Herman received Bombardier training at Victorville as well as navigator training at Carlsbad. He had been taught to use the Norden bombsight, that highly guarded military secret. ...

Herman's' first bombing mission was on December 1, 1943. He flew with another B-17 crew whose bombardier had been grounded. Since he had arrived at Thurleigh barely ten days before, and his flying equipment hadn't been issued yet, he had to "beg, borrow and steal"...

Charles L. "Steve" Stevenson was the navigator of Herman's original crew. He and Herman flew side by side in "the nose" of the B-17, and they became close friends....

Merle "M.P." Brown was the co-pilot of Herman's original crew and also on the Liberty Lady. After their interval in Sweden, he and Smithy flew together for several more missions. ...

Smithy (pronounced "Smitty") was the pilot of Herman's B-17 crew and of the Liberty Lady. Smithy and Herman were like brothers. ...

Tom Brokaw's book The Greatest Generation generated a worldwide interest in the Americans who grew up during the depression and then, as soon as they were ready to enter adulthood, went to war....

Well, it's time to formally introduce "The Colonel." Herman lives in Columbia, SC in The Atria, a Senior Living community. ...

I want to know more about what it was like for the bomber crews at Thurleigh. The movie “Twelve O’Clock High” might be the best “visual” we’ve got because it was about Thurleigh. But what I want to know is what was it like?...

The 8th Army Air Force was activated as part of the U.S. Army Air Forces January 28, 1942, at Hunter Field in Savannah, Georgia. Pearl Harbor had just been bombed about a month and a half earlier. ...

In October, Herman's crew went together to New York for the trip to England. In winter months, instead of flying across, the airmen would sail across the Atlantic on one of the ocean liners which had been converted to troop ships....