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Published in the
Ironwood Daily Globe, May 9, 1961.
Youth honored for poem about crash of B-47
A Hurley youth was honored here Monday night for a poem he
wrote about the B-47 jet bomber crash that occurred Feb. 24 in Iron
County, Wis.
Bernard DeRizzo, son of Mr. and Mrs. Bruno DeRizzo of Cary
Rd., Hurley, and a junior at Hurley High School was presented with a
scale model of a B-47 by Brig. Gen. Harold Humfeld, commander of the
Strategic Air Command's 40th Air Division at Wurtsmith Air
Force Base, Mich., at the public meeting held in the Ironwood Memorial
Building.
The following is the poem, which was read by Gen. Humfeld:
The B-47
Through the frosty
winter night,
across the black
sky's starry height,
from out of the
clouds- the threshold of Heaven
appeared the powerful
B-47.
Over the mighty
northern woods,
under God's door,
its six great engines
sent out their roar.
It's great power-a
dream of man's mind,
thus flew the giant,
the best of its kind.
Boldly the navigator
set the line,
while the commander
checked the time.
Rapidly the operator
tuned the band
that guided the
pilot's sensitive hand.
Over the forests and
towns below,
the doomed 47
continued to go.
But suddenly a rumble
proved something went wrong.
The giant ship began
her swan song.
Both pilot and crew
understood the trouble
and they turner her
aside on the double.
For if fate had
decided it must go down,
they would give their
lives to spare the town.
The skilled pilot did
all that he could,
but it wasn't enough
and the plane hit the wood.
There was a roar, a
thud, and a piercing crash
in the dark of night,
a blinding flash.
Why were these four
persons to die
to keep free this
land, sea and sky?
How long will their
song be heard in the sky?
Forever! Their memory will never die.
Their day is over,
their work is done;
no more frolic
between sky and sun.
They are gone,
but still there are
more
who will fly to keep
open freedom's door.
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The
swept-wing B-47 produced by Boeing was a milestone in bomber design
in many ways. The system pioneered the traditional bomber layout
found on many of todays systems and offered up capabilities unheard
of before then. As a post-war and Cold War design, the system was the
epitome of what the US military sought in terms of high-level
penetration systems capable of nuclear strikes deep into enemy
territory.
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