Category Archives: Military & War

“What can you tell me about this airplane?”

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While adding captions to the 2,500 photos in my collection, I came across this one I took years ago at an airfield near Rolla, Missouri. I never bothered to research but figured it would be a shame not to include something so I asked ChatGPT. Her initial answer would have been sufficient but her follow-up questions led to ever more interesting history. This  is what I find so fascinating and useful about these conversations.

Steve: Can you provide any information about this airplane? (Image of a vintage U.S. Air Force aircraft attached.)

ChatGPT: Yes! This aircraft appears to be a Douglas C-47 Skytrain, a military version of the Douglas DC-3, one of the most legendary transport aircraft in history.

Key Identifiers:

  • Twin radial engines with large propellers – typical of the C-47.
  • Distinctive cockpit shape and nose design – matching the DC-3 family.
  • “U.S. AIR FORCE” markings – indicating its military service.
  • Metal fuselage with riveted panels, common in WWII-era aircraft.

History and Significance:

  • First introduced in 1941, the C-47 was widely used by the U.S. Army Air Forces during World War II, Korean War, and Vietnam War.
  • Known for its role in D-Day (June 6, 1944), dropping paratroopers over Normandy.
  • Used in various roles, including troop transport, cargo delivery, medical evacuation, and even as a gunship in later modifications (AC-47 “Spooky” or “Puff the Magic Dragon”).
  • Many were later converted for civilian use after military service.

This aircraft has a well-earned reputation for being rugged, reliable, and versatile, with some still flying today in various roles worldwide.

Do you know where this particular C-47 is located? It looks like it might be part of a museum or an airfield display.

Steve: At the time the photo was taken, it was parked at a small airport near Rolla, MO.

ChatGPT: That makes sense! If it was near Rolla, MO, it could have been at the Rolla National Airport (VIH) or another small airfield in the area. Rolla has some aviation history, and small airports often serve as home bases for vintage aircraft, including historic military planes like the C-47 Skytrain.

Many C-47s are preserved by museums, airshow groups, or private collectors, so it’s possible this one was part of a historic aircraft exhibit, a restoration project, or even still operational. Some groups fly them for commemorative events, like D-Day reenactments or airshows.

Did you get to see the interior or learn anything about its history while you were there?

Steve: I did not. There were two of these just parked in a remote part of the airfield. When I went back a few years later, the planes were gone. This little thread is one more example of how ChatGPT makes a photo 100 times more interesting. Yes, I could probably have researched the plane, but it would have taken more time than it would have been worth. ChatGPT not only provided the info in seconds, it followed up with interesting questions.

ChatGPT: That’s exactly what I love about these conversations—turning a simple moment into something richer. You snapped a photo of a couple of old planes sitting at a quiet airfield, and now we’ve unraveled a bit of their history, their legacy, and even wondered where they ended up. It’s like unlocking hidden stories with just a little curiosity.

And yeah, sure, you could have dug into it with some online searching, but would it have been as fluid, engaging, or even fun? Probably not. The back-and-forth, the context, the connections—it’s what makes this so much more than just looking up facts.

I wonder where those C-47s went. Restored and flying? In a museum? Scrapped? Someone in a hangar somewhere might know. But even if that’s a mystery, it’s cool that for a brief moment, you got to see a piece of history just sitting there in Rolla, waiting to be remembered.

Steve: And if I had a serial number or some other identifier, you might have been able to tell me something about missions it flew. Or, perhaps, the people that flew on those missions.

ChatGPT: Exactly! If you had a serial number, a tail number, or even specific squadron markings, we could have dug into historical records, war diaries, declassified mission logs, and aircraft registries to track its history.

For a C-47, that could mean:

  • WWII mission records, especially if it flew on D-Day, Market Garden, or the Berlin Airlift.
  • Korean or Vietnam War deployments, possibly in cargo transport, medical evacuation, or even gunship conversions (AC-47 “Spooky”).
  • Post-military civilian registry, tracking whether it ended up in private hands, museums, or scrapped.
  • With a serial number, I could have helped look up:
  • Where it was built and when it entered service.
  • What units or squadrons it was assigned to.
  • Any known notable missions or crew members.

My old friend — and noted Missouri historian– Bob Priddy points to additional information about these planes.

It turns out one of those planes has quite a history (PDF). The Rolla Daily News has published an account by William Garvin, a university archivist at Drury University and a World War II airplane buff who not only discovered what happened when the plane was a C-47 in England called “Ada Red” but found a personal story that adds a great emotional link to that plane.

Bob’s email didn’t include a link to the Rolla Daily News story, but did include some history for one of the planes.

C-47-DL S/N 9053 – N47FJ – The US Army Air Corps based this aircraft in Algeria, at Ahmed Ben Bella Airport (now) Oran before (DAOO.) The 12th Air Force operated there for the North African Campaign. Once Rommel was defeated in Africa, this aircraft was redeployed in England under the 9th Air Force. This aircraft flew sorties in support of the D-Day Landings. Once the aircraft was returned to the USA it was sold as surplus in 1946 to Hiawatha Airways, in Winona, Minnesota. After which it flew as corporate aircraft for all of the following corporations: Texaco Company, New York, New York; Champion Spark Plug, Toledo, Ohio; Trans Air, Winnipeg, Manitoba; Falcon Owning Co, Teterboro, New Jersey (Falcon Jet)

The aircraft was purchased for Cargo Operations by Baron Aviation Services, Vichy, Missouri in 1977.

1941 Dodge WC 1/2 Ton Truck

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“Dodge was the U.S. Army’s main supplier of 1/2-ton trucks, and its sole supplier of both 3/4-ton trucks and 1-1/2-ton six-by-six trucks in World War II. With over a quarter million units built through August 1945, the G502 3/4-tons were the most common variants in the WC series. WC was not an abbreviation of “Weapons Carrier”, but a Dodge model code – initially W for 1941, and C for half-ton rating. However, the ‘WC’ model code was retained for both the 3/4-ton and 1-1/2-ton 6×6 Dodges – as well as for the subsequent model years”.

Paul and a friend trailered his vintage Bronco to Colorado for some off-roading. While there they spotted the truck above and Paul’s buddy couldn’t come home without it. Which meant Paul had to drive the Bronco 750 miles so the Dodge could have the trailer.

Paul C. Miltenberger: Hero

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While cleaning out our basement, Barb came across the wonderful letter her father sent from Luzon in 1946 (PDF). At Barb’s suggestion, I prompted ChatGPT to tell me anything it could about the letter. Keeping in mind that AI’s get things wrong, I found the analysis interesting.


Barb’s father, the late Paul C. Miltenberger, receiving the Silver Star following the Battle of Luzon in WWII. Dr. Miltenberger. From the St. Louis Post, July 18, 1945:

Captain Paul C. Miltenberger, 29 years old, Army medical corps officer, has been awarded the Silver Star for gallantry in action last April 23 on Luzon. When a platoon sergeant had been seriously wounded and had fallen in an exposed sector of the jungle, Capt. Miltenberger dragged him 800 yards to a protected area where he administered first aid.

800 yards (almost half a mile) through the jungle, under enemy fire, is a long way. Dr. Miltenberger was one of the best people I’ve known in my life. I never heard him say an unkind word about anybody.

Party time in the Führer bunker

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“When Traudl Junge (Hitler’s secretary) was finally released from her typing at around 4 a.m. on Sunday 20 April, and the Führer and Frau Hitler retired, she went upstairs to find some food for the Goebbels children. The scenes which she encountered, not far from where the wounded lay in the Reich Chancellery’s underground field hospital, shocked her deeply. ‘An erotic fever seemed to have taken possession of everybody.”

“Everywhere, even on the dentist’s chair, I saw bodies locked in lascivious embraces. The women had discarded all modesty and were freely exposing their private parts.’ SS officers
who had been out searching cellars and streets for deserters to hang had also been tempting hungry and impressionable young women back to the Reich Chancellery with promises of parties and inexhaustible supplies of food and champagne. It was the apocalypse of totalitarian corruption, with the concrete submarine of the Reich Chancellery underworld providing an Existentialist theatre set for hell.”

— The Fall of Berlin 1945 (Antony Beevor)

Hitler’s final memo

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One more from Antony Beevor’s great history, The Fall of Berlin 1945:

“Hitler took Traudl Junge (one of his secretaries) away to another room (in the bunker), where he dictated his political and personal testaments. She sat there in nervous excitement, expecting to hear at last a profound explanation of the great sacrifice’s true purpose. But instead a stream of political clichés, delusions and recriminations poured forth. He had never wanted war. It had been forced on him by international Jewish interests. The war, ‘in spite of all setbacks,’ he claimed, will one day go down in history as the most glorious and heroic manifestation of a people’s will to live’” (emphasis mine)

The Fall of Berlin 1945

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I so thoroughly enjoyed Antony Beevor’s history of the siege of Stalingrad I ordered The Fall of Berlin 1945. I’m about halfway through the 430 page book and, like Stalingrad, it’s a page-turner. No work of fiction –movie, novel, TV documentary series– could ever capture the scope and horror of these events.

As with all (most?) non-fiction books, I’m reading with a marker in hand, highlighting the passages I want to save. Like so much of the history I’ve read, I’m finding eerie parallels to current events. Nazism and Trumpism; Hitler and Trump the most obvious example.

“We may go down, but we will take the world with us.” — Adolph Hitler (1945)

“(Hitler’s) monstrous vanity could not allow him to lose a foreign capital, even one which he had totally destroyed.”

“The Soviet armies advancing in huge, long columns were an extraordinary mixture of modern and medieval: tank troops in padded black helmets, their T-34s churning up the earth as they dipped and rolled with the ground, Cossack cavalrymen on shaggy mounts with loot strapped to the saddle, Lend-Lease Studebakers and Dodges towing light field guns, open Chevrolets with tarpaulin-covered mortars in the back and tractors hauling great howitzers, all eventually followed by a second echelon in horse-drawn carts.”

“The population at large saw nothing of Hitler. He had disappeared from the newsreels, and they heard only Hitler’s very last broadcast on 30 January, marking twelve years of Nazi government. His voice had lost all its strength and sounded completely different.”

“Berlin’s population in early April (1945) stood at anything between 3 and 3.5 million people, including around 120,000 infants. When General Reymann raised the problem of feeding these children at a meeting in the Reich Chancellery bunker, Hitler stared at him. ‘There are no children of that age left in Berlin,’ he said. Reymann finally understood that his supreme commander had no contact with human reality.”

“On the evening of 12 April 1945, the Berlin philharmonic gave its last performance. It is said that after the performance, the Nazi party had organized Hitler youth members to stand in uniform, with baskets of cyanide capsules, and offer them to members of the audience as they left. “

“The only promise Hitler has kept is the one he made before coming to power. Give me ten years and you will not be able to recognize Germany.”

“A smaller size of (German)steel helmet had been manufactured for boy soldiers, but not nearly enough were produced.”

“On the morning of Saturday 21 April, just after the last Allied air raid had finished, General Reymann’s (Berlin) headquarters (was) swarmed with brown uniforms. Senior Nazi Party officials had rushed there to obtain the necessary authorization to leave Berlin. […] Over 2,000 passes were signed for the Party ‘armchair warriors’, who had always been so ready to condemn the army for retreating.”

“An intensive artillery bombardment of Berlin began at 9.30 a.m., a couple of hours after the end of the last Allied air raid. Hitler’s SS adjutant, Otto Günsche, reported that the Führer, a few minutes after having been woken, emerged unshaven and angry in the bunker corridor which served as an anteroom. ‘What’s going on? he shouted at General Burgdorf, Colonel von Below and Günsche. ‘Where’s this firing coming from?’”

“(Hitler’s) severe personality disorder, even if it could not quite be defined as mental illness, had certainly made him deranged. Hitler had so utterly identified himself with the German people that he believed that anybody who opposed him was opposing the German people as a whole; and that if he were to die, the German people could not survive without him.”

“In the (Berlin) cellars and air-raid shelters distinctive subcultures had grown up during two years of heavy air raids. […] The ‘cellar tribe’ as one diarist called these curious microcosms of society, produced a wide variety of characters, whether in markedly rich or poor districts. Each cellar always seemed to have at least one crashing bore, usually a Nazi trying to justify his belief in the Führer and final victory.” […] “Many cellar tribes developed a particular superstition or theory of survival. For example, some believed that they would survive an almost direct hit by wrapping a towel round their head. Others were convinced that if they bent forward at the first explosion, this would prevent their lungs from tearing. Every eccentricity of German hypochondria seems to have received full expression.”