The last “AS”: the Highlight High Warry Hunting Donald McPherson, who killed 5 enemy planes, died at 103

Donald McPherson was naval fighter on the USS Essex aircraft carrier at the Pacific Theater, where he hired Japanese forces in recent years of war. He won the Congress gold medal and three distinguished flight crosses for his service

However, his daughter Beth Delabar said that his relatives have always felt that McPherson preferred an inheritance reflecting his dedication to faith, family and community instead of her exploits in wartime.

“When everything is done and Papa lists the things he wants to be recalled for … his first first thing would be that he is a man of faith,” she told Beatrice Daily Sun, a newspaper in the south-east of Nebraska who reported McPherson for the first time on August 14.

“It was only in recent years of his life that he has had so many honors and medals,” she said.

McPherson was listed as the last American Ace living in the conflict by American Fighter Aces Association and the Fagen Fighters Wwii Museum. He was honored during the museum victory last weekend at Minnesota. To be considered an ace, a pilot must shoot down five or more enemy planes.

McPherson enlisted in the navy in 1942 at the age of 18. The trainees were not allowed to marry, so he and his wife Thelma were married just after finishing the 18 -month flight program in 1944. He stole F6F Hellcat Fighters against the Japanese as part of Fighter Squadron VF – 83.

He told a mission where he killed two Japanese planes after noticing them near the water on a convergent course. In a video that the Fagen museum played in his honor, McPherson described how he pushed the nose of his plane and shot the first plane, sending this pilot to the ocean.

“But then, I did a wing to see what happened to the second. Using at full speed, my Hellcat responded well, and I supported the relaxation and that exploded,” said McPherson. “Then I turned around and did a lot of violent maneuvers to try to get out of there without being killed.”

When he returned to the aircraft carrier, another sailor underlined a ball hole on the plane about one foot behind where he was seated. His daughter, Donna Mulder, said that his father had told him that experiences like that during the war gave him the feeling that “maybe God had not finished with me”.

So, after his return to the family farm in Adams, in Nebraska, he devoted himself to restoring by helping to start the baseball and softball leagues for the children of the city and as a scout master and in leadership roles in the United Methodist Church of Adams, the American Legion and the veterans of the foreign wars.

The community later appointed the McPherson ball field in honor of Donald and his wife, Thelma, who often maintained a score and ran the concession stand during the matches.