[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 51 (Monday, March 25, 2019)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E347]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 HONORING CAPTAIN JOHN FREDERICK WILSON

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. JOHN R. CURTIS

                                of utah

                    in the house of representatives

                         Monday, March 25, 2019

  Mr. CURTIS. Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor Captain John 
Frederick Wilson, as he celebrates his 100th birthday.
  Born on April 2, 1919 and raised in Park City, Utah, John Frederick 
Wilson, known affectionately as ``Jack'', was one the few pilots 
trained at BYU. On December 11, 1941, four days after the Japanese 
surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, he joined the Army Air Corps.
  After learning to fly the four-engine B-24 Liberator bomber--an 
aircraft featured in the Hollywood film ``Unbroken''--he was assigned 
to the 90th bombing group in the Fifth Air Force of the Army Air Corps. 
He was sent by ship to Pearl Harbor, and then to New Guinea, where he 
became pilot and captain of a ten-member B-24 crew.
  Jack and his crew were assigned to seek out and destroy the Japanese 
airstrips in the island Pacific. Given his prowess as a pilot, Jack and 
his crew were soon reassigned to reconnaissance missions to track the 
Japanese fleet. His beloved B-24 was stripped of all bombs, bomb bays, 
machine guns, and other defensive weapons, so that the weight could be 
replaced with extra gas tanks to support their long-distance 
reconnaissance missions. His biggest fear rapidly became encountering 
not enemy aircraft, but running out of fuel. ``My career as a B-24 
pilot basically consisted of long periods of boredom punctuated with 
moments of terror.''
  Jack and his crew were dispatched to a small airstrip on an island 
near Okinawa. They were assigned to fly five days a week to the North 
China sea, to track the Japanese fleet. He there became as member of 
the famed ``Jolly Rogers'' and was issued a card that he has carried in 
his wallet to this day: ``Having been assigned to the best damned heavy 
bomb group, and having paid his dues, Captain Jack F. Wilson is hereby 
considered a member in good standing of the Jolly Rogers.''
  Jack refused to participate in the demonization of the Japanese that 
was popular during and after the war. ``There are good people 
everywhere,'' he taught his children and grandchildren. At one time, a 
typhoon had threatened the island airstrip and the Okinawan people 
showed him a cave that he and his B-24 crew sheltered in, thereby 
saving their lives.
  After the war, Jack used his flying skills to help locate wildfires 
and his people skills to create the National Interagency Fire Center in 
Boise, Idaho, which bears his name.
  Madam Speaker, I ask you and my colleagues to honor a native Utahn, 
the last remaining B-24 pilot from World War II, and extend warm 
greetings to Mr. Wilson on April 2, 2019, his 100th birthday. We 
commend him for his life of service and valor in defense of his 
country.

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