| What They Did After the War |
| Al Locke In the fall of 1945, Al resumed his studies at the University of Oklahoma in Norman. In 1946, Al was appointed as a first lieutenant in the Air Reserves. He graduated from OU in June 1950 with a BS in Electrical Engineering. In 1953 he was designated as a standby reservist with the 14th Air Force at Robins Air Force Base, Georgia. Al worked for the Oklahoma Gas and Electric Company in Oklahoma City from 1950 until his death in 1972. He published several research articles and served as a representative on a national committee planning the transition to the metric system by the electrical engineering profession. At the time of his death, Al was supervisor, Department of Transmission and Distribution. He was active in the Warr Acres Kiwanis and his church, Putnam City Baptist. Al and his wife Patsy had three children; Linda born August 27, 1945, Jean born November 15, 1948 and Allen born March 21, 1951. After the kids had all graduated from high school, Patsy went back to college and earned her degree in elementary education. She completed her MA in Library Science in 1977, and taught school in the Putnam City school district in Warr Acres OK until she retired in 1987. Patsy is now married to Walt Oman, minister to seniors at Emmanuel Baptist Church in Pullman, Washington. Linda is a professor of human nutrition at Washington State University, Spokane, and is the mother of Melinda Staley, who assembled this web page. Jean is an interior designer and runs her own antique business in Oklahoma City. Allen is an architectural engineer in Tulsa and owns his own engineering company. |
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| John Hortenstine In 1986 I obtained the address of John Hortenstine, our navigator, and we began corresponding. When the 448th held a reunion in Hampton, Virginiain 1992, we met there and had a great time reminiscing. The following information was gleaned from our contacts via letters and the reunion. After the ditching, he served for about three months in Intelligence, then got to thinking that, according to regulations, if he went back to flying he could collect flying pay for the previous three months. When we got together at a 448th reunion in 1992, he told me, "I got greedy and requested assignment to flying duty." He served as an instructor for crews taking PFF training and also flew eight night missions scattering propaganda leaflets behind the German lines. After the war, John, who remained in the Air Force Reserves, went back to Virginia Tech, where he was enrolled when he enlisted, and graduated in 1946 with a degree in chemical engineering. He worked at various engineering jobs until he was recalled to active duty during the Korean War. After flying sixty-one missions in a B-26, he returned to the States, then was sent to England for a four-month tour. He was stationed at Alconbury, which is in the same area as Seething and Hethel, where we were based during WWII. In his first letter to me in February, 1986, he wrote, �I even looked up some of my old English girl friends.� John was discharged in 1952, but remained in the Reserves in the Air Transport Command until he retired as a lieutenant colonel at age 60. After being released from active duty, John resumed his career as an engineer in Abingdon, Virginia, and later got involved in real estate. When we began corresponding in 1986, he had quit his engineering practice but was still doing a �little real estate work,� as he put it, and then added, �I have a farm or two to keep me busy.� John did not marry until 1971. He and his wife, Molly, had one son, who was born in 1973 or 1974. In early 1993 Molly called to tell me that John had died suddenly of a heart attack. Dale VanBlair |
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| What Dale did after the War |
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| Errol Self Virgil Carroll Frank Cappella Pedro Paez Hank Boisclair We do not know what these members of the crew did after the war, or if they are still living. |
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| Al Locke in February 1961. |