Warbird Information Exchange

Task Force was on TCM this morning and I went to IMDB to check out if some of the people were actually Navy pilots.

Turns out one was and he was a 7 kill ace of VF-15.

Wayne Morris (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0606998/bio) was an actor who got interested in aviation and joined the reserves and went active duty.

Does anyone have any pictures of him with his aircraft or information regarding what aircraft he flew? Obviously it was an F6F, but I mean pertaining to markings.

Thanks.

Here you go!

http://www.acepilots.com/usn/morris.html

Looks like the VF-15 birds were all the dark blue with a thin white band across the top of the V-Stab. Here is a link to a pic of him in his cockpit with "Kills"

http://www.arlingtoncemetery.net/bdmorrisjr.htm

Wayne Morris also co-starred in "I Wanted Wings" with Ray Milland and William Holden. A movie I always enjoyed.
TonyM.

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"Welcome back Mr. Lasky."

He died on the USS Bon Homme Richard next to his brother-in-law and CV-31 CO Capt Dave McCampbell from CAG-15.

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Don't touch my junk!!

About Wayne "Bert" Morris....he was the CO of my dad's reserve squadron, based at Los Alamitos, in 1946 (VF-771), which was made up of alot of guys from VF-15 who were still in the SoCal area. Morris' last flight in the Navy was a squadron (all sixteen) "buzz job" of Warner Brothers studio. Dad was number thirteen in the rat race pattern and all he could think about was that they would all be kicked out of the Reserves. Morris took the hit for all of them, however, saying that they were doing what a good group in a squadron would do....obey orders and follow the leader. According to guys who flew in -15 (Satan's Kittens) Morris was a regular guy, never tried to pull a "Hollywood" moment, always took the tough missions.

My dad said the reserve squadron parties were ""quite good" with lots of Hollywood actresses around....he doesn't recall anybody missing a squadron weekend when Morris was in command.