Gail Halvorsen

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Gail Halvorsen in 1989 on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the Soviet blockade of Berlin
Gail Halvorsen around 1983 at Tempelhof Airport
Gail Halvorsen ties sweets to small parachutes
Gail Halvorsen at the inauguration of Gail Halvorsen School on June 15, 2013

Gail Seymour "Hal" Halvorsen (born October 10, 1920 in Salt Lake City ) is a former pilot in the United States Air Force . It flew in 1948/1949 during the Berlin Airlift ("Operation Vittles") and became famous around the world as a cherry bomber, first in Berlin and later under the English name Candy Bomber . From 1970 to 1974 Halvorsen was the commandant of Tempelhof Airport . He is Colonel a. D. and honorary member of CARE Germany-Luxembourg . By the time he retired with the rank of Colonel on August 31, 1974 , he had done more than 31 years of military service and more than 8,000 hours of flight time.

Raisin Bomber

Halvorsen was the first pilot who before landing on the in the US sector of Berlin located Tempelhof airport for the curious there on small piles of rubble on the Neuköllner threw fortified waiting page children on little parachutes of candy. These actions ("Operation Little Vittles" - Operation Small Provisions) brought the pilots and aircraft involved in the airlift the name " Raisin Bomber" ("Candy Bomber" in the USA). Since the planes flew into Tempelhof every 90 seconds, the waiting children could not distinguish his machine from the others from the ground. He therefore agreed with the children that he would "wiggle" the wings when approaching (hence his nickname "Uncle Wobble Wings") in order to identify himself.

These actions were soon picked up and published by the press. This triggered a wave of support, Halvorsen and his crew soon had 425 kilos of sweets to drop off every day. At the end of the airlift, a total of around 25 aircraft crews had dropped 23 tons of sweets over Berlin. As a motive for the dropping of chocolate, chewing gum and other sweets, Halvorsen said that he had done this to please the children in bombed Berlin, used to hardship and privation. Many contemporary witnesses agree that these actions had a significantly positive influence on the image of Americans in post-war Germany.

In 2004, Gail Halvorsen, now over 80 years old, planned an action for the children in Iraq that was comparable to the “raisin bombers” . The idea came about during a lecture he gave at the University of Dayton in Ohio . In the discussion that followed, the idea arose of throwing candy in schoolyards in Iraq. Business and aid organizations have promised to support this project. He was not given approval by the US Army.

As part of the celebrations to mark the 60th anniversary of the end of the airlift, Halvorsen flew again in May 2009, this time as a passenger, in a “raisin bomber” over the grounds of the former Tempelhof Airport and dropped around 1,000 chocolate packets over the tarmac.

Honors

In 1974 Gail Halvorsen was awarded the Federal Cross of Merit and the high US military order Legion of Merit . At the 2002 Winter Olympics in his hometown of Salt Lake City, at the invitation of the German team, he wore the name tag with the words “Germany” at the opening ceremony in the stadium.
In September 2008, Halvorsen led the pageant on Fifth Avenue as Grand Marshal of the traditional German-American Steuben Parade in New York City to the cheers of tens of thousands of spectators . In this context, he was awarded the Hessian Order of Merit by the then Hessian Minister of State for Federal and European Affairs, Volker Hoff.

As early as October 2008, the district assembly of the Berlin district of Steglitz-Zehlendorf proposed that Halvorsen be made an honorary citizen of Berlin. This was rejected by the Berlin Senate in 2011 on the grounds that “among all those who secured supplies for Berlin at the time” and who are already being commemorated with annual events, no individual should be singled out, especially since Halvorsen has already received the Federal Cross of Merit.

On June 15, 2013, a secondary school in the Berlin district of Dahlem was named after Halvorsen: The former 9th Integrated Secondary School - which emerged in 2011 from the merger of the Alfred Wegener Oberschule and the Beucke Oberschule - has since been named "Gail S. Halvorsen School ". The name giver, who was 92 years old at the time, personally unveiled the name tag in a ceremony. In addition to the Clay School, the name of the second Berlin school reminds of the time of the Berlin Airlift. At the same time, a Berlin school was named after a living namesake for the second time.

In 2015 he was honored with the Lucius D. Clay Medal . Gail Halvorsen has also been an honorary member of CARE Germany-Luxembourg since November 24, 2016 .

As part of the 70th anniversary of the Airlift, the former air base baseball fields on the former Tempelhof airfield, which are now used by the baseball and softball department of the gymnastics community in Berlin , were renamed Gail S. Halvorsen Park in May 2019 .

On the occasion of the 70th anniversary, Halvorsen, now 98 years old, took part in the celebrations on the grounds of the former Tempelhof Airport on May 12, 2019.

literature

  • The Berlin Candy Bomber . Horizon Publishers, Bountiful, UT, 1990, ISBN 0-88290-361-6 . - 3rd edition: Horizon Publishers, Springville, UT, 2004, ISBN 0-88290-616-X .
  • German translation: chewing gum and chocolate. The memories of the Berlin candy bomber. Edition Grüntal, Berlin 2005, ISBN 3-938491-02-7 .
  • Andrei Cherny: The Candy Bombers. The Untold Story of the Berlin Airlift and America's Finest Hour. Berkley Caliber, New York, 2009, ISBN 978-0-399-15496-6

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ About Gail S Halvorsen
  2. ^ Wolfgang Julien Huschke: The Raisin Bomber: the Berlin Airlift 1948/49; their technical requirements and their successful implementation . Berliner Wissenschafts-Verlag, 2nd edition 2008, ISBN 978-3-8305-1485-5
  3. ↑ Frauke Lübke-Narberhaus: It's raining chocolate again , Berliner Zeitung of May 13, 2009 (accessed on July 1, 2015)
  4. ↑ Airlift pilot to become an honorary citizen , Berliner Zeitung of October 16, 2008 (accessed on July 1, 2015)
  5. ↑ Andreas Beyerlein: No exception for the candy pilot , Berliner Zeitung of May 12, 2011 (accessed on July 1, 2015)
  6. ↑ Gail S. Halvorsen School - Integrated secondary school with upper secondary school in Berlin-Dahlem. Retrieved June 24, 2020 .
  7. ↑ Andreas Beyerlein: Pilot Gail S. Halvorsen: A hero you can touch , Berliner Zeitung from June 15, 2013 (accessed July 1, 2015)
  8. ↑ Franziska Felber: Zehlendorf celebrates the Gail Halvorsen School , Der Tagesspiegel from June 15, 2013 (accessed on July 1, 2015)
  9. ↑ 70 years of the CARE package: conclusion of the anniversary year . ( care.de [accessed December 19, 2016]).
  10. ^ Commemoration of the airlift 70 years ago. MOZ.de, May 12, 2019, accessed on May 20, 2019 (German).

Web links

Commons : Gail Halvorsen  - collection of images, videos and audio files
personal data
SURNAME Halvorsen, Gail
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Halvorsen, Gail Seymore (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American pilot
DATE OF BIRTH October 10, 1920
PLACE OF BIRTH Salt Lake City , Utah, USA