Warbird Information Exchange

Amongst the photographs my Dad had of his service flying the Sikorsky HRS were a few taken by the now defunct Los Angeles Examiner during the huge, Lex Baker One amphibious exercise in February, 1952.

I wondered if there had been other photographs taken and tracked down the archives of the Examiner to the USC Library collection. A lot of it is available online and much of it is public domain. I conducted numerous searches and wrote emails to USC but, there were no other photographs available.

I did however, find some fantastic photos of HMR-161 putting on an exercise for the press in July, 1951, shortly before they sailed for Korea. I also ran across a group of about fifteen photographs taken on October 14th, 1951 at an Open House and Airshow at Los Angeles International Airport. In those fifteen were three photographs of Marine HRS helicopters.

For some reason, LA Airport rang a bell with me and I pulled out Dad's logbook.

Sure enough, on October 14, 1951 he flew HRS-1, BuNo127826 (Squadron callsign, How-Sugar Eight) from MCAF Santa Ana to LA Airport and back that day. AMAZING!

Here's the photographs:

Yes, that's Los Angeles International - circa 1951. I'm guessing this is looking Southwest.


The four HRS-1's of HMR-162 come in for landing.


Three of the four ships on the ground. The farthest is How-Sugar One; BuNo127812. The next is How-Sugar Six; BuNo127822. The one on the left is either the one my Dad was flying, How-Sugar Eight or it is How-Sugar Nine; BuNo127827. Can't quite make out the number.

In any case, he's flying one of those Sikorskys and this was really an exciting find for me. Just wish Pop was still here to share it with. There's lots of history out there folks! You just have to do a little digging.

By the way, had a small update to the website today. Enjoy!

_________________
Cheers,

Craig

Facebook Groups:

U.S. Marine Corps Sikorsky HRS / CH-19 Helicopter Database
U.S. Coast Guard Sikorsky HO4S / HH-19 Helicopter Database

Thanks for sharing. I always enjoy seeing other people's family involvement in history.
I'm doing research on my grandfather and his brother who were in B-24s and B-29s during WW2, and I like what I come up with at times.

Some pictures of My dad's time with HS-2. They Flew HO4S version of the Helos that Craig's dad flew. My Dad was an Aircrewman, operating the sonar gear as they chased subs. They were based out of NAAS Ream Field just south of San Diego ( later called NAS Imperial Beach). Dad was with them from 1952 thru fall of 1955. The photos on the carrier where taken on the USS Point Cruz CVE-119 during their Far East cruise in 1954. The kids in the one photo on the flight deck are Japanese orphans at Opama. The crashed H04S was at Ream Field. It was on a night mission and had gotten too low over the water and went in. The AT on that flight was one of dad's buddies and he did not survive the crash. The shot of dad by the car was taken in Memphis while he was going through his "A" school.