Lt. Duane Grounds of the 376th Squadron, P-51 Pilot, passed away last week at the age of 85. We have lost one of the greatest Americans and human beings that has ever lived. They are all "The Greatest Generation". Thank you to you all.
Many thanks for letting us know - a very sad loss indeed - our thoughts are with his family and friends.
Am always inspired to think of Pilot Officer Gillespie Magee's poem "High Flight" at these sad times.
"Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds - and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of - wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long delirious, burning blue,
I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew -
And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod
The high untresspassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand and touched the face of God."
