U.S. Navy VPB-118 – “The Old Crows”
More On VPB-118
This site is managed by Richard Peterson, son of Harold
Peterson, Crew 2 (PPC Dodson). CONTACT
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Ongoing Miscellaneous Comments
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02/24/2007
The 2007 VPB-118 Reunion will be held in Chattanooga, Tennessee from August 31 through September 3. We all thank Glenn Barnes and family for the wonderful reunion this past Labor Day in Rapid City, South Dakota. Please note the wonderful photo of Crew 11 (PPC McCutcheon) which Mary Anne Barnes got from the family of Otto Bunkers.
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05/29/2006, Memorial Day
I added a great cutaway diagram of the PB4Y-2 from the pilot's manual and made some minor modifications today. I recommend that you check the Collings Foundation to see if their planes, including their awesome B-24, are coming to your area this summer.
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10/1/2005
VPB-118 Crew and family: VPB-118 is represented here on Yahoo Groups.
Click button to join
Yahoo Groups. Please contact me if you have any problem
joining. -
10/1/2005
An aviation art buff named Zach Amis informed me that the VPB-118 print commissioned by Henry "Horse" Thompson is on sale at Historic Aviation site. Limited edition, so hurry up!
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5/7/2005
I finally posted photos of the 2004 Reunion. 'Nuf said!
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10/24/2004
Posted additional Park Crew Photos, including three photos of event that caused the loss of the crew and very nice portraits of crew member Mike Marich and PPC Park. I will be doing reunion photos very soon so that there is more than just the intro!
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10/16/2004
Posted Intro page to Reunion 2004 photos. There are some interesting photos and I will post them as soon as I can.
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10/16/2004
Condolences to Mrs. Galloway and family on the loss of her husband Jim.
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10/2/2004
Posted highlights of Tom Bay's (Crew 2) scrap book. There is a flight log that I have to post still, as well as some other possible material. Later this week we meet at the reunion in Missouri.
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6/6/2004
Posted two Park Crew photos! Thanks again, folks, you are making this site something truly meaningful.
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6/1/2004
Posted 2003 Reunion photos, Presidential Unit Citation, FairCen Log article, M.L. Marshall Purple Heart material. Thanks for all the material, folks.
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5/22/2004
I just finished posting an additional, great Crew 8 photo and for the first time a crew photo for Webster's relief crew. It's great to get new photos to post. I have more stuff to post and am working on it as able. Thanks for everyone's help and patience.
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2/1/2004
I've received several messages from people with information, scans, and photos recently. Perhaps the cold weather has people surfing the internet more often, but whatever the reason, I appreciate the input. I will try to budget some time to update the site with some of the stuff I've been working on.
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...previous
A surprise submission from Kurt Stauffer: scans of the entire log book of Crew 10’s George Hatch AOM2C! Also from Kurt, a new photo!
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Coming Up
Photos and other items from the scrapbook of Tom Bay (plane captain of Crew 2, my Dad's crew), courtesy of his son, Walter ... Ground personnel listing ... One-page listing of all VPB-118 personnel for easy searching ... Site hits counter ... Site guestbook.
10/4/2009
I have uploaded all of the video interviews that I had from last year's reunion. Check out the videos page, I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out.
10/3/2009
I haven't posted any comments here in two weeks, but that does not mean that I haven't been busy. I've been doing some restoration work on the Crow mascot, and am excited about the crow's new look. I made a prosthesis for the beak, took off the black tape (which turns out to have been cosmetic/temporary in intention, it seems), filed and scraped off excess glue, and repainted him. He's lookin' good!
I've been updating the chronology, time permitting but the other thing that I did was install and use my video capture hardware to finally create videos from the interviews that we did last year. The result is the new videos page, which will have several videos soon....
9/17/2009
I started a chronology of the squadron a few days ago. I am only adding a paragraph or two a day because I have to synopsize the book which involves a little editing and writing on my part. Please check back to see how it's going. I plan to continue through until the end of the book and then to link from the crew pages to the chronology so that the text is not duplicated.
9/14/2009
I added a Google Search widget to the top right of the main pages. If you tried it yesterday, it was a generic search. After a little cogitating I realized I should make it specific to the site, which it is now. Pretty cool, I think! I started a chronology page but the early part is kind of complicated (earlier squadrons that became the patrol bomber squadrons at the end of the war) so it's taking a little extra time. I hope to have a beginning to post in a few days.
9/6/2009
The Squadron roster page is complete now.
9/5/2009
I added a new page today, with what will eventually include a complete roster of the entire squadron. I am up to Crew 7/13 but I am going by the order in the book so it's not really apparent where I am. Less than half way, I think. However, I have completely realized one goal, which is to get the names of the "ground grippers" on the site for the first time. I wish I had done that a lot sooner. Hopefully tomorrow I will be able to get the rest of the squadron listed. You can access the new page from the site map or from the heading on the Crews page, where I added a link.
8/29/2009
Today I added a proper header to the main pages of the website. It's still pretty basic but I think what I have serves its purose fairly well. The sea image in the background is taken from an actual action photo taken by a VPB-118 crew member; I just used an area of the image with empty sea and changed it from a grayscale image to a blue duotone. I've still got a lot of work to do on the crew pages and other lower-level pages to get them all set up with reasonalby standards-compliant HTML but we're getting there. I should start adding some general chronology soon while working on the page upgrades.
8/10/2009
VPB-118 lost Charlie Hodge on the 6th, I'm sorry to report. Barry Hodge told me he died from complications from heart surgery. Charlie's personality and storytelling will be sorely missed by all. Barry sent me this link to a story in the Memphis Commercial Appeal.
Additionally, I happened across an obituary for Conrad Dodl of the McCutcheon crew just this morning. Conrad passed away about two weeks ago according to the obit.
8/9/2009
I did a major overhaul of the crews page today. Now you should be able to read the table more easily, plus you can resort the data to search for whatever particular information you may be looking for. (You must have javascript turned on for the sorting feature to work.) I want to do another table like this for crew members but will have to do that in another session.
7/20/2009
I got kind of crazy and did something that I had in mind for a while: I added embedded Google Maps for all of the airstrips that I could think of that VPB-118 was stationed at. I think I left out one on Okinawa, the one at the end that wasn't so popular. Anyway, I think it turned out pretty well, see for yourself at the new maps page.
7/19/2009
I added a site map page with links for people that don't have Javascript enabled. I also revised the navigation bar for the main pages. If you go to a lower-level page that has the old menu bar on top, you may possibly navigate to an invalid link. If this happens, please go back to the site map page. I will be updating all of the navigation bars as time permits, as well as ugrading the layouts of all pages.
7/18/2009
I finished scanning the John Hanan (Keiser Crew) albums and am getting ready to send them back to his son, Tom. I have only posted a few images from that collection, but there are some fine images there, taken by John himself.
I have added a small amount of simple Javascript to the pages to facilitate reorganizing the site. I can change structure or content in one spot and it will show up across the site, which is a huge time-saver and allows me to try out more ideas. However, for folks with Javascript turned off the menus will no longer be visible. I should have a site map with links to it provided for those folks very soon.
6/14/2009
I posted two new pages in the Hanan (Crew 13) scrapbook today, bringing the total to four.
6/7/2009
First of all, let me remind you that I am using the blogspot for most of my commnents at this point owing to the ability of visitors to post comments there. I think. Nobody's commented yet.
I posted the sad news that Rogers Fiedler passed away earlier this week on the blog.
I have started posting scans to the Keiser Crew section. In addition to the new images which I will start posting, you will see a preview of the new look for the website. Yes, friends, the training wheels are coming off and you are about to see a more professional look to the site.
5/25/2009
I can't believe that I haven't updated since November 2007. Ouch. The good news is that I will be posting new images soon, and hope to upgrade the entire look and structure of the site in the coming months. Additionally, I started a blogspot that you can access and post to immediately, if the urge takes you. VPB-118 folks should already know that the next reunion is scheduled for Asheville, NC.
11/11/2007
Veteran's Day update: new crew photo of Rinehart Crew and candid Rinehart crew photos; with possible new Hal Olsen nose art.
As many of you know, the next reunion is to be in Chicago, hometown to Tom Peterson (my brother), his wife, and myself (webmaster of this site). We are hoping to visit Great Lakes Naval Training Station and 94th Aero Squadron Restaurant (a good restaurant next to a small airport, with static warplane exhibits) as well take folks on a Chicago River architectural tour. Details to follow.