Aero Vintage Books

While I don't come across them often, once in a while I do manage to find photos of brand new B-17 crews. Way back when I was researching a 301st BG crew that went down in February of 45. One of the surviving crew sent me photos that showed them in training, fooling around inside their 17, playing at war with the guns, and pretending to be wounded etc. They were laughing their heads off. I'm reminded of that crew and those photos when I see a graduation photo of a crew. The reality of the war is still out there. It's still adventure. That and they all look so young.

Most if not all of these are from Alexandria, LA.

Great stuff! The trainer ships are a big interest of mine (as many are no doubt sick of hearing ).
The first plane, 43-37578, bounced around from Ardmore to Tinker to Biggs and back to Ardmore.

Chris Brame wrote:Great stuff! The trainer ships are a big interest of mine (as many are no doubt sick of hearing ).
The first plane, 43-37578, bounced around from Ardmore to Tinker to Biggs and back to Ardmore.

While the Osborn B-17 is good, sometimes I shake my head and wish people would look at the actual card.....

43-37578 never was permanently assigned to anything other then Ardmore AAF

43-37578 went to Tinker for after having an accident on 9 June 1944 - co-pilot retracted the landing gear then to make things worse, the aircraft slipped off the jacks on 10 June 44.

Then on 1 October 1944, while on a cross country flight and parked on the Biggs AAF ramp, this aircraft was struck by a B-17 being flown by Brig General Frank A Armstrong Jr (yes, that Armstrong)

She then again had a fourth accident on 21 April 1945 at Ardmore AAF - she was struck by .50 cal fire from another B-17

Should also mention this aircraft was assigned to 2nd AF / 46th BOTW / 222nd AAFBU (CCTS - H) / flight D-3 - (Ardmore AAF)

Don

Can you post more of these shots - except for the Od/G B-17F, all are from Alexandria late war (around the time Alexandria went from being an 2nd AF base to a 3rd AF base) - about June 45

Sadly that's all I have. I've come across them one at a time over the last few years and grab them when I see them.

The 17 marked D2 on the nose has June 45 on the back.
8054 is dated June 44
8051 dated June 44
The crew with the signatures is dated November 44
7784 is also dated June 1944.

All are officially stamped "Official Air Force Photograph, Army Air Base, Alexandria, LA" with the date stamped as well.

Don

To top photo is the rarest of the bunch - it shows the third Air Force X that designated Alexandria and only used for less then 1 month - also not the second B-17 in the background also marked X-C2 (hey, I will take what ever photos I can find of these ZOI B-17's)

8051 is 44-8051

The photo with the signatures is also 44-8051

7784 is 42-97784

8054 ?? where is 8054.... (this is a missing photo in y collection....

I know I have seen the tail of 05 someplace in my stack

just look at the expression on the back row of the top photo I have posted for 44-8051 - a happy crew....

terveurn wrote: (hey, I will take what ever photos I can find of these ZOI B-17's)

Hope you don't already have these:

42-30691 Patsy, at Chanute circa 1945


42-10xxxx A P1, also at Chanute circa 1945 (both from an eBay auction)

And just for fun, two planes from the Chino scrapyard scene in The Best Years of Our Lives combined with photos from when they were in service:


41-24636


42-3236

I also have a small blurry image of an Alexandria B-17 in flight, code looks like X B1; can't remember where it came from but if I got it from you, mea culpa:

-Chris

Some really great photos - the late Alexandria bird I do not have (she should be a 42-102 aircraft) as well as the Avon Park A=P1 was also missing

Do you have this bird - should be Drew AAF - so D-K3

Nope, don't have that one.

terveurn wrote: Did not find any B-17's after 42-102800 without the cheek windows being factory installed

It's taken some digging, but I've found two (The Paducah plane is, I'm 99% sure, another one). Many thanks to Craig Fuller at AAIR for scanning the accident reports:

42-102877 4-1-45 Laredo AAF, TX


42-102895 8-1-44 Hobbs AAF, NM (plane #98)


Another shot showing the fuselage of 895 (#98 on nose) from the Hobbs Facebook page:

The Hobbs Facebook page has over 2000 photos, but most are duplicates. Maybe less than 100 are vintage shots of Hobbs aircraft, but there are many showing the two-digit plane ID numbers.

https://www.facebook.com/HobbsArmyAirFi ... tos_stream

It's possible 895 was the plane reassembled in Hangar 6 at Hobbs a month after the accident as a ground trainer; although the record card doesn't mention it as Class 26:

These are the other stateside 17 images I have.



My version of Patsy


A couple of F models

The George Hart Crew taken at a training base in Florida

They survived the tail end of combat in the ETO with the 8th

Been working my way through organizing my photo files (again) and found a shot with two more "X" Alexandria planes, with an "AL" in between:

From an eBay listing some three years ago. And again if it was one of yours, terveurn - again mea culpa.

Could more for your to ID


Gulfport P-Y2 -- looks like 42-5728
Gulfport P-C1 (its a long serial number, so possibly a 42-102 number)