Wyoming Bomber Crash Kills War Hero

Tell Johnny Hello is a war story, family story, love story, biography, and memoir. Told by a soldier whose letters and personal diary chronicled two years of his life as he trained and served for nine months active duty on the crew of a B-24 bomber from Shipdham Air Base in Norfolk, England. Carl E. Cleland was a gunner and radio operator who flew twenty-six bombing missions from Shipdham, over Europe, Italy, Romania, Benghazi, and North Africa. Through his letters to “home folks,” which were under strict censor, Carl describes the places, people, and things he sees from the air and the ground. He frequently asks about his youngest nephew, Johnny, me. His uncensored diary describes daily activity of service life, bombing missions, the “excitement” of battle, fears, complaints, feelings, and the general ups and downs of army air corps life. Revealed through these transcribed letters and diary entries, Carl builds an indelible portrait of his mind, personality, soul, and his unwavering love of flying. After surviving twenty-six missions, Carl tragically died in a plane crash on a training flight near Casper, Wyoming, in the Spring of 1944. Johnny never knew him but after seventy-five years Carl speaks to all who listen, and especially to Johnny, me. I have learned to know him, and I would love to have you know him too. Johnny says, “Hello Uncle Carl.”

John C. Cleland was born on a small family farm in Delaware County, Ohio. He married his high school sweetheart Marilyn, in 1960, and after two years learning the carpenter trade, John and Marilyn left central Ohio, and entered college in Aurora, Illinois. John received a BS in life science in 1967, from now Aurora University. Teaching biology at Aurora West High School for a year, they moved back to Ohio and John taught at Mount Vernon High School for twenty-nine years. During that time John completed his MS in Natural Science at the University of Oklahoma in 1973. John retired in 1997 and built and operated a small nursery growing and selling perennials, annuals, and baskets. John retired from the nursery in 2000 and since has been writing, researching family ancestry, and gardening in season. John and Marilyn have four adult children, seven grandchildren, and six great-grandchildren. They live on a mini farm near Gambier, Ohio.