thedrifter
03-05-09, 06:21 AM
Pilot’s items found 50 years after crash
By Melissa Nelson - The Associated Press
Posted : Wednesday Mar 4, 2009 21:44:36 EST
PENSACOLA, Fla. — It has been 50 years since 12-year-old Patrick Glasgow walked into his father’s bedroom and told the Navy Blue Angels commander goodbye before heading to school.
It was the last time the boy would speak to his father, Cmdr. Robert Nicholls Glasgow, who died later that day in October 1958 when his F-11 Tiger crashed near the Gulf of Mexico on a training flight.
The son learned after reading an Associated Press story Tuesday that the dog tag his father was wearing and a small metal emblem of his Navy fighter squadron — likely part of his father’s Zippo lighter — were recently found by an Alabama woman who wants to return the items to the family.
“I am very much in shock,” he said Wednesday from his Newport Beach, Calif., home.
“I get choked up when I think about my dad. The fact that he was an aviator back then was awesome to me. Not only was he a good aviator, but he was good enough to be commander of the Blue Angels.”
The son followed his father by joining the Marines and flying the F-4 fighter jet from 1968 to 1972.
The Alabama woman, Debbie Harris, found the items on the sand at a beach near her home. Curiosity about the artifacts led her to the Museum of Naval Aviation at Pensacola Naval Air Station where she found Bob Rasmussen, a retired Navy captain, former Blue Angel and the museum’s director.
Rasmussen was flying with Glasgow on Oct. 14, 1958, the morning of the fatal crash.
A friend of the Glasgow family read the Associated Press story in California and the family contacted Rasmussen.
Harris wants to return the items in person, either by traveling to California or by having the family come to Alabama.
“My worst fear would be that they would be indifferent, that they would say for me do whatever I wanted to with these things. I’m so relieved that they care and that they want these items,” she said.
The pilot’s widow, 87-year-old Mickie Sue Glasgow, jokes that it’s time for her to buy a lottery ticket because of the unlikely chance of anyone finding and returning her husband’s belongings.
“He loved flying and he died doing what he loved. I’ve always tried to talk to my kids about their father and they’ve always been very interested in him,” she said.
Patrick Glasgow sees the return of his father’s belonging as a positive sign.
“I told my mom yesterday that maybe dad is trying to send us a message that he is still looking over us or something,” he said.
Ellie
By Melissa Nelson - The Associated Press
Posted : Wednesday Mar 4, 2009 21:44:36 EST
PENSACOLA, Fla. — It has been 50 years since 12-year-old Patrick Glasgow walked into his father’s bedroom and told the Navy Blue Angels commander goodbye before heading to school.
It was the last time the boy would speak to his father, Cmdr. Robert Nicholls Glasgow, who died later that day in October 1958 when his F-11 Tiger crashed near the Gulf of Mexico on a training flight.
The son learned after reading an Associated Press story Tuesday that the dog tag his father was wearing and a small metal emblem of his Navy fighter squadron — likely part of his father’s Zippo lighter — were recently found by an Alabama woman who wants to return the items to the family.
“I am very much in shock,” he said Wednesday from his Newport Beach, Calif., home.
“I get choked up when I think about my dad. The fact that he was an aviator back then was awesome to me. Not only was he a good aviator, but he was good enough to be commander of the Blue Angels.”
The son followed his father by joining the Marines and flying the F-4 fighter jet from 1968 to 1972.
The Alabama woman, Debbie Harris, found the items on the sand at a beach near her home. Curiosity about the artifacts led her to the Museum of Naval Aviation at Pensacola Naval Air Station where she found Bob Rasmussen, a retired Navy captain, former Blue Angel and the museum’s director.
Rasmussen was flying with Glasgow on Oct. 14, 1958, the morning of the fatal crash.
A friend of the Glasgow family read the Associated Press story in California and the family contacted Rasmussen.
Harris wants to return the items in person, either by traveling to California or by having the family come to Alabama.
“My worst fear would be that they would be indifferent, that they would say for me do whatever I wanted to with these things. I’m so relieved that they care and that they want these items,” she said.
The pilot’s widow, 87-year-old Mickie Sue Glasgow, jokes that it’s time for her to buy a lottery ticket because of the unlikely chance of anyone finding and returning her husband’s belongings.
“He loved flying and he died doing what he loved. I’ve always tried to talk to my kids about their father and they’ve always been very interested in him,” she said.
Patrick Glasgow sees the return of his father’s belonging as a positive sign.
“I told my mom yesterday that maybe dad is trying to send us a message that he is still looking over us or something,” he said.
Ellie