Profile 67: FINAL - "50" F4F-4 Wildcat as flown by Joe Foss, VMF-121

DONE!  I presented it to the Commissioner last Wednesday and...they like it!

At almost 30" long, this Wildcat is impressive on size alone and because of its size, was a real stretch for me.  For my work, it's quite detailed.  At the risk of sounding like the geek I am, I'm rather proud of the paint chips on the tailwheel shroud.

Anyway, presenting a finished piece is an interesting moment.  In this case, we were standing around the conference table, arms behind backs (it always happens, people put their arms behind their backs and lean into the artwork), lots of "hmmm's"  and "huh's" - then one of the guys breaks the silence and says, "You know, Joe Foss is definitely a candidate for The Most Interesting Man In the World*."

Really?!

Let's roll the facts on the man:

  - Born at a farmstead with no electricity.
  - Father dies; Joe drops out of school to run the family farm
  - Saves $60, learns to fly, becomes Marine Corps aviator
  - Refused combat duty because of his "old age"
  - Learns fighters (F4Fs) on his own
  - Ditches airplane in ocean, swims with sharks until rescued by Missionaries

  - Shoots down 26 Japanese airplanes in aerial combat*

  - Receives Medal of Honor for service between October '42 and January '43

  - Starts his own businesses after the war (some worked, some didn't)

  - Starts the South Dakota Air National Guard
  - Becomes a Brigadier General
  - Wins two terms as Governor of South Dakota
  - Loses a House seat race to George McGovern
  - Turns down $750K for rights to make a movie about him
    (and that's 1950s money, too!)
  - Becomes Commissioner of the American Football League
  - Hosts the TV show, American Sportsman
  - Gets arsenic poisoning and becomes paralyzed
  - Fights his way out of paralysis
  - Becomes a born-again Christian
  - Does PR for KLM Airlines
  - Becomes President of the National Rifle Association
  - Makes the cover of TIME Magazine
  - Has an airport, high school and national foundation named for him...

    ...just "google" the guy.

"Joe Foss" is not just a name.  It's an adjective, noun and verb.

However, he did share his 'formula' for success when I got to sit down with him in 2002.  "I don't think about yesterdays. You want to do something, then you just go and do it."

It's really brilliant advice - devilish though because so few people want to see life so simply, so positively.  To Joe, "success" was not complicated or mysterious.  It was simply the result of continuous forward desire.

Ok. Now's a good time to show you a little artifact of Joe's wartime service - a page from the VMF-121's "War Diary" showing the day's activity for November 7, 1942.

Go ahead and read it - and notice the lack of info such as aircraft number, serial (BuNo) number.  This is somewhat unusual in that aviators tend to keep detailed records on airplanes.  It just goes to show that combat at Guadalcanal was chaotic.

Close your eyes - imagine a searing hot day, gluey humidity and the slap-crunch of leather shoes on coral gravel; the whine of an air raid siren - pilots leap up onto their Wildcats, engines belch to life...

On that November day, Joe experienced his 'Most Interesting' combat mission.  After shooting down 3 Japanese aircraft, his last victory - a two-seat Japanese biplane  - returned the favor; the enemy's rear gunner shot Joe down, too.

Forced to ditch his F4F in the ocean, Joe almost didn't make it out of the cockpit.  With a foot caught under the seat, Joe sank into the deep with the plummeting plane until - at about 30 foot depth - he wrenched himself free and shot to the surface.

Waterlogged, exhausted, Joe was now alone in the heaving sea.  Sharks circled, hours passed, darkness arrived... then, a boat paddled by natives and a Missionary (really, I'm not making this up) approached, hauled him aboard... two days later, he's back in combat!

When I was a little kid - 3 or 4 - my father had this paperback book, "Greatest Fighter Missions" by a man named Edward Sims.   Before the words made any sense, I'd pour over the book's little combat diagrams.  They're really fantastic works of art as well as graphical stories.  Whoever did them was a master!

Anyway, I still have the book, and the diagram of Joe Foss's November 7, 1942 mission has remained in-memory all this time.  Now you can remember it too - see below.  Cool huh?!

And see the little profile drawing of the Wildcat in the lower left hand corner?  I distinctly remember trying to duplicate it, using crayons on the thick grayish paper my mom would give me.  It just occurred to me -  I started drawing Joe's Wildcat forty years ago!

You know, I'm glad I kept at it.

If I've learned anything from Joe Foss it's that circumstances are irrelevant. The man went from dirt-farm to Pacific Island to General to paralytic to...you get the point.  In "the combat of life" success is not about what's happened or even what's going on currently.  All things pass.

Success is about what you do next.

"I don't think about yesterdays. You want to do something, then you just go and do it." 

And that's how you become Most Interesting Man in the World.

*********

POSTSCRIPT:  An old SDANG pilot buddy of Joe's just emailed me.  I thought you'd like to read what he wrote:

John:  Liked your drawing of the F4F...I flew this plane a number of times. A stable plane but a crude cockpit.  Upon takeoff with right hand on the stick and left hand on the throttle, I was forced to put the stick in my left hand and reach down to the floor with my right hand to hand crank up the wheels. When I looked up I had pushed the stick forward with nose headed for the ground. I bet the autos on the highway thought I was buzzing them.  Upon landing I unlatched the catch and let gravity pull down the wheels.  There was an inch of armor plate both behind the seat and under the seat. How Joe  Foss ever shot down 26 Jap planes I'll never know.The Japenese Zero was much more manueverable because they had no armor plating and weighed less.  But Joe was a crack shot, having hunted pheasants in South Dakota,he knew how to lead the target.  After the war I flew P-51 Mustangs with Joe putting on many air shows for local celebrations.  When I reminesce, how lucky can one get?  I got to fly the F4F, the F4U, and the P-51 Mustang .........Semper Fi from an old (92 years) Marine fighter pilot from the carrier Wasp.  

Claude Hone, VMF 216, SDANG

* From the ad campaign for Dos Equis beer.

**The truth is, much of the aerial combat in the Pacific Theatre was one-sided.  After 1943, the quality of the Japanese aviator grew progressively poorer by the day.  And of course,  Japanese airplanes were comparatively easier to shoot down on account of prevailing aeronautical design philosophies of the Japanese military. . But Joe, in 1942, fought the best the Japanese had - and they were every bit as good as the American pilots.   F4F vs A6M (Japanese Navy fighter commonly called a Zero) was a match made by Mars himself.  Joe's 26 victories came the hard way. 


Sources:  Artwork, me.  VMF-121 War Diary courtesy of the U.S. Marine Corps History Division,  Guadalcanal F4F photo ©unknown, Diagram: Greatest Fighter Missions by Edward M. Sims published by Ballantine Books, New York, 1962.  Please holler if you know other proper attributes.

Profile 67 - UPDATE "5?" as flown by Joe Foss, VMF-121

So.  It looks like all I have to do is add the rudder, tweak some shadows and add final markings.  I'm still on the fence of what aircraft number to use - 50?  53?  84?

I remember in 2001 (or 2000?) trying to impress Joe that I knew the number of the plane he flew at Guadalcanal and his sardonic reply, "That's my airplane, huh?"   I had no idea at the time that in reality, Joe scrambled to whatever airplane was in operating condition.  And the paperwork of who flew-what was of little consequence when Japanese bombers were readying to unleash their fury.

Joe never "had an airplane" and he didn't care, either.  I could have put down any number and he'd have been fine with it.  But facts are facts, right?

Anyway,  the question brings up the whole idea of "numbers" in war - especially war against the Japanese in WW2.  The numbers are appalling.   In fact, they're unbelievable (irony intended).

When one thinks of war's "numbers" - the most natural counting is of deaths.  People are weird this way - battles, wars, conflicts gain a perverse appeal with the increase in body counts.   Anyway, here's what I learned about the body count between the Japanese and The United States:

Japan:  2.2 million soldiers dead or approximately 4% of the country's population in 1940

United States:  420,000 soldiers dead or approximately .33% of the country's population in 1940.

Carve up those stats however you'd like.  Personally, I'm fascinated with the indication that a Japanese solider was 12x more likely to die.  But the fact remains:  The Japanese slaughtered their young men in the pursuit of gain.

A few years ago, Morrie Magnuson explained, "War is always about the leaders.  It's not about the soldiers.  Soldiers do what they're told."    To the American way of thinking, a 12:1 death ratio is clear proof of the Japanese leader's insanity.

Today, in 21st Century, there's a reluctance to make disparaging remarks about another nation's culture or belief system.  But the truth is, the leaders that drove Japan into WW2 were nuts.  Of course, there may be those that attempt to explain their behavior by describing "The Bushido Code of the Samurai," but it doesn't change the reality

So.  What does this mean to the drawing above?  I'll get to that.  But have a look at the photograph below.  It's a Japanese flag taken from a dead Japanese soldier discovered by an American Marine pilot circa Spring, 1944.

In case you're not brushed-up on your Japanese, here's what it states.  Kinda.


“Brave man from Manshuu (Manchuria)

Honorable Hourjiro Saito (name) From all the people at the shop!

In recognition of being a part of the battle at the Haruha River with the Manchurian Independent Defense Unit”

In other words, this was just a guy who carried some stuff from his buddies into combat.  In fact, I know so - I have the soldier's wallet, too.  And based on what's in there, I can pretty-much state, the "Jap" was just a poor guy like the rest of us, doing what he was ordered to do and paying the ultimate price.

Ok.  Back to Joe Foss. I'm trying to figure out which number to choose for his airplane and got lost in the rabbit-trail of "numbers" of war.  

Which to choose.  50?  53?  84?  2.2 million?

In the next and final post, we're going to look at a day in the life of Joe Foss and what he went through to defeat the enemy.  He'll narrowly escape death, but take the life of at least 3, maybe 5, with him.  a 1:5 ratio over one day's work.

Profile 67 - UPDATE "5?" as flown by Joe Foss

Here you go - it's about 50% done and the obvious parts need to be masked in... but I'm on schedule!  Two more posts after this one and this might be the most accurate rendering of Joe's F4F.  At least it will crack the top 100.  I think.

A question I often get is this - "What do you use for references?"

And that's a good question; the answer is simple.  "Whatever I can get my hands on."

Right now, within a 12' radius, there are no fewer than 100 different drawings of F4F Wildcats circa 1942.  And those are just books.  There are also other people involved - smarter, sharper and unafraid to either share knowledge and/or correct my errors. 

But you know what?  None of them - books or bookworms - quite agree!  So in the end, I have to sort the facts and make a call.  Kind of like an eeny-meeny-miny-mo game.   

BUT!  

A couple years ago, I was prowling around a trio of derelict SBD Dauntless dive bombers.  Two of them happened to have been painted in the 1942 Navy scheme.  My buddy - a man who shall remain nameless for reasons that will be obvious in about two seconds - handed me his pocket knife and said, "Cut a piece of that fabric off.  You might need it some day."

And well-I'll-be-damned.  He was right.

Look below - those are actual pieces of control-surface fabric from the the two SBDs.  Strip away the mold, the aging, the fading...add some hot sun, cold rain, coral dust, oil, grime...and you've got the livery of an F4F-4 Wildcat circa Fall, 1942, Guadalcanal.  

It's kind of like my buddy Steve and his recipe for making wild duck edible - add this, do that... by the time it gets to the table, it's been altered so much, it's "Duck" by DNA only.  

In my pointless pursuit of perfection, my rendering will soon get into the mix of options.  Will mine be "the most accurate color rendering of all"?  Well, it's probably the only available profile illustration that was based on actual 1942 color* chips.  

But like Steve's duck, you'll need to take that with a grain of salt - and whatever else he throws in to make it palatable.  

See you next week!




*Technically, the color is called "non-specular blue-gray."

Profile 67: BEGINNING - "5?" as flown by Joe Foss

Here it is - the starting sketch of Joe Foss's F4F-4 Wildcat circa Fall of 1942, on Guadalcanal.

This particular commission is a especially weighty - not just because it represents one of America's heroes but also because it's going to be displayed in a very public place.  Suffice it to state, the pressure is on.  But it takes pressure to make a diamond, right?

I'm working hard to make this project worth your time.  If only half the pieces I'm hoping for fall together, there'll be some fresh data, real inspiration and a blow-mind surprise.  Or two.

Regular readers know my Drill - I start with a sketch, then try to tell the story behind it via progressive updates to the art.   As my target-date for finishing is June 22, check back every Saturday throughout June for progress shots and back-story.

In the meantime, I'll set the stage for the Guadalcanal story - in 6 months between August of 1942 and February of 1943, over 35,000 soldiers would die, 50-some ships would sink and 1,300+ airplanes would never fly again.

Guadalcanal was a bloody mess.

And somewhere in there, an "old man" from South Dakota would use a handful of hard-worn Wildcats to defeat a fierce enemy,  help turn the tables in the Pacific War and come home to the Congressional Medal of Honor.

When it comes to seat-of-the-pants history, it doesn't get better than this...

Image: 1943 King Features Syndicate via darwinscans.blogspot.com