Oil City, Pa., was ready to welcome home its hero, 25-year-old Lieut. Colonel Francis Gabreski, top-scoring Thunderbolt pilot of the Eighth Air Force and top U.S. ace. Gabby's fiancée, pretty Kay Cochran, 20, had made all the plans for a wedding, too.
Scheduled to go home on August 1, hawk-faced Colonel Gabreski went on working as an extra-duty volunteer on his old jobbomber-escort, strafing missions, other fighter pilot's miscellany.
A true pilot, who likes to fly, he talked of raising his record U.S. score of 28 German planes. But it was not to be.
Last week to Gabby's parents came the telegram...
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