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World War II bomber pilot focuses on big picture
Paul Grassey to speak at Memorial Day event
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Left, Paul Grassey is shown as a young pilot at the controls of a B-24 during World War II. Right, Grassey stands in front of a B-24 at the National Museum of the Mighty Eighth Air Force in Pooler. - photo by Special
Paul Grassey, who piloted a baker’s dozen B-24 bombing runs over Europe during World War II and helped get the National Museum of the Mighty Eighth Air Force off the ground, talks in detail but focuses on the big picture of war and remembrance.He will be speaking Monday during Statesboro’s Memorial Day Remembrance. After a musical prelude beginning at 10:30, the program will convene at 11 a.m. in the Emma Kelly Theater. American Legion Dexter Allen Post 90 hosts the event.Grassey, a 91-year-old who describes stretching a B-24’s range to cross the icy North Atlantic in as much detail as if it had happened last week, now lives at the Landings near Savannah with Nancy, to whom he has been married for 56 years.That first long-distance mission involved transferring 16 B-24 bombers from Goose Bay, Labrador, to a base in England in 1943.
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