on February 26, 1943. I'd be very surprised if he was on both of those missions. I think it's just a mix-up. Whenever Rooney wrote about his Wilhelmshaven trip it was always the February 26th one.

Jack Nye and Honest Injun

July 2011: The photo below of the B-26 "Honest Injun" was sent to us by Allen Berry (Jack Nye's nephew). Nye piloted the B-26 that Walter Cronkite accompanied on February 1944 mission. See more on this below. Nye is in the back on the right. Arthur Brand (front left) and Ceibert Bragg (front center) are easily identifiable from the photo shown below. Less easy to identify are the other two in the photo. Most likely they are: Norman Rosner (back left) and Enrique Zepeda (front right). Thank you to Allen for sharing this image!

Tomas Hauschild Update

December 2010: Follow this link for an update on Tomas Hauschild who was injured in June in a World War II bomb explosion.

Additional Photos from the Training Session

September 2010: Here are two other photos from the Writing 69th training session. These came to us many years ago courtesy of Robert Elliott, the 92nd Bomb Group's historian.

This is the most often published shot of the Writing 69th, though it only includes six of the eight. The two military men, Andy Rooney and Denton Scott, were left out. From left to right it's Gladwin Hill, William Wade, Robert Post, Walter Cronkite, Homer Bigart, and Paul Manning.

Surrounding an inflatable raft is a large group that includes the journalists, the newsreel cameramen, and others. Though hard to tell, the first person on the left could be Andy Rooney. Behind him is Paul Manning. We cannot identify the person behind Manning. Movie director William Wyler is probably the one at the point of the raft. Behind him is Gladwin Hill. Newsreel cameraman Jim Wright is next. The person rolling up the paper looks a little like Bob Post, but is probably too short to be him. Ken Gordon and Jack Ramsden, two of the newsreel cameramen, are next, then Homer Bigart. We cannot identify the man behind Bigart nor the one next to Ramsden. George Oswald, a newsreel cameraman, is the third person from the right, his face partially obscured. William Wade is leaning in from the far right with Walter Cronkite over his shoulder.

An Update on the Newsreel Cameramen

August 2010: We heard this week from a granddaughter of one of the newsreel cameraman. She identified her grandfather, George Oswald, in the photo on our Unanswered Questions page. He is also identifiable (sitting next to Walter Cronkite) in the photo on the Training page. At least two other photos exist from that training session. We will post them before long.

Tomas Hauschild Injured in WWII Bomb Blast

June 2010: A German newspaper reported this week that Tomas Hauschild, a great friend of the Writing 69th home page, was injured in the blast of a World War II bomb that he and other members of the German Explosive Ordnance Disposal Service were in the process of disarming. Three from the team died in the explosion, which took place on June 1st in the city of Gottingen. Tomas is in the hospital in stable condition after an operation. He has shrapnel injuries from the explosion and burns to his arms, legs, and face. Our thoughts, prayers, and best wishes go out to Tomas and his family.

Update (June 2010): Tomas has been in touch and reports that he is home from the hospital! We’re very glad to hear that he is on the mend and wish him all the best for a speedy recovery.

Update (December 2010): Tomas continues to suffer from the effects of the explosion and reports that he will have an operation on his left ear in December. (He has already had a similar operation on his right ear.) We continue to wish Tomas the best for his physical and emotional recovery from this horrific accident.

Crash Site Photos!

April 2010: In an amazing development, Tomas Hauschild has discovered three photos that are believed to be of the crash site of the B-24 bomber that carried Robert Post and Capt. Adams' crew. These images were in a photo album kept by a neighbor of Gerd Behrens. The first two images show the wing of what appears to be a B-24. The third is a tangle of wreckage, that looks at first glance like a B-17 tail section, but we believe it to be the B-24's nose and cockpit (assuming that the remains of a wing have been twisted nearly vertically).