Barksdale B-24J

Fri Oct 03, 2008 10:05 pm

Kevin - its not a myth, I've seen pictures. The Libs are in a wooded area at the north end of the island. Lots of parts, too - landing gear, turrets, etc. Also a trashed-out Corsair and at least one C-47. Very corroded by now, I'm sure.

Fri Oct 03, 2008 10:16 pm

Anyone got any pictures they can post? Or maybe we can start here... where is the island, and whose territory is it?

Can anyone point to the right spot on the island, maybe from a Google map? I'm not being difficult, just asking...

kevin

Fri Oct 03, 2008 10:48 pm

Kevin, my mistake...I know the 17 was flown in, read in a mag...Air Classic?...Had a photo op where crew were in period uniforms and flight gear with both the B-17 and B-24 in the article...when the B-17 arrived at Barksdale...I don't know where my misinformation came from, but stand corrected.....so how about a little history for me??? Where did this B-24 come from...history prior to Barksdale...and how did she get to be there....ex-west side Tulsa guy, Gary

Fri Oct 03, 2008 10:52 pm

Kevin, since we are on the B-24 subject...have you heard of a tail section from a B-24 being in existance somewhere around the central area of Ok? I know about the B-24 verticle fin and metalized rudder that used to be a bilboard for a wrecker service in Stillwell....but have heard roumors of a tail section in Ok...might possibly be a B-25...might just be a fairy tail, but fun pursuing....

Fri Oct 03, 2008 10:59 pm

tulsaboy wrote:Anyone got any pictures they can post? Or maybe we can start here... where is the island, and whose territory is it?

Can anyone point to the right spot on the island, maybe from a Google map? I'm not being difficult, just asking...

kevin

Not mine, but...

http://www.military-collections.com/PacificGhosts.html

U.S. MARINES F4U CORSAIR ON ANGUAR

http://www.dmgroom.com/travel/rtw98/html/micron_p.html

Corsair fighter plane from WWII, Anguar, Palau.

Fri Oct 03, 2008 11:13 pm

Some pictures of stuff from Anguar and the rest of Palau..

http://www.bentstarproject.org/flip/

Sat Oct 04, 2008 12:40 am

GARY HILTON wrote:Kevin, since we are on the B-24 subject...have you heard of a tail section from a B-24 being in existance somewhere around the central area of Ok? I know about the B-24 verticle fin and metalized rudder that used to be a bilboard for a wrecker service in Stillwell....but have heard roumors of a tail section in Ok...might possibly be a B-25...might just be a fairy tail, but fun pursuing....

Gary, the only B-24 stuff I know to exist is a pair of vertical fins less rudders and a quantity of smaller parts that are in the Stillwater Airport terminal museum. There is a section of nose-art from a SWPA combat B-24D in one of their display cases. Everything there came from the Paul Mantz scrapping operation.

Kevin is very correct about the Barksdale/Spartan airplane. It was stripped of most everything after Spartan quit using it. I have a photo somewhere of it sitting engineless at the Tulsa airport before it was moved to Barksdale. The school used it as a multi-engine runup trainer for a time after the war. If one were to dig hard enough I suppose some parts of the old girl are still in the Spartan hangars. I know of at least one life raft door that surfaced recently.

Sat Oct 04, 2008 7:48 am

Hey, there's a '32 Ford there too! Worth as much as the B-24 parts. :lol:

Sat Oct 04, 2008 9:42 am

Has anyone on the forum ever heard the rumor of two B-17 airframes still existing in Oklahoma? I was on a military staff car website several years ago and the subject of possible Fortresses (mostly intact airframes) in the general area of Oklahoma City after the war came up. At least one individual said they were there prior to some of the interstate highway system being built, but he felt that they were so near the right-of-way that they would have had to have been moved. Another (rather eccentric :roll:

) fellow swears they are stored in a big horse barn still. The Oklahoma City Depot stored a good many aircraft during the postwar period, so it is a possibility that someone drug them out in the country.

Scott

Sat Oct 04, 2008 9:51 am

Some KBAD Lib shots from early 2007.

Sat Oct 04, 2008 11:31 am

Wonder what happened to the cowlings? You'd think the base sheet metal shop could hook them up with some home made jobs to at least cover up those engines. They could pass it off as "training"...

Sat Oct 04, 2008 11:42 am

As the Barksdale B-24 is part of a local AFB Museum does it in reality still belong to the NMUSAF in Dayton ??

Sat Oct 04, 2008 11:51 am

According to the plaque in front of the plane, it is on loan from the US Air Force museum system.

This earlier photo has the cowlings still n the port side. The starboard side has them gone, but the nacelles are covered by tarps.

Sat Oct 04, 2008 12:15 pm

I say let's move it to Michigan!!!

Sat Oct 04, 2008 1:10 pm

I remember reading once that they put a B-24 on display in front of the Willow Run plant after the war. It's long-gone now, of course. I wonder what ever happened to it..I assume it was probably scrapped.

I have a wartime documentary that shows B-24s being built at WR..from sheet metal in the warehouse to finished bomber rolling out the door. They show the planes being test flown, and doing practice bomb drops. I assume this was done over Lake Huron or Lake St. Clair. I've always fantasized that maybe a Liberator might have had a problem and ended up in one of the Great Lakes, and is just waiting to be found. Actually, in my fantasy, the plane makes and emergency landing on the ice in the winter, and sinks undamaged when the ice melts in the spring. Hey, if you're gonna dream...

SN