Bob Giltner, my mother’s cousin, was anxious to be an Air Force pilot and serve in World War II, but he wasn’t quite old enough to join at the beginning of the war. He worked on finishing high school and took flying lessons. By December of 1942 he’d had his first solo flight. By 1944 my father, Jack Riley, was writing home to my mother, asking her to tell her cousin Bob not to be too quick to join up. He explained that the war would be over soon and that Bob should just stay out of it if possible. Dad had been serving in the South Pacific for a while by then, and had seen the ugly truth of war.
But in March of 1945, after graduating from high school the previous spring, Bob enlisted in the Army Air Corp Reserves. He served only about six months, until the Pacific War ended in August of 1945. Bob then continued his studies at the University of Kentucky, graduating in 1949. He then worked with his father on the family’s experimental farm, near Eminence, KY. The farm was operated in conjunction with the College of Agriculture of the University of Kentucky, and was known to progressive farmers throughout the country.
In September of 1950, just after the start of the Korean War, Bob again joined the Air Force. He received his pilot’s wings about a year later. A jet pilot, he was part of the 319th Fighter Interceptor Squadron, a unit attached to the Far East Air Forces of the Fifth Air Force. By early March of 1952 this squadron was sent to Suwon Airbase, just south of Seoul, South Korea. They flew F-94 Starfires equipped with radar devices. The missions were restricted to local air defense in order to prevent the possible loss of new technology (airborne intercept radar equipment), over enemy territory. They were used to maintain a screen, protecting B-29 bombers from enemy interceptors.
On November 15, 1952 Bob and his co-pilot, Second Lieutenant Ralph Dean Ness, were on a routine radar test flight with six other aircraft when their Lockheed F-94B jet disappeared into the overcast and was later found crashed, only 6 miles southeast of the Suwon Airfield. The crash was determined an accident and not due to enemy fire. Neither survived. Bob, by then a First Lieutenant was only 26 years old and Ralph Ness was only 22. Bob had only been in Korea for about six months, when the accident occurred. The Air Force lost 28 F-94s between January 1952 and the end of the Korean War, July 1953. Only one of the 28 was due to any direct enemy action.
The week before his death, Bob’s parents had received a letter from him while he was on rest leave. Perhaps it was during this leave, that Bob had purchased a beautiful string of Mikimoto pearls in Japan. They were supposedly for his future bride. We don’t think that he had anyone particular in mind but perhaps he was, at age 26, just beginning to look toward the possibility of married life. His mother kept the pearls, and when she died, they were given to Bob’s niece, June. When June wears them she thinks of her grandmother’s heartbreak at losing her oldest son.
Today Bob Giltner would have celebrated his 81st birthday. I honor him for his service and mourn for a life that was cut short before even having a chance to find his anticipated bride. War and freedom have a tremendous price tag.
Please add a comment if you have any additional information or stories about Bob.
-Mary
**** YOU HAVE GOT TO READ my update to this story to read what I found out about Bob after posting this article .....Link to update
**** YOU HAVE GOT TO READ my update to this story to read what I found out about Bob after posting this article .....Link to update
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