WWII Forums Quiz Part VII

I looked some more and found a picture of the rear gun on the web. It does not give any notes for the picture but you can see the slits in the fuselage for the air to come in.
I also have an interior shot of the gun position if anyone is interested.
Scroll to the very bottom of the page.

Nakajima G5N1 Liz

 

TA152, yes, please post some more info on that turret system! Thanks!

Here's today's unknown covey of birds....

 

They look like early model Russian SB 2 bombers in Spanish employ judging from the fuselage markings.

 

Downed in flames after a short burst! Over to you!

 

BWHAhahahahah......

What famous American served as the operations officer for the Navy Air Transport Unit on Bouganville, Vella Lavella, and then Green Island in the South Pacific during World War II?

 

Richard M. Nixon, LT USN

Richard Nixon joined the U.S. Navy at the age of 29. Richard Milhous Nixon was born on 9 January 1913 to Francis Anthony and Hanna Milhous Nixon in Yorba Linda, California. After attending public schools in California, Nixon earned his Bachelor of Arts degree from Whittier College in 1934. Continuing his education at Duke University, where he acquired a Bachelor of Laws in 1937, Nixon returned to Whittier, California to practice law. In January 1942, Nixon became an attorney for the Office of Emergency Management in Washington, D.C. where he worked until he accepted an appointment as lieutenant junior grade in the United States Naval Reserve on 15 June 1942. Following his appointment, Nixon began aviation indoctrination training at the Naval Training School, Naval Air Station in Quonset Point, Rhode Island. After completing the course in October 1942, he went to the Naval Reserve Aviation Base in Ottumwa, Iowa, where he served as Aide to the Executive Officer until May 1943. Looking for more excitement, Nixon volunteered for sea duty and reported to Commander Air Force, U.S. Pacific Fleet where he was assigned as Officer in Charge of the South Pacific Combat Air Transport Command at Guadalcanal in the Solomons and later at Green Island. His unit prepared manifests and flight plans for C-47 operations and supervised the loading and unloading of the cargo aircraft. For this service he received a Letter of Commendation from the Commander South Pacific Area and South Pacific Force for "meritorious and efficient performance of duty as Officer in Charge of the South Pacific Combat Air Transport Command... " On 1 October 1943, Nixon was promoted to lieutenant.
From August through December of 1944, Nixon was assigned to Fleet Air Wing EIGHT. From December through March 1945, he served at the Bureau of Aeronautics, Navy Department, Washington, D.C. In March, his next assignment was as the Bureau of Aeronautics Contracting Officer for Terminations in the Office of the Bureau of Aeronautics General Representative, Eastern District, headquartered in New York City. In that capacity he had temporary additional duty at various places, including Washington D.C., Philadelphia, Buffalo, New York City, and East Hartford, Connecticut. When he was released from active duty on 10 March 1946. He was promoted to Commander in the Naval Reserve on 1 June 1953.
While on active duty besides the Letter of Commendation, Nixon earned the American Campaign Medal, the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal, and the World War II Victory Medal. He is entitled to two engagement stars on the Asiatic- Pacific Campaign Medal for supporting air action in the Treasury- Bougainville operations from 27 October to 15 December 1943 and for consolidation of the northern Solomons from 15 December 1943 to 22 July 1944. Nixon transferred to the Retired Reserve of the Naval Reserve on 1 June 1966.

(I just visited the Nixon Library a couple of months ago while in CA on business )

 

I got my scanner working again. I will write what the caption says about the turret but I for one do not have a clue how the thing works.

"Streamlined tail gun position rotated on a longitudial axis to adjust position of slit for 20mm cannon which was not installed in this view. Small hole on frame holds one of three fins that rotate the turret with deflected air. Small wheel served as tail skid.
This view of the tail cone shows two of the three right angle positioned fins used to rotate the gun turret. When cannon was twisted to the desired direction to fire, mechanical linkages adjusted to fin angle and airstream rotated the turret."

 

Tail gunners position viewed from inside the fuselage. One of Liz's two 20mm cannon was located here. Gun position featured bicycle type seat layout with pedals which gunner used to traverse his drum fed weapon, with aid of outside wind deflectors. The Dorsal 20mm was power operated.


After the war the engineer got a job working for the USAF at Tachikawa Air Base making modifications on USAF aircraft. He was killed in an accident in April 1951 at the age of 42.

 

good enough Texson. However, why didn't he ever get a guest appearance on Black Sheep Squadron?

 

T. A. Gardner wrote:

They couldn't apply enough pancake makeup to cover his 5 o'clock shadow???

 

TA152, Thanks for posting the info!
It sounds like the turret rotated in response to sticking out those 3 vanes at the right angle to get the turret to rotate to the position the gunner determines by aiming inside the turret. It appears an angle around the long axis of the fuselage and the gun could be moved along the arc of the opening on the turret to cover the firing field of regard. (But it seems complicated compared to azimuth and elevation.)
Did it say how well it worked ???

 

Next Quiz Question:

When the draft hit in WWII, professional teams were left short handed. This caused two NFL teams to field only one team together in the 1943 season: What were the two teams and what was that one team called???

 

NationMaster - Encyclopedia: Steagles

Steagles is the popular nickname for the team created by the temporary merger of two National Football League (NFL) teams, the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Philadelphia Eagles, during the 1943 season. The teams were forced to merge because both had lost many players to military service due to World War II. After the season the merger was dissolved. The Eagles resumed their traditional operation while the Steelers merged with the Chicago Cardinals for the 1944 season, creating a team known as Card-Pitt.

Officially the team was known simply as the Eagles (without a city designation), the Eagles-Steelers, or the Steelers-Eagles. (The NFL never even registered "Steagles" as a trademark.)

 

A+++, Macrusk! Carry on!

 

To carry on the sports theme:

Who played what sport in London's White City Stadium on 13 February 1944? What was the name given the game? And who won?

For bonus, what was the follow-up game called, and who won?

 

From Time magazine:



"The U.S. and Canada had at each other on a London football field last week. The field, with barrage ballons loafing palely overhead in the springtime sky, was London's White City Stadium. There were no cheerleaders, chrysanthemums, furry beauties or meandering drunks; but there was plenty of color. The crowd of 55,000 uniformed men & women heard a U.S. band blast out the Stars and Stripes Forever and the Notre Dame Victory March, and Canada's musicians, in a dozen different tartans, shook the air with the skirling of 112 massed bagpipes.
Half the game was played by Canadian rules, half by American. This meant that during the first half there were twelve men on a side ; interference was forbidden more than three yards ahead of the line of scrimmage; the backfield could be in motion before the ball was snapped.
But the Canadian rules were no handicap to the U.S. team, from the moment the Canadian Army's Mustangs fumbled the opening kickoff. For the U.S. Infantry Blues, Quarterback Tommy Thompson of Fort Worth, Tex., formerly of the professional Philadelphia Eagles, threw two touchdown passes to Halfback Corporal Johnny Bayne, from Ridge Farm, Ill. Corporal Bayne ran the ball to another score, and the Blues just missed two more close chances. Final score: Blues -18; Mustangs -0."


Never found what they called the game or the follow up game The reporter refers to the springtime sky (13 Feb is hardly springtime!)

 

I reread the article and it said the engines they put in the Liz had 20% less horsepower than advertised and the aircraft was not suited for a bomber. They had only built six aircraft and took the bombers and stripped out the turrets and made them transports. They were stationed at Katori Air Base and flew to places like Hong Kong, Formosa, Tinian, the Marianas and Manila.
They flew in personnel, ground support equipment, munitions, medicine, and other priority items. On the return flight to Japan they took up to 200 white boxes containing the remains of Japanese soldiers killed in action. They also brought fruits and vegetables that were not available in Japan.
Two aircraft out of six survived the war.
I guess the turrets were never tried out in action.

 

Texson66, I think you have an article on the 2nd game -as the first game in February 1944 was betwen the Mustangs and the Pirates.

From The Half-Million: The Canadians in Britain 1939-1946, CP Stacey & Barbara M Wilson:

"The affair began, characteristically enough in a meeting ina pub, Major W. Denis Whitaker of the Royal Hamilton Light Infantry, a sometime quarterback with the Hamilton Tigers, found himself sitting beside a lieutenant in the American recreational services who turned out to have a special interest in football. What was more he had lately received from the States complete equipment for six teams. Almoust inevitably, the idea of an international match arose. Whitaker approached Lieutenant-General Kenneth Stuart, chief of staff at Canadian Military Headquarters, whom he had known at Royal Military College. Stuart was enthusiastic, and the result was the "Tea Bowl" game played at London's White City Stadium between the Canadian Army Mustangs and the Pirates of the Central Base Section, U.S. Army.

For the Mustangs Whitaker recruited a strong team of Canadian peacetime footballers, chiefly but not entirely from his own 2nd Canadian Division. Among them were Major J.A. Nicklin, a veteran of the Winnipeg Blue Bombers, Lieutenant Orville Burke of hte Ottawa Rough Riders, and Captain George Hees from teh Toronto Argonauts. THanks to Stuarts arrangements, the team had six weeks' hard trainign before the contest. This paid off on the day of the game, 13 February 1944.

It was a great occasion, with a crowd of some 30,000 and music at halftime by the band of Headquarters, European Theater of Operations, U.S.A., and massed Canadian pipe bands. The first half was played under American rules, and at halftime there was no score. In the second half, under Canadian rules, the Mustangs took charge. The last quarter was dramatic. To quote a broadcast the next day by Captain Ted (afterwards Sir Edward) Leather, the Canadian manager, 'Orville Burke, who played one of the greatest games of his career, threw a forty yard pass to Denny Whitaker who romped home in the clear for the second Canadian counter.' With the score 11-6, in the last minute of play Burke threw another pass to Nicklin, who crossed the line just as the whistle blew. The Canadians won 16-6, and Whitaker, teh Canadian captain, now a brigadier-general, still has the silver teapot that served as a trophy.

There was, from the Canadian point of view, a less satisfactory sequel. Whitaker's arrangement with the Americans had been that there would be only one game, a 'sudden death' affair. But General Stuart while at the game had discussed a rematch with an American general. It emerged that there was a United Staes infantry division (referred to for security purposes as the 'Blue' Division, but actually the 29th, commanded by Major-General Charles H. Gerhardt) which had a football team that the Americans believed, with reason as it turned out, could 'put up a very much better game' than the Central Base sections boys. (The 29th, incidentally, had been the first U.S. divsion to arrive in the United Kingdom, and it landed on Omaha Beach on D-Day.)

The generals arrangment turned out to be awkward for the Canadians. The Canadian team had been disbanded, Whitaker had been promoted to command his battalion, and action was comparatively imminent. However, the team as far as possible was reconstituted. Nicklin was not available; he was second-in-command of the 1st Canadian Parachute Battalion, and the commander of the British brigade in which he ws serving would not release him, nor did Nicklin* himself care to risk and injury that migh tput him out of the coming operation. George Hees was also unavailable. The Americand had the advantage of the services of at least one crack professional player, Sergeant Tommy Thompson, late of the Philadelphia Eagles.

The second game, called this time the "Coffee Bowl,' was played at the White City on 19 March, before a crowd estimated at 50,000. Thompson was the star, and the Blues, in the word of one newspaperman, 'ran roughshod' over the Mustangs. A Canadian officer wrote, 'The fine display put on by the massed Canadian pipe bansd compensated to some degree for the defeat. But the Canadians lost, 18-0." The book has 2 photos one with Whitaker and and PFC Frank Dombrowski (USA) with the Tea Bowl trophy as well as one of the stadium crowd Feb 1944.

* Nicklin was killed on 24 March 1945, while commanding his battalion in the Rhine crossing operation.

Texson66, your turn to ask another question.

 

Ah not sure if there is a question pending?

 

My bad. I'm on travel so I would appreciate if someone could post a question. Thanks!