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We didn't care, we just made fun of that because we knew that was all part of the propaganda. She played the best music, we listened to her all the time. The thing of it is the censors wouldn't let you say where you were or anything ,but she knew who we were. We would make a mission and she would name the Squadron. Mr. Misenhimer: Now, April 12, 1945, president Roosevelt died, did you all hear about that? Mr. Ebel: Everybody was shocked and everybody was worried about that and they did not know just what the outcome was going to be on that. They did not know what Truman was going to do. He turned out to be a fine guy, he was one of ours. Mr. Misenhimer: On May 8, 1945, Germany surrendered. Did you all hear about that? Mr. Ebel: That was quite a deal too you know, we were living on a shoestring. We were 9000 miles at the end of a supply line and by the time it got to us it done got whittled down pretty good, we were not getting anything. We were patching up our planes and they were flying those old junks, I mean War wiery stuff and we were having a lot of trouble, planes crashing because they were just wore out. As soon as the war in Europe was over all of the sudden we got new aircraft we were given some better food and we got more gasoline and a lot of times we could not fly and
we had to wait until the tanker came in....if we had gas we would fly otherwise we did not fly we could not do anything. So war really changed out there in the Pacific when the war in Europe was over.
The National Museum of the Pacific War presents an oral interview with Doyle Ebel. Ebel was drafted into the Army Air Forces in March, 1943 and trained at Miami Beach before going to radio operator school in Missouri. He also attended gunnery school before becoming a crewmember on a B-24 and shipping overseas in July 1944. He was assigned to the 26th Bomb Squadron, 11th Bomb Group at Saipan in October. Ebel recalls an emergency landing on Iwo Jima. He flew 37 combat missions before the war ended and returned to the US in November, 1945.
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Ebel, Doyle.Oral History Interview with Doyle Ebel, July 30, 2013,
text,
July 30, 2013;
Fredericksburg, Texas.
(https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1606583/m1/48/:
accessed July 16, 2024),
University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu;
crediting National Museum of the Pacific War/Admiral Nimitz Foundation.