Obituaries

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Leslie Neilson
Born: February 11, 1926

Although his career stretches back half a century and includes over 100 films and countless TV programs, Leslie Nielsen gained true fame late in his career, when he starred in a series of comic spoofs beginning with 1980's Airplane!.

The son of a Canadian Mountie and the brother of Canada's future Deputy Prime Minister, Nielsen was born in Regina, Saskatchewan, on February 11, 1926. He developed an early knack for acting when he was forced to lie to his disciplinarian father in order to avoid punishment, and he went on to become a radio announcer after serving in the Royal Canadian Air Force during WWII (despite being legally deaf, the result of a childhood illness). To prepare himself for his future career, Nielsen studied at Toronto's Academy of Radio Arts, which was run by CBC commentator and future Bonanza star Lorne_Greene. After several years in radio, he won a scholarship to New York's Neighborhood Playhouse, where he studied acting under Sanford_Meisner and dance under Martha Graham. He then spent five years appearing on such live television programs as Tales From Tomorrow before making his film bow in Ransom! (1956). With the exception of his starring roles in the sci-fi classic Forbidden_Planet (1956) and the popular Debbie_Reynolds-vehicle Tammy and the Bachelor (1957), much of Nielsen's early work was undistinguished; he was merely a handsome leading man in an industry overstocked with handsome leading men. An attempt to do a "Davy Crockett" by starring as Francis Marion in the Disney TV saga The Swamp Fox resulted in a nifty title tune but little else. Nielsen went on to star in such series as The New Breed, Bracken's World, and Hawaii Five-O (1968), but found he was more in demand as a heavy than as a hero.

A notorious offscreen practical joker and cut-up, Nielsen was not given an onscreen conduit for this trait until he was cast in the Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker spoof Airplane (1980). This led to his deadpan characterization of monumentally inept police lieutenant Frank Drebin on Z.A.Z.'s cult TV series Police_Squad, which in turn spawned the 1988 hit The Naked Gun and two sequels. Nielsen also found success in a number of other film spoofs, so much, in fact, that those familiar only with his loopy comedy roles are invariably surprised that, once upon a time, he took himself deadly seriously in films like Harlow (1965) and The_Poseidon_Adventure (1972). Hal Erickson, Rovi


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8vtcHGdchE
 
After watching Leslie Nielsen play serious roles for years the change to slapstick was unexpected.
I do remember him for the the comedy roles first when I think of him now and it always brings a smile to my face.

RIP Leslie.
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Wheels
 
Bill Foxley :salute:
Bill Foxley, who has died aged 87, was considered the most badly burned airman to survive the Second World War; his example and support became an inspiration to later generations who suffered similar severe disabilities.
Foxley was the navigator of a Wellington bomber that crashed immediately after taking off from Castle Donington airfield on March 16 1944. He escaped unscathed but, hearing the shouts of a trapped comrade, went back into the aircraft despite an intense fire. Foxley was the navigator of a Wellington bomber that crashed immediately after taking off from Castle Donington airfield on March 16 1944. He escaped unscathed but, hearing the shouts of a trapped comrade, went back into the aircraft despite an intense fire.

He managed to drag his wireless operator free, suffering severe burns in the process. "The plane was like an inferno," he said later. "I had to climb out of the astrodome at the top and that's when I got burned." His sacrifice was not rewarded, however, as his comrade died shortly afterwards, as did two other crewmen.

Foxley was admitted to Queen Victoria Hospital, East Grinstead, with horrific burns to his hands and face. The fire had destroyed all the skin, muscle and cartilage up to his eyebrows. He had lost his right eye and the cornea of the remaining eye was scarred, leaving him with seriously impaired vision .

He came under the care of Sir Archibald McIndoe, the pioneering plastic surgeon, and over the next three and a half years underwent almost 30 operations to rebuild his face, including procedures to give him a new nose and build up what was left of his hands.

He finally left hospital in December 1947, when he was discharged from the RAF as a warrant officer. Though he did his best never to let on, he was rarely free from pain for the rest of his life.

A notable witness to his courage was Winston Churchill. During a brief convalescence in 1946 in Montreux, Foxley and a fellow burns victim, Jack Allaway, found themselves in the gardens of a house where Churchill was painting. After watching how the two men manipulated cups of tea with their disfigured hands, Churchill walked over and offered each a cigar. Allaway reportedly then dated Churchill's daughter Mary.

William Foxley was born in Liverpool on August 17 1923. He was 18 when, in 1942, he joined the RAF to train as a navigator. Posted to Bomber Command, he was nearing the end of his training course when his Wellington crashed.

After being discharged from the RAF he worked in the retail trade in Devon but wanted to return to Sussex and be near to East Grinstead. For many years he had a distinguished career in facilities' management at the London headquarters of the Central Electricity Generating Board, where he was the terror of contactors. Many of the workmen were unaware that he was nearly blind, and when a redecoration job had been completed Foxley would press his face up to within a few inches of the wall and glare at it, not letting on that it was the only way he could inspect the paint work.
Foxley had to overcome very public horror of his scarred features. Commuting daily by train from Crawley to London, the seat next to his often remained empty. Passengers who moved to take up the seat would change their minds at the last moment, prompting Foxley to tell them: "It's all right. I'm not going to bite you."

In 1969 he appeared (with officer rank, for effect) in the film Battle of Britain, as a badly burned pilot who is introduced to a WAAF officer, played by Susannah York, in an celebrated scene set in an RAF operations room.

The hospital ward at East Grinstead had been full of men who had suffered severe burns. Such was their indomitable spirit that they formed the association known as the Guinea Pig Club, in honour of McIndoe's pioneering and unproven surgery. Considered by its members to be more exclusive than any smart London club, the Guinea Pig provided a support network for burns victims throughout their lives. Foxley once commented that being a "pig" meant "everything" to him.

Nor did he restrict his support to veterans of the Second World War. Foxley also gave immense encouragement to those badly burned during the Falklands conflict as well as in Iraq and Afghanistan. With two fellow "pigs", he set up the charity Disablement in the City, which grew into Employment Opportunities, of which the Duke of Edinburgh was president. After developing into a nationwide organisation, Employment Opportunities merged in 2008 with the Shaw Trust.
Foxley also devoted a great deal of his time to raising funds for the Blond McIndoe Research Foundation, even getting sponsored, aged 80, to abseil down a fireman's tower. "There's nothing to it," he said afterwards.

Unable to play sport, Foxley took to long-distance running and would often run 12 to 18 miles a day, an activity he kept up until he was in his seventies. Twice he trained for the London Marathon, but minor injuries thwarted his participation on both occasions. He rode a bicycle to the supermarket until a few months before his death and regularly paraded at the annual service of Remembrance at the Cenotaph.

The nature of Foxley's injuries left him unable to smile or communicate his emotions. The most animated feature of his reconstructed face was its glass eye, which glinted when it caught the light. None the less, he never lost his positive approach to life. When asked how his experiences had affected him, he would reply: "It's your personality that will come through, whatever. I've never let it worry me too much; I've just got on with it."

Bill Foxley, a remarkable and courageous man, died on December 5. He married his first wife, Catherine, who nursed him at East Grinstead Hospital, in 1947. She died in 1971. He is survived by their two sons and by a daughter from a brief second marriage.

source: The Telegraph
 
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Air Commodore John Sowrey :salute:

Air Commodore John Sowrey, who has died aged 90, was a member of a remarkable RAF family whose members fought in both World Wars; he himself became an ace fighter pilot in the Western Desert, and in the 1950s tested the latest jet fighters.
Flying Hurricanes with No 73 Squadron, Sowrey had his first success on June 15 1941. Supporting the 7th Armoured Division near Halfaya, his section encountered two Messerschmitt Bf 109s. Sowrey engaged them and shot one down. He was back in action that afternoon, when he shot down another.

A few days later Sowrey was distraught to learn that his younger brother, Jimmy, who was based at a nearby landing ground, had been shot down in his Hurricane and killed, just two weeks after joining his squadron.

Sowrey joined No 213 Squadron and flew during the campaign in Syria against Vichy French forces before returning to the desert a year later as a flight commander with No 80 Squadron. On May 21 1942 he and his wingman shared in the destruction of a Junkers 88 bomber, which crash-landed in the desert; two days later they accounted for another, which came down in the sea.

Near Bir Hacheim on June 10, Sowrey and his formation encountered a force of Stuka dive bombers. He shot one down but was then forced to crash-land in the desert and walk back to his base. Three weeks later, after engaging more Stukas, he once again found himself on foot in the desert.

The Eighth Army had established a defensive line at El Alamein. Late in the afternoon of July 4, Sowrey and his section intercepted a force of enemy dive bombers attacking Allied troops. He soon shot down one but, while disposing of a second, he collided with his victim and was forced to bail out. Attacked while descending in his parachute, he took two days to regain friendly lines where, due to his dark complexion, he was taken for an Italian — and again shot at.

Shortly afterwards he was rested, having destroyed five enemy aircraft and shared in the destruction of two others.

John Adam Sowrey was born in Cambridge on January 5 1920 and educated at Tonbridge School. His father and his two uncles had distinguished careers in the RFC and RAF, and John was awarded a King's Cadetship to RAF Cranwell, graduating in March 1940.

Within weeks he was in action with No 613 Squadron, flying Lysanders on convoy patrols and dropping supplies to the beleaguered British Expeditionary Force at Calais. In March 1941 he became a fighter pilot flying Hurricanes and soon left for Egypt, where he was attached to No 73 Squadron.

After 18 months of almost continuous operations, Sowrey instructed trainee fighter pilots before going to Kenya, from where he flew communications aircraft around East Africa and the Indian Ocean. In November 1943 he was made an adviser to No 336 Squadron of the Greek Air Force, and for eight months flew Hurricanes on shipping protection and air defence duties off the Libyan coast.

After returning to Britain in June 1944, Sowrey joined No 131 Squadron to fly Spitfires on high altitude patrols, bomber escort sorties and offensive sweeps. For his long and sustained period of flying throughout the war he was awarded a DFC .

After serving as adjutant of No 603 Auxiliary Air Force Squadron, Sowrey went to Farnborough in 1951 to attend the Empire Test Pilots' School. For three years he tested the latest jet fighters, including the Hunter, Swift and Javelin. When he flew the only surviving prototype of the Javelin (the other two having crashed), the aircraft's only hydraulic system failed, making the flying controls virtually immovable.

Sowrey was ordered to bail out, but did not fancy a parachute descent into the Welsh mountains in winter. Instead he nursed the aircraft back to a safe landing at Boscombe Down. He was awarded an AFC, the fifth member of the Sowrey family to receive the decoration. The Gloster Aircraft Company presented him with a gold watch.

In 1955 Sowrey commanded the fighter wing at RAF Wattisham, flying Hunter day fighters and Meteor night fighters. On one occasion he led the wing over Buckingham Palace for the annual Battle of Britain Day fly-past.

After three years on the staff at Nato headquarters in Oslo, where he was able to indulge in his love of winter sports, he commanded the RAF station at North Luffenham, which housed a Thor nuclear ballistic missile squadron and a Bloodhound anti-aircraft missile unit.

In the summer of 1963 he went to Delhi as air adviser at the High Commission. During a visit to India by the Duke of Edinburgh, Sowrey acted as his personal pilot, flying him to various venues in a Dakota.

After a staff tour in the MoD, Sowrey retired from the RAF in 1968. He was awarded a Queen's Commendation for Valuable Service in the Air.

His first wife, Audrey, was an accomplished dress designer and established a small retail outlet, Regamus, in Knightsbridge . Sowrey worked in the background, and one of his tasks was to deliver an outfit to Buckingham Palace for Lady Diana Spencer to wear for her engagement photographs.

Sowrey and Audrey bought properties in the French Alps and the Italian Riviera, later moving to Nice. He was thus able to continue skiing until late in life. He also competed in the national gliding championships in the early 1950s, and was an accomplished sailor. He owned a number of yachts and crossed the North Sea to Norway and Sweden, sailed to France and enjoyed regular sailing holidays in the Mediterranean. He was also an enthusiastic and competent painter in watercolours.

John Sowrey died on November 30. His wife Audrey, whom he married in 1952, died in 1993. In 1994 he married, secondly, Lorna, who survives him with two daughters of his first marriage. His cousin is Air Marshal Sir Freddie Sowrey.

source: The Telegraph
 
Group Captain Ron Duckenfield :salute:

Ron Duckenfield, who has died aged 93, flew Hurricanes during the Battle of Britain and shot down three enemy aircraft; later he spent over two years in Rangoon Jail as a prisoner of the Japanese.
Duckenfield left for France on May 11 1940, a few days after joining No 501 Squadron. Flying in to reinforce the air component of the British Expeditionary Force, he was badly injured when the transport aircraft in which he was a passenger crashed on landing at Bethenville. Evacuated back to England, he noted that "on my first visit to France, my feet never touched the ground".

Duckenfield rejoined No 501 just as the Battle of Britain began. Flying from Hawkinge on the Kent coast he was soon in action and shared in the destruction of a Stuka dive-bomber over Dover on July 29. On August 15 he shot down a Dornier bomber and damaged a second. Flying almost every day as the Battle intensified, he shot down two Messerschmitt Bf 109 fighters. He was mentioned in despatches.

Byron Leonard Duckenfield was born in Sheffield on April 15 1917, the son of a cavalryman serving in Mesopotamia. He was educated at the city's Central School (where he first demonstrated an aptitude for languages) and, after a brief period as an assistant milkman, joined the RAF .

In September 1940 Duckenfield joined the Air Fighting Development Unit to test new fighters and captured enemy aircraft. After a year which he described as "the most rewarding of my RAF career" he was awarded the AFC. In February 1942 he was appointed to command No 615 Squadron flying Hurricanes and a month later sailed with the squadron for India. Flying from Jessore, operations against the Japanese commenced in December as the enemy advanced into the Arakan.

Duckenfield flew armed reconnaissance sorties and on December 27 led eight Hurricanes to attack Magwe airfield. Over the target his engine failed and he was forced to crash land in a creek 200 miles behind enemy lines. He was soon captured and put in solitary confinement before being taken to the notorious Rangoon Jail.
Despite the harsh treatment, Duckenfield decided to derive some benefits from his incarceration. With his flair for languages he started to teach himself Japanese and over the next two years created a Japanese/English dictionary: it was the beginning of a long association with the language and the people of Japan. Finally, on May 2 1945, an RAF reconnaissance pilot flying over Rangoon Jail saw "Japs Gone" painted in large letters on the roof. Within days the skeletal prisoners were liberated.

After recuperating in England, Duckenfield returned to duty with the RAF. In 1947 he joined the British Forces of Occupation in Japan before attending the School of Oriental Studies, where he spent two years studying for a degree in Japanese. In 1950 he returned to flying when he commenced a two-year appointment commanding No 19 Squadron flying the Meteor jet fighter.

After a number of staff appointments in the UK and overseas he returned to Japan to spend three years as the air attaché in Tokyo before retiring from the RAF in June 1969.

Duckenfield joined Rolls-Royce and was appointed marketing manager for Japan, giving him many opportunities to return to the country. In April 1979 he became the company's senior executive adviser for the Far East and was based in Tokyo for three years. His language skills and understanding of the country and its people was a great asset to the company.

During his long postwar association with Japan, Duckenfield gained an increasing respect for the Japanese people. He made many friends in the country and was admired for promoting Anglo/Japanese relations.

In retirement he was an avid walker, often covering fifteen miles a day. He also took on a number of commitments teaching and translating Japanese.

Ron Duckenfield died on November 19. He married Diana Maidment in October 1939 and she died in 1979. In 1980 he married, secondly, Virgie, who survives him with a daughter from his first marriage. A son who served in the RAF predeceased him.

source: The Telegraph
 
My grandfather and hero.


Eldon D. Triggs, Sr., 88, of Cheyenne died Oct. 11, 2010 at Cheyenne Regional Medical Center.

He was born March 11, 1922, in Ayrshire, Iowa, and was raised by his widowed mother, Lizzie Triggs. He married Beverly A. Freimuth on May 16, 1941, in Blair, Neb. He was a veteran of the U.S. Navy, serving aboard the USS Saratoga and wounded at Iwo Jima, during WWII, where he was awarded the Purple Heart. He later retired from the Department of the Treasury and later worked as a tax and management consultant.
 
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