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Saturday, February 5, 2011
Edward Henry "Butch" O'Hare
I have been planing to make this post for about 6 months. In doing my research on Edward Henry "Butch" O'Hare, I discovered that there is a lot misleading and false information about "Butch" O'Hare written,in newspapers and magazines and even propigated by some TV networks and the internet. The reason for this is that much of this information has been writtin and rewritten with out CAREFULL Research, and not going back to the original and official sources. By not doing this, we repeatedly spread the inaccurate information.
Some information must be included about "Butch" O'Hare's father (Edward Joseph O'Hare) in order to recognize and understand, and to correct the false information.
The following facts will help you to Recognize Unreliable Information:
1. Edward Henry "Butch" O'Hare was born in St. Louis Missouri and was NOT raised in Chicago, nor did he ever live there.
2. His father Edward Joseph O'Hare (EJ) was an attorny who worked for the Al Capone Gang in court. He voluntarily gave the IRS information which helped convict Al Capone. "EJ" O'Hare was NEVER charged with, or convicted for committing a crime.
3. "Butch" O'Hare was appointed to the Naval Academy from Missouri, where he grew up, he was living with his mother after his parents were divorced, and he was not appointed from Illinois. "EJ" did not "buy" an appointment from the feds, for his son, by giving evidence against Al Capone.
4. Some have reported that the Chicago police found a copy of Robert H. Smith's poem "The Clock of Life,"
in the pocket of "EJ" O'Hare. That is not true. It never Happened. Some have reported that there was more than one shooter. The Chicago police say that there was a driver and a shooter.
*****
Edward Joseph O'Hare
"Butch" O'Hare's father, Edward Joseph O'Hare was an Irishman, He was born in 1893. For most of his lfe he was known as and called "EJ" O'Hare. At the age of 19, "EJ" married Selma Anna Lauth, and moved into an apartment above her father's Soulard grocery store, in St. Louis, Missouri.. They had a son Edward Henry (known as Butch) who was born on March 13, 1914 and two daughters, Patricia and Marilyn.
"EJ" O'Hare was determined to make something of himself. He would come home from work, to eat dinner, and then head for business classes at Saint Louis University.
In 1927, "Butch" O'Hare's parents divorced. "Butch", Patricia and Marilyn were to live with their mother Selma, in St. Louis, while their father Edward moved to Chicago. He became known as "Easy Eddie". He preferred to be called "EJ". He had become a lawyer. The parents decided that "Butch" was showing signs of laziness and at the age of 13, enrolled him at Western Military Academy in Alton. Educationally, it was determined to be one of the best schools of the day for "Butch".
"EJ" O'Hare always found time for recreational activities with his son, whether it was at a sporting event, a poetry reading or a theatrical production. Often it was just shooting at tin cans or bottles. In his conversations, the proud father often used the phrase, "My son, Butch"
During childhood summers, the O'Hares had escaped the St. Louis heat to the river camps on the Meramec and Gasconade rivers. "EJ" had given Butch a .22-caliber rifle. Plinking at cans and bottles tossed in the river, "Butch" learned to shoot. At Western Military Academy, he was a fine marksman and became president of the rifle club. "Butch" O'Hare graduated from Western Military Academy in 1932, at the age of 18.
The talks with his father had inspired "Butch" O'hare to become a Navy pilot, and Congressman John J. Cochran, who was one of "EJ" O'Hare's St. Louis' political friends, appointed "Butch" to the United States Naval Academy.
The following year (1933), "Butch" O'Hare started at the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland.
In a few short years, he and many of his classmates from both schools would die in WWII.
While "Butch" was attending Western Military Academy, "EJ" was expanding his business interests from the St. Louis levee to Chicago, Illinois. "EJ" had passed the Illinois bar exam in 1923 and joined a Chicago law firm. By 1930, "EJ" had moved his family into a new house in Holly Hills, in St, Louis. It had a swimming pool and a skating rink. He could afford the house since one of his first clients was Owen Patrick Smith, the commissioner of the International Greyhound Racing Association. Owen Smith had retained "EJ" O'Hare to apply for a patent for a mechanical rabbit that enticed the greyhounds to chase the mechanical rabbit around the race-track. "EJ" would later by the patent rights from Owen Smith's widow.
Al Capone ran Chicago during Prohibition era. He had the dominant gang in the city, and since "EJ" had to choose a gang for protection, he chose the Capone gang. "EJ" O'Hare was very successful. From 1925 to 1931, "EJ" and Al Capone operated dog tracks in Chicago, Boston and Miami with the mechanical rabbit.
"EJ" O'Hare became fascinated with flying. He flew commercially to the race tracks whenever possible, He once hitched a ride in Charles Lindbergh's mail plane.
The races were usually made up of eight greyhounds chasing the mechanical rabbit around a half-mile track. The dogs were trained to break from a starting gate which was actually a line of eight individual kennels, or boxes, with wire-mesh fronts that snapped out of the way the instant the rabbit started to run. Reaching speeds of 40 miles an hour or so, the dogs would sprint after the mechanical rabbit, never catching it, with the first greyhound across the finish line being the winner, the second grabbing the place payoff and the third animal coming in to show.
Betting was done in the same way used at horse and dog tracks around the country today. But what turned the sport into the money generating scam, that it was for Al Capone and "EJ" O'Hare, were that (1) dog racing was unregulated at the time and (2) if you give each of seven dogs a pound of hamburger a few minutes before a race, it's a cinch that the eighth, unfed dog will win the race. Both "EJ" O'Hare and Al Capone made enormous profits.
Eventually, dog racing in Illinois was determined to be illegal and "EJ" O'Hare and Al Capone combine had to shut down the Hawthorne Kennel Club operation, although they continued to run dogs in the Boston, Miami and Tampa areas.
Almost overnight, they turned the Hawthorne Kennel Club into Sportsman's Park Race Track and began to run thoroughbred horses where once greyhounds had chased Oliver Smith's running rabbit. The fact that the Sportsman's was right next door to Hawthorne Race Course which, for 40 years at that time, had also been running thoroughbreds, made little difference
If one horse-racing facility was good for Cicero, Capone and O'Hare evidently figured, two would be twice as good. Edward J. O'Hare was named president of the new Sportsman's Park racing track.
In addition to running Sportsman's track, "EJ" performed a variety of legal services for Scarface Al and various members of the Capone Mob. "EJ", as a lawyer, was always right around the edges of the ever- present political fix. He looked after the arrests that the assorted Capone guys were charged. He developed both a friendship and a real estate partnership with a Chicago RCourt Judge named Eugene J. Holland. In one 15-month period, Judge Holland dismissed gambling charges against 12,624 defendants, while finding only 28 guilty.
"EJ" and Al Capone argued repeatedly about the dog tracks. In 1930, "EJ" O'Hare asked John Rogers, a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, to arrange a meeting with the IRS. John Rogers organized a luncheon at the Missouri Athletic Club with IRS agent Frank Wilson. Afterwardsh, "EJ" agreed to turn over some financial records of Al Capone's, that he had in his possession.
Frank Wilson led a group of IRS agents that worked with Eliot Ness at the Justice Department. The overall goal was to wreck Capone financially by destroying his bootlegging business. Frank Wilson's job was to convict Al Capone of tax evasion. The IRS determined that Capone had never filed an income-tax return. His business card stated that he was a "secondhand furniture dealer," and there was a storefront, stocked with junk, next to a Chicago brothel he operated.
The financial records provided by "EJ" O'Hare helped prove, in federal court, that Capone's income came from more than secondhand furniture. Al Capone was convicted of tax evasion. He was sent to the federal prison on Alcatraz Island in August 1933. He was released in January 1939.
In 1937, the year that Butch O'Hare graduated from Annapolis, his father received a piece of mail from an ex-con who had been in Alcatraz with Capone. In simple, declarative sentences, the note read: "Capone is mad. He is enraged. He will kill you."
"EJ" O'Hare, was still President of Sportsman's Park Race Track and a millionaire lawyer with real-estate interests and stock transactions to keep an army of accountants on overtime. His friends said that he began to seem a little nervous, and maybe a little distracted.
Ursula Sue Granata, sister of a Mob tied State Representative, aa well as "EJ" O'Hare's seven-year fiancee, denied that Eddie was showing signs of any kind of strain or nervousness. "He entertained ten or twelve friends at a dinner party in the Illinois Athletic Club," she said. "Contrary to some things I have read, I didn't see the least indication that he was nervous," Miss Granata declared.
"EJ" and Sue Granata, who were a long an item in the gossip columns, never seemed able to get their relationship formalized because his earlier divorce from "Butch" O'Hare's mother prevented all the Catholic priests in the area from officiating. However, they were hopeful that by about the spring of 1940, their request for a dispensation from the Vatican would come through and they would then be able to marry.
Alphonse Capone, regarded by many as the father of organized crime in America, was due to be released from Alcatraz.
On November 8, 1939, Edward J. O'Hare was seen cleaning and loading a Spanish-made .32-caliber pistol in his office at Sportsman's Park. Although it was known that he owned several firearms, "EJ" was never known to carry a gun.
"EJ" O'Hare left his office at the racetrack, got into his black 1939 Lincoln Zephyr coupe and drove away, heading first north on Cicero and then northeast on Ogden, toward Downtown Chicago.
As "EJ" O'Hare approached the intersection of Ogden and Rockwell, a car roared up beside him and a shotgun wielding murderer opened fire with repeated blasts of big game slugs. The slugs tore through the glass and metal of the Lincoln's door, killing "EJ" O'Hare instantly.
WHY? Most likely because "EJ" had given the government information useful in its prosecution of Capone. The gangland style murder made big headlines, and the newspapers printed numerous speculations on the circumstances of the murder. Many of these were less than flattering and implied that E.J. was involved with the mob". (Ewing & Lundstrom's excellent biography, "Fateful Rendezvous: The Life of Butch O'Hare", covers these events in great detail.)
Edward J. O'Hare's auto rests against the trolley pole, marked by the arrow on the orginal Chicago Tribune print, at Ogden Avenue and Rockwell Street in Chicago after his murder on November 8, 1939. Edward J. O'Hare died of two shotgun blasts as he raced his automobile northeast on Ogden Avenue near Rockwell Street in a futile effort to outdistance the men who would kill him. (Chicago Tribune archive photo)
The Lincoln crashed into a post at the side of the roadway. The killers continued east on Ogden, where they soon became lost in other traffic. As might be expected, they were never found.
Edward J. O'Hare's car rests against the trolley pole at Ogden Avenue and Rockwell Street after his murder on Nov. 8, 1939. (Chicago Tribune archive photo)
In April 1947, "EJ" O'Hare's role in the conviction of Al Capone was revealed in the April 26 issue of Collier's magazine. Internal Revenue Service agent Frank Wilson was quoted saying, "On the inside of the gang, I had one of the best undercover men I have ever known: Eddie O'Hare."
*****
Upon his graduation from Annapolis "Butch" O'Hare received choice duty on the USS New Mexico (BB-40). Even though he was interested in aviation, all new officers had to spend two years in surface ships, before specializing in aviation or submarines. And so in 1939, he started flight training at Naval Air Station (NAS) Pensacola, learning the basics on N3N-1 and Stearman NS-1 biplane trainers.
Ensign O'Hare had made two training flights at the Naval Air Station at Pensacola, Florida, that day. When he landed at sunset, he then heard of his father's death. Ensign O'Hare took emergency leave for his father's funeral, and then reported back.
Arriving at Pensacola after the funeral, young O'Hare moved up to flying more advanced biplanes like the Vought O3U, the Corsair SU, and the Vought SBU-1 scout bomber (top speed 205 mph). In early 1940, he completed the required flying in patrol planes and advanced land planes.
He recieved his gold naval-aviator wings in May 1940 and went on to train with an air squadron, learning aerial combat, night carrier landings and gunnery. He was good at gunnery.
Pre-War Carrier Flights
When he finished his naval aviation training in May, he was assigned to VF-3, the USS Saratoga's Fighting Squadron. The CO was Warren Harvey; the great John "Jimmy" Thach was XO at this time, later succeeding Harvey as CO. VF-3 was flying the Grumman F3F-1 biplane and the newer Brewster F2A-1.
In July, 1940, Ed O'Hare made his first carrier landing, "just about the most exciting thing a pilot can do in peacetime."
Jimmy Thach used to knock the new pilots down a notch by out-flying them. He would let a rookie gain an altitude advantage, and then, while reading a newspaper or eating an apple, he would out-maneuver him and get on his tail. But when he tried this on "Butch" O'Hare, he couldn't gain an advantage. Impressed with O'Hare's impressive flying abilities, Jimmy Thach closely watched the promising young pilot.
In early 1941, VF-3 transferred to Enterprise, while Saratoga underwent a major refit at Bremerton. While the 'Big E' was at San Diego, Warner Brothers filmed the early Technicolor movie Dive Bomber on it, featuring Errol Flynn, Ralph Bellamy, and Fred MacMurray.
In July 1941, Butch" took a break from training to ferry aircraft, picking up a F4F-3 fighter from Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn. Less than a year later, he would fly a plane of this type into history. But for now he just wanted to fly it to St. Louis to visit his mother.
Before his visit was over, he had met Rita Wooster, a nurse at Deaconess Hospital, and asked her to marry him. He told her he loved her. Rita pointed out that she didn't love him, she had just met him and, besides, she was quite a bit younger than he was.
"It doesn't matter," Butch" said.
She said she was Catholic and could only marry a Catholic.
"I'll convert," he said.
Just six weeks after meeting, "Butch" and Rita were married in St. Mary's Catholic Church in Phoenix, Arizona. Immediately after the wedding, "Butch" had to report back to his squadron aboard the USS Saratoga carrier. For a honeymoon, they sailed to Hawaii in separate ships, Butch on Enterprise and Rita in a passenger liner.
On Sunday, December 7, 1941, the squadron was waiting for the Saratoga to return from scheduled maintenance. "Butch" was off duty. He was driving home for lunch with Rita, when he heard of the Pearl Harbor attack on his car radio.
The Saratoga left for Pearl Harbor the next day.
In January, Butch's squadron was transferred to the USS Lexington. The same month, the Japanese stormed ashore at Rabaul, several hundred miles north-northeast of Australia.
Butch's squadron and the Lexington became part of a task force commanded by Vice Adm. Wilson Brown, who had clear orders: Leave Pearl Harbor, cross the equator into the South Pacific and attack the Japanese.
Unfortunately, As they steamed toward Australia, Vice Admiral Brown realized that he was in uncharted waters for the United States Navy. He had to rely on navigation surveys completed by the British Royal Navy a century earlier.
While still 400 miles from Rabaul, the Lexington was discovered by a giant four-engine Kawanishi flying boat. Lieutenant Commander John Thach, skipper of the Lexington's Wildcat fighters, shot down the Japanese "Snooper," but not before it had radioed the carrier's position.
That afternoon Commander Thach led six Wildcats into the air to intercept nine twin-engine enemy bombers. In a determined attack each of the Wildcats destroyed a bomber and damaged two more. The ship's anti-aircraft guns finished off the rest.
The Japanese commander at Rabaul had 18 land-based Mitsubishi bombers, nicknamed "Bettys" by the Americans because of their voluptuous shape. (The real Betty was said to be a well-endowed American Army nurse.) At 2 p.m. February 20, 17 Bettys took off to attack Vice Adm. Brown's task force in two waves. Through his periscope, an American submarine commander saw them coming and risked surfacing to radio the task force.
Eight more Japanese bombers were reported on the way. Six Wildcats, one of them piloted by "Butch" O'Hare, roared off the Lexington's deck to stop them.
O'Hare and his wingman spotted the V formation of bombers first and dived to try to head them off. The other F4F pilots were too far away to reach most of the enemy planes before they released their bombs. "Butch" O'Hare and Duff Dufilho realized that they were the only American fighters positioned to attack. They charged their machine guns and attempted to fire test bursts. "Butch" O'Hare's four machine guns worked fine, but Duff Dufilho's four jammed.
"Butch" O'Hare didn't hesitate. Full throttle, he roared into the enemy formation. While tracers from the concentrated fire of the eight bombers streaked around him, he took careful aim at the starboard engine of the last plane in the V and squeezed his trigger. Slugs from the Wildcats six .50-caliber guns ripped into the Japanese bomber's wing and the engine literally jumped out of its mountings. The bomber spun crazily toward the sea as O'Hare's guns tore up another enemy plane. Then he ducked to the other side of the formation and smashed the port engine of the last Japanese plane there.
One by one he attacked the oncoming bombers until five had been downed. Lieutenant Commander John Thach later reported that at one point he saw "three of the bombers falling in flames at the same time". By now Thach and the other pilots had joined the fight. This was lucky because "Butch" O'Hare was out of ammunition. The Wildcats took care of several more bombers and the Lexington managed to evade the few bombs that were released. It was an amazing example of daring and shooting skill.
With his ammunition expended, O'Hare returned to his carrier, and he was fired on accidentally but with no effect by a .50-caliber machine gun from the Lexington. "Butch" O'Hare;s plane had, in fact, been hit by only one bullet during his flight, the single bullet hole in F-15's port wing disabling the airspeed indicator.
"Butch" O'Hare approached the gun platform to calmly say to the embarrassed anti-aircraft gunner who had fired at him, "Son, if you don't stop shooting at me when I've got my wheels down, I'm going to have to report you to the gunnery officer."
Edward H. O'Hare shot down five G4M1 bombers within minutes of each other.
John Thach calculated that"Butch" O'Hare had used only sixty rounds of ammunition for each bomber he destroyed; an impressive feat of marksmanship. In the opinion of Admiral Brown and of Captain Frederick C. Sherman, commanding the Lexington, Lieutenant O'Hare's actions may have saved the carrier from serious damage or even loss. By 1900 all Lexington planes had been recovered except for two F4F-3 Wildcats shot down while attacking enemy bombers; both were lost while making steady, no-deflection runs from astern of their targets. The pilot of one fighter was rescued, the other went down with his plane.
Afterward, Lieutenant Commander John Thach figured out that "Butch" O'Hare had used only sixty rounds of ammunition for each plane he destroyed. He had probably saved his ship. He was promoted to Lieutenant Commander and awarded the highest decoration of his country, the Congressional Medal of Honor.
"Butch" O'Hare was back on the Lexington shortly after 5:45 p.m. He had shot down five Japanese bombers in less than four minutes.
In the after-action report, Capt. Frederick Sherman, the Lexington's commander, recommended that "Butch" be decorated. "Butch" said he didn't want a medal, insisting, "The other officers in the squadron would have done the same thing."
The Lexington returned after the New Guinea raid to Pearl Harbor for repairs and to have her obsolete 8-inch guns removed, transferring some of her F4F-3 fighter planes to the USS Yorktown (CV-5) including BuNo 4031 "white F-15" that O'Hare had flown during his famous mission. The pilot assigned to fly this plane to Yorktown was admonished by "Butch" O'Hare just before take off to take good care of his plane. Moments later, the plane unsuccessfully took off, rolling down the deck and into the water; the pilot was recovered, but "white F-15" was lost.
On March 4, "Butch" O'Hare learned that he was front-page news throughout the United States. Up to this point, the war news had been consistently bad. Wake Island had fallen on December 23, Hong Kong on Christmas and Singapore on February 15.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt realized that the country badly needed a live hero, and summoned to the White House. After all, "Butch" O'Hare was a young, handsome naval aviator who had slugged it out with a superior Japanese force and won.
On April 21, 1942, at 10:45 a.m., "Butch" and Rita O'Hare were ushered into President Roosevelt's office. President Franklin Roosevelt promoted Edward H. O'Hare to Lieutenant Commander and awarded him the Medal of Honor. Photographers took Pictures as Rita O'Hare hung the medal around her husband's neck.
The President of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress, March 3, 1863, has awarded in the name of The Congress the Medal of Honor to
LIEUTENANT
EDWARD HENRY O'HARE
UNITED STATES NAVY
Navy Rank and organization: Lieutenant, U.S. Navy.
Born: 13 March 1914, St. Louis, Mo.
Entered service at: St. Louis, Mo.
Other Navy awards: Navy Cross, Distinguished Flying Cross with 1 gold star.
Citation:
"For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity in aerial combat, at grave risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty, as section leader and pilot of Fighting Squadron 3 on 20 February 1942. Having lost the assistance of his teammates, Lt. O'Hare interposed his plane between his ship and an advancing enemy formation of 9 attacking twin-engine heavy bombers. Without hesitation, alone and unaided, he repeatedly attacked this enemy formation, at close range in the face of intense combined machinegun and cannon fire. Despite this concentrated opposition, Lt. O'Hare, by his gallant and courageous action, his extremely skillful marksmanship in making the most of every shot of his limited amount of ammunition, shot down 5 enemy bombers and severely damaged a sixth before they reached the bomb release point. As a result of his gallant action - one of the most daring, if not the most daring, single action in the history of combat aviation - he undoubtedly saved his carrier from serious damage."
On the following Saturday, a parade was held in St. Louis. Arriving at 16th and Washington shortly before noon, Lieutenant Commander O'Hare was guided to the back seat of a long, black open Packard, where he sat between his wife and his mother.
The parade began at noon. It was led by a police motorcycle escort. Following was the Jefferson Barracks band, the marching veterans, a truck packed with photographers, Lieutenant Commander O'Hare's car and other open cars carrying dignitaries. 350 students from Western Military Academy, brought up the rear.
The next day, as :Butch" O'Hare's mother and sisters clipped newspaper stories and photos. His place in history was begining to dawn on them.
One of the many headline read, "60,000 give O'Hare a hero's welcome here." The parade was compared with those honoring the St. Louis Cardinals' 1926 National League championship and to Charles Lindbergh's 1927 homecoming after his New York to Paris flight.
With his Medal of Honor presentation, bond tours, and other commitments, Lieutenant Commander O'Hare was out of combat.
"Butch" O'Hare's Non-combat Duty
On March 26, Lieutenant Commander O'Hare was greeted at Pearl Harbor by a horde of reporters and radio announcers. During a radio broadcast in Honolulu, :Butch" O'Hare enjoyed the opportunity to say hello to his wife Rita ("Here's a great big radio hug, the best I can do under the circumstances") and to his mother ("Love from me to you").
Lieutenant Commander O'Hare was not employed on combat duty from early 1942 until late 1943; activities in this period included flying a F4F-3A Wildcat (BuNo 3986 "white F-13") as Lieutenant Commander Jimmy Thach's wingman for publicity footage on April 11, 1942, the Medal of Honor presentation on 21 April 1942, a parade in his hometown of St. Louis on April 25, 1942, and speaking on war bond tours.
On April 8, he thanked the Grumman Aircraft Corporation plant at Bethpage (where the F4F Wildcat was made) for 1,150 cartons of Lucky Strike cigarettes, a grand total of 230,000 smokes. Ecstatic Grumman workers had passed the hat to buy the cigarettes in appreciation of Lieutenant Commander O'Hare's combat victories in one of their F4F Wildcats. "Butch" a loyal Camel smoker, opened a carton, deciding, that it was the least he could do for the good people back in Bethpage. In his letter to the Grumman employees he wrote, "You build them, we'll fly them and between us, we can't be beaten." That was a sentiment "Butch" O'Hare would voice often in the following two months.
"By shooting down five bombers "Butch" O'Hare became a flying ace, was promoted to Lieutenant Commander, and became the first naval aviator to be awarded the Medal of Honor. With President Franklin D. Roosevelt looking on, O'Hare's wife Rita placed the Medal around his neck. After receiving the Medal of Honor from Franklin D. Roosevelt, Lieutenant Commander O'Hare was described as "modest, inarticulate, humorous, terribly nice and more than a little embarrassed by the whole thing"." - Aviation History magazine, November 1995
On June 19, 1942, Lieutenant Commander O'Hare assumed command of VF-3, relieving Lieutenant Commander Thach. He was relocated to Maui, Hawaii, to instruct other pilots in combat tactics. United States Navy policy was to use its best combat pilots to train newer pilots, in contrast to the Japanese practice of keeping their best pilots flying combat missions.
Ensign Edward L. "Whitey" Feightner, who served with Lieutenant Commander O'Hare in July 1942, later said that one of the best pieces of information "Butch" O'Hare passed on to him, was "If you ever jump one of these Zeros and you surprise him, remember, the first thing he's going to do is a loop. Don't follow him into it! By the time you go into it a second time, he'll be behind you. The first thing you should do when he starts up the loop is make a hard right turn and keep turning. You'll come right around, and when he bottoms out of the loop, you'll be right on his tail!"
Lieutenant Commander O'Hare also related "First of all, remember, in today's world, whenever you take off and engage the enemy, you're going to be outnumbered. If you want to survive this War, you have to look behind you every chance you get. Even when you pull the trigger, be sure to look behind because there's gonna be someone back there."
In early June 1942, Lieutenant Commander O'Hare arrived in Hawaii to take command of his old squadron amid the fleet's celebration of its victory at Midway, which would put the Japanese on the defensive for the remainder of the war.
In "Fateful Rendezvous", their authorized biography of "Butch" O'Hare, Steve Ewing and John B. Lundstrom describe a peaceful interlude of a year and a half for the new lieutenant commander. His squadron was based on Maui, where his pilots could train almost every day in perfect flying weather. According to the biography, one of the pilots, Lt. Sy E. Mendenhall, originally wasn't too pleased about being assigned to the Maui backwater, but he had heard about "Butch" — that he was a hero and "a peach of a guy personally." A local couple, Frank and Ethel Hoogs, gave "Butch" the use of a small beach cottage that became the social center for the squadron's officers and enlisted men.
Lieutenant Commander O'Hare wrote his sister Marilyn for Thanksgiving 1942, "I've put on 20 pounds ... just living too well I guess."
In February 1943, his squadron boarded ship for San Diego, where Lieutenant Commander would be reunited with his wife Rita and see their daughter, Kathleen, for the first time.
The squadron, meanwhile, was joining an air group that would fly the new, bigger and more powerful F6F Hellcat fighters off newly constructed carriers. The Hellcats had modern landing gear; pilots would no longer have to retract the gear as they had in the old Wildcats by hand-cranking a mechanism made of sprockets and bicycle chains.
Lieutenant Commander O'Hare said goodbye to Rita and Kathleen in June, and his squadron returned to Maui. On July 26, the Hoogses threw a fabulous luau on the beach at Maui as a sort of graduation party for the squadron's rookies.
That marked the end of "Butch" O'Hare's peaceful interlude.
In August 1943, Lieutenant Commander was promoted to air-group commander, overseeing three squadrons. But he still insisted that everyone call him "Butch".
Butch OHare's section aboard USS Independence 06SEP1943. L-r Alex Vraciu (Butch's wingman), OHare, Sy Mendenhall, A.Willy Callan.
On November 10, 1943, his air group was assigned to the USS Enterprise, which joined a task force bound for the Gilbert Islands southwest of Hawaii. Group Commander flew with VF-6 in the air strikes against Wake Island. On this mission Alex Vraciu, the future ace, was Butch's section leader. Both Group Commander O'Hare and Alex Vraciu scored that day.
The attacks on two atolls in the Gilbert Islands, Tarawa and Makin, would be the first American amphibious attacks on the Central Pacific route leading directly to Japan.
Beginning on November 19, Group Commander O'Hare's air group supported the assault on Makin. A prisoner later said a dawn air strike killed the Japanese commander.
At dusk the next day, the Bettys made a low-level attack on the USS Independence. The Hellcats rose to confront the Bettys, but one of them managed to damage the Independence with a torpedo. The task-force commander, Rear Adm. Arthur W. Radford, asked Group Commander to devise a defense against such dusk attacks.
Group Commander O'Hare created three-plane teams - two Hellcats and an Avenger torpedo bomber carrying radar. The Enterprise would launch these night-fighter teams at dusk, and the fighter- director officer in the carrier's combat- information center would direct them toward Japanese planes as they appeared on radar.
The Avenger pilot would follow the center's directions, flying toward the Japanese planes until they showed up on his plane's radar screen, too. When the pilot could see the enemy plane's blue exhaust flares, he would direct the two Hellcats to attack.
Group Commander O'Hare called his night-fighter teams "Black Panthers."
On the afternoon of November 26, the Enterprise's combat-information center alerted "Butch" to a group of about 20 inbound Bettys. H Group Commander O'Hare asked Rear Adm. Radford to order the Black Panthers aloft.
As night fell, the Enterprise launched "Butch" and another Hellcat, piloted by his usual wing man, Ensign Andy Skon. The Avenger that was to guide them, piloted by Lt. Cdr. Phil Phillips with Hazen Rand as the radio/radar operator and Alvin Kernan (now an eminent literary critic) as the gunner, had not yet been launched when the Enterprise's fighter- direction officer abandoned Butch's plan.
The FDO sent Group Commander O'Hare and Andy Skon on a search for low-flying Bettys. After an hour, "Butch" decided that it was time to find Lt. Cdr. Phillips' Avenger.
At 7:05 p.m. the incoming Bettys, flying at wave-top level, attacked.
The American ships protecting the carriers raised a dense curtain of anti-aircraft fire, and Rear Adm. Arthur Radford maneuvered the entire task force to deny the Bettys any good torpedo-attack angles. Lt. Cdr. Phil Phillips shot down one Betty.
To the east, "Butch" O'Hare and Andy Skon in their Hellcats fired at several fleeting Bettys. Gunners in the Bettys fired back.
The FDO then directed "Butch" O'Hare and Andy Skon toward Lt. Cdr. Phil Phillips' Avenger.
As Group Commander O'Hare approached, he asked Lt. Cdr. Phillips to turn on his "turtleback" light, a white light behind the pilot's headrest. Butch turned his on, too. Shortly afterward, the Avenger's rear-facing gunner, Kernan, saw the two Hellcats slide in behind him from above. "Butch" O'Hare was to the gunner's left, Andy Skon to the right.
At almost the same instant, Alvin Kernan saw a fourth plane appear above and behind Butch. "There's a Jap on your tail," Lt. Cdr. Phil Phillips radioed Group Commander O'Hare as he ordered Alvin Kernan to fire.
But the intruder fired first, from its nose gunner, down into Group Commander O'Hare's Hellcat.
The Hellcat dropped gently. Shortly afterward, Andy Skon and the Avenger's crew saw something "grayish-white" appear below, splashing into the sea.
In Phoenix, Butch's sister Marilyn was returning by car from Thanksgiving dinner with their mother, Selma, when the radio announced that several Japanese planes had been shot down, with the loss of only one American plane.
"That's Edward," Selma said instantly.
"Oh, Mother, don't be ridiculous," Marilyn responded.
"It's Edward," Selma insisted.
Official word arrived on December 9, that "Butch" O'Hare was missing in action. His mother Selma left for San Diego to be with her daughter-in-law Rita and grand-daughter Kathleen.
Lt. Commander. Bob Jackson wrote to Rita from the USS Enterprise to describe the extensive, but unsuccessful, search for Group Commander O'Hare. In his letter, Bob Jackson quoted Rear Adm. Radford saying of "Butch" O'Hare, that he "never saw one individual so universally liked."
"Butch" O'Hare was last seen at the 5 o'clock position of the TBF. About that time, the turret gunner of the TBF, Alvin Kernan (AOM1/c) noticed a Japanese G4M Betty bomber above and almost directly behind "Butch" O'Hare's 6 o'clock position.
Alvin Kernan opened fire with the TBF's .50-cal. machine gun in the dorsal turret and a Japanese gunner fired back. "Butch" O'Hare's F6F Hellcat apparently was caught in a crossfire. Seconds later Butch's F6F slid out of formation to port, pushing slightly ahead at about 160 knots and then vanished in the dark. The Avenger pilot, Lieutenant Commander Phillips, called repeatedly to O'Hare but received no reply.
Ensign Skon responded: "Mr. Phillips, this is Skon. I saw Mr. O'Hare's lights go out and, at the same instant, he seemed to veer off and slant down into darkness." Lieutenant Commander Phillips later asserted, as the Hellcat dropped out of view, it seemed to release something. It dropped almost vertically at a speed too slow for anything but a parachute. Then something "whitish-gray" appeared below, perhaps the splash of the plane plunging into the sea.
Lieutenant Commander Phillips reported the position (1°26' north latitude, 171°56' east longitude) to the ship. After dawn a three plane search was made, but no trace of Commander O'Hare or his plane was found.
United States Navy flying ace Group Commander Edward H. "Butch" O'Hare.
A solemn pontifical Mass of Requiem was offered for Group Commander O'Hare at the St. Louis Cathedral on December 20, 1943.
As "Butch" O'Hare went missing on November 27, 1943, and was declared dead a year later, his widow Rita received her husband's posthumous decorations, a Purple Heart and the Navy Cross on November 27, 1944.
Paul Tibbets also went on to become a pilot, but in the Air Force. A year and a half after his classmate's death, he would lead a special group of bombers trained to drop at least two atomic bombs - one on Germany and one on Japan. Germany surrendered before the drop, but Paul Tibbets, flying a B-29 bomber named for his mother, Enola Gay.
Paul Warfield Tibbets, Jr, dropped the A-bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, on August 6, 1945.
What happened to Group Commander Edward H. O'Hare?
Three possible explanations:
(1) Friendly fire, i.e. Kernan mistakenly shot O'Hare down.
(2) The Japanese bomber shot O'Hare down, in a quick, lucky burst that killed Butch instantly without heavily damaging the Hellcat.
(3) When Kernan opened up, O'Hare took evasive action, the Hellcat's wingtip touched a wave and dipped into the ocean.
In a recent, thoroughly-researched biography of Edward Henry O'Hare, the respected author and naval historian John Lundstrom and his co-author Steve Ewing incline toward the second explanation (Butch was shot down by the Betty), in a "freak occurrence in a dangerous and complicated operation."
Their specific conclusion is that "Butch fell to his old familiar adversary, a "Betty". Most likely he died from, or was immediately disabled by, a lucky shot from the forward observer crouched in the rikko's [Betty's] forward glassed-in nose... the nose gunner's 7.7mm slugs very likely penetrated Butch's cockpit from above on the port side and ahead of the F6F's armor plate."
Further, the Index references to TBF gunner Alvin B. Kernan explicitly state he is "wrongly accused of shooting down Butch."
HONORS
"Butch" O’Hare has been honored in many ways, in 1945 a United States Navy Destroyer (D-889) was named after him.
In September 1949, O'Hare's name was engraved on the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific "Wall of the Missing" in Honolulu.
The Patriots Point Naval and Maritime Museum honored O'Hare with a F4F-3A on display and a plaque dedicated by the USS Yorktown CV-10 association, "May Butch O'Hare rest in peace..."
Chicago's O'Hare International Airport
On April 19, 1947, Col. Robert R. McCormick, publisher of the Chicago Tribune, proposed that Chicago's new airport be named for Group Commander O'Hare, who had often visited his father in the city.
The next week, "EJ" O'Hare's role in the conviction of Al Capone was revealed in the April 26 issue of Collier's magazine. Internal Revenue Service agent Frank Wilson was quoted as saying, "On the inside of the gang, I had one of the best undercover men I have ever known: Eddie O'Hare."
The airport was constructed in 1942-43 as a manufacturing plant for Douglas C-54s during World War II. The site was chosen for its proximity to the city and transportation. The two million square-foot (180,000 m²) factory needed easy access to the workforce of the nation's then-second-largest city, as well as its extensive railroad infrastructure. Orchard Place was a small nearby community and the airport was known during the war as Orchard Place Airport/Douglas Field (hence the location identifier ORD).
In 1945 Douglas left Chicago for the west coast.
Chicago's Midway airport had no more room to expand, and so the city of Chicago planned to expand the Orchard Place Airport to provide for Chicago's future needs.
On September 19, 1949, six years after "Butch" O’Hare went down near Tarawa Island in the South Pacific, the Orchard Place Airport was named O’Hare International.
The "Butch" O'Hare story was inspiring enough to prompt some 200,000 Chicagoans to turn out for the 1949 renaming of the airport. This included the Mayor of Chicago, Martin H. Kenelly and Illinois Governor Adlai Stevenson. There were bands and speeches and overhead, a lone, smoke equipped airplane spelled out the name "O'Hare" in block letters that emblazoned against a clear blue sky.
The story behind the airplane is that it had been recovered from Lake Michigan by the United States Navy and donated to the Air Classics Museum. The plane was restored to replicate the one that was flown by "Butch O'Hare". It was Sponsored by the City of Chicago and McDonald's Corporation, the recovered F4F-3 Wildcat is exhibited in Terminal Two at the West end of the ticketing lobby to honor the extraordinarily heroic feats of O'Hare International Airport's namesake -"Butch" O'Hare.
In March 1963, United States President John F. Kennedy laid a wreath at O’Hare International Airport in his honour.
People come by the thousands, hour after hour, day after day, flying into the concrete and steel and glass monster that's never quite finished, that's always under construction, always expanding, always overflowing.
With over 70,000,000 passengers a year, it is very busy: just ask the people who get lost there.
Aerial view of Chicago's O'Hare International Airport.
*****
THE FIGHTER PILOT
Paul Tibbets, a good friend of "Butch" O'Hare's since their days together at Western Military Academy, said, "He was a hell of a fine man."
The role of the fighter pilot aboard an aircraft carrier at sea is the same as that of a fighter pilot anywhere: to win and hold control of the air. Until he does this, his own base, the carrier, is not safe. Also the important bombers and torpedo planes the ship carries, may not be able to get through the enemy fighter screens with their lethal loads.
"Butch" O'Hare was killed in aerial combat at the age of 29.
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