WARBIRDS B-25 MITCHELL

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Above

North American B-25J Mitchell 45-8835 Bettys

Dream. ALL MOOSE PETERSON
Far right

Vic Tatelman, co-pilot on the original Bettys

Dream, with 45-8835.

ut into the jungle, the

base was a stark barren
space carved out of the
lush vegetation that surrounded
it. Runways, planes, tents and
a few buildings were what the
men had anticipated seeing.
What they found was as much a
surprise to the crews as our own
approaching planes were to the
Japanese.
These were the evocative
words of Lt Victor
Tatelman as he piloted
North American B-25
Mitchell Dirty Dora
of the 345th
Bombardment
Group

(BG), 499th Bombardment

Squadron (BS) on a raid against
Wewak, New Guinea, of October
16, 1943. He continued his
description: The intention was for
the planes to come in by surprise
and take out the base while leaving
no time for the Japanese pilots to
gain their planes. The approach
was simple in concept: come in at
treetop level at dawn.
Screaming in at 200ft (60m)
the B-25s found the airfield full
of aircraft, row after row of new
Yokosuka D4Y Judy dive-bombers,
Mitsubishi G4M Betty bombers
and Mitsubishi A6M Zekes. As
Dirty Dora buzzed in, Vic lined
up eight 50-calibre nose guns and

AM
squeezed the trigger, tearing into
the parked aircraft.
Vics usual co-pilot, Lt Willie
Graham, was acting as bombardier
on this run. As Vic fired the guns,
Willie dropped the parafrag
bombs and: the new and waiting
warplanes of the Japanese crumpled
beneath the onslaught... Parafrags
parachute-retarded fragmentation
bombs were essential at such low
level; ensuring that pilots werent
caught up in a friendly blast, but
that didnt help the guys behind.
Known as the Air Apaches,
the 345th BG was activated in
November 1942 and thats when
the squadrons came up with their
names: the 489th BS became the

Moose Peterson explains why the Texas Flying

Legends Museums multi-gun B-25J was the
enemys worst nightmare

Falcons, the 499th Bats Outa

Hell, the 500th Rough Riders
and the 501st Black Panthers. The
345th was originally to be deployed
to England, but Major Gen George
C Kenney successfully made the
case for more B-25s in the Pacific.
After a brief stop in Australia, the
345th set up camp at Port Moresby,
New Guinea, in April 1943.
The 345th was in combat for 26
months, racking up 58,562 hours,
making 10,609 strikes, expending
58,000 bombs, 12.5 million rounds
of ammunition, sinking 260 enemy
vessels, destroying 260 enemy on
the ground and 107 in the air.
All of this came at a high cost with
712 air and ground crew killed
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WARBIRDS B-25 MITCHELL

Famous names
Lee Atwood, president and chief executive of North American Aviation,
named the B-25 after General William Billy Lendrum Mitchell.
Mitchell is an instrumental figure in US airpower. Many of his tactics,
sometimes controversial, were adopted with great effectiveness
during World War Two. He is the only American individual to have a
military aircraft named after him.
The B-25 became a household name on April 18, 1942 when the
Doolittle Raid used 16 stripped-down Mitchells launched from the
carrier USS Hornet to bomb Tokyo as a reprisal for the attack on
Pearl Harbor. Devising and leading the attack was Lt Col James
Jimmy Doolittle.

and 177 aircraft lost. Participating

in nine major campaigns, the 345th
became one of the most decorated
outfits of the war, including the
award of four Distinguished Unit
Citations.
To honour these men the Texas
Flying Legends Museum today
proudly flies its B-25J in the
colours of Bettys Dream. (As well as
Dirty Dora, Vic Tatelman also flew
Bettys Dream.)

Birth of a classic

North American Aviation

designed the NA-40 in
1938 in response
to a US Army
Air Corps

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(USAAC, renamed USAAF in

1941) request for an advanced
twin-engined light attack bomber.
The NA-40 had a smooth design,
two Pratt & Whitney R-1830
radials, twin tail, upside down
bathtub cockpit, greenhouse
type nose and tricycle landing gear.
It was designed for a five-man
crew: pilot and co-pilot sitting in
tandem, bombardier/navigator,
radio operator and gunner.
The first flight took place
on January 29, 1939. Many
modifications were made,
creating the NA-40B, but while
undergoing tests at Wright
Field, Ohio, it crashed and
was destroyed by fire.
In March 1939 the
USAAC issued a
new requirement,
this time for
a medium

bomber. The proposal, resulting in

the NA-62, was written in 40 days
and was a substantial upgrade of
the NA-40.
After North American had
expended 156,000 engineering
hours the USAAC signed a $12
million contract for 184 aircraft
and a test airframe on September
5, 1939. This was an example of
ordering straight off the drawing
board; the B-25 hadnt yet flown
and a prototype was never built.
Compared with the NA-40,
the NA-62/B-25 was larger
and dramatically streamlined.
The wings were lowered to the
shoulder position and had a
distinctive dihedral crank.
After wind tunnel tests, the
USAAC Mock-up Board approved
the design in November 1939
and the test airframe was shipped
to Wright Field in July 1940 for

Left

The distinctive shark

mouth on Bettys Dream.
Below

A view of the cockpit.

structural trials. The first B-25,

40-2165, rolled off the production
line on August 19, 1940.

Gunship

In the Pacific, the Mitchells speed

and payload worked perfectly for
General Douglas MacArthurs
island-hopping campaign tactic.
The B-25 was one of the most
field-modified aircraft of World
War Two, much of it to do with
armament for specific mission
requirements. In the Pacific,
Mitchells didnt serve at high
altitude; working instead at very
low altitudes, eliminating the need
for the nose greenhouse and the
bombardier.
It was in August 1943 that the
transition to the strafer role, for
which the 345th became famous,
began. The B-25 became incredibly
effective when its nose incorporated

eight pilot-operated 50-cal

machine guns. If the top turret were
turned forward, the combined ten
guns of the Mitchell could deliver
an astonishing 7,500 rounds a
minute. Some B-25s had two twin
50-cal blisters on the side of the
front fuselage, increasing the fire
power even more.
A key element of MacArthurs
battle strategy was the Air
Apaches. The original Bettys
Dream, which first saw action late
in the war, was part of the 499th
BS, the Bats Outa Hell. Captain
Charles E Pop Rice Jr, who the
Texas Flying Legends B-25J
honours, was assigned to Bettys
Dream in June 1945. In a very
short time Rice flew 22 missions in
the Dream and was credited with
sinking at least two ships.
Piloted by Major Wendell
Decker, with Rice as co-pilot,

Bettys Dream escorted two Betty

bombers carrying the Japanese
peace envoys to the island of
Ie Shima (present-day Iejima,
Okinawa) on August 19, 1945.
Two days later, Captain Walter
Naas with co-pilot Vic Tatelman
in Bettys Dream was the escort
to MacArthurs staff returning to
Manilla in the Philippines. The
345th BG was officially deactivated
at Camp Stoneman, California, on
December 29th, 1945 after just
over three years of existence.

Above left

Bettys Dream pursued

by a Zero in a Pacific War
scenario.

New life

Bettys Dream, as flown by Texas

Flying Legends, was built for the
USAAF in August 1945 as B-25J
45-8835 at Fairfax, Kansas City,
Kansas. With the war days away
from ending the USAAF did not
accept 45-8835 for service and
it was sent to the boneyard
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WARBIRDS B-25 MITCHELL

Heavy Betty
Alan Miller of the Texas Flying Legends Museum gives some insight
into the experience of flying Bettys Dream: The speed you see
out of Betty during our show is about 250mph. Because of the
complete restoration and all the original equipment in Betty, shes
heavy compared to other B-25s flying today. Despite that, Betty
handles with remarkable ease for a bomber. Its a joy to fly and Im
honoured doing so.

at Walnut Ridge, Arkansas, on

October 31, 1945. There it became
one of the 513 B-25s handled by
the site along with thousands of
other, mostly new, aircraft.
Lodwick Aircraft Industries
purchased 45-8835 in February
1946. The company had a contract
with the War Assets Administration
to sell surplus aviation assets and
Mitchell 45-8835 was civilian
registered as NX69345. (The
last three digits were fitting as
the aircraft was destined to
be painted in 345th BG
colours.)
Four months
later NX69345
joined the
New

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Jersey-based
Bendix Aviation
Corporation and
for the next two decades
served as a test bed for everything
from radar, avionics and even
brakes. In November 1967, the
B-25J was transferred to the Bendix
Field Engineering Corporation
in Columbia, Maryland where it
remained until 1972.
Ernest Koons of Edmonton,
Alberta, Canada, purchased the
bomber from Bendix in August
1972, registering it as CF-DKU.
His son related: My father
bought [the] B-25 with a
few other partners back in
1972 from Bendix and
tanked her up to haul
diesel fuel in the
Arctic. One of
the partners
collapsed

the nose gear twice upon

landing
Also at Edmonton, Aurora
Aviation purchased Kilo-Uniform
in December 1972 before selling it
on to G&M Aircraft of St Albert,
Alberta, in 1978. For the next 15
years it served as a fire bomber and
the greenhouse nose was changed
to the solid strafer type. Painted
bright yellow with a green stripe
it became well known as its pilots
fought many forest fires with it in
Canada.

Flying museum

Retired in September 1993, the

fire-fighter was ferried to B-25
specialist Aero Trader in Chino,
California, to be sold. In June
1994 it was sold to C&P Aviation
Services and the process began to
produce what Aero Trader says
is its most accurately and fully

Above

The B-25 flying with bomb

bay doors open.
Left

An evocative, sunlit view

of Bettys Dream.

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WARBIRDS B-25 MITCHELL

Above

A view of the aircrafts

nose guns.
Left

Turret gunners position.

restored B-25J flying today, Bettys

Dream.
Registering 45-8835 as N5672V,
for the next five years Aero Trader
worked on the Mitchell, restoring
it to its status when rolled out from
the factory in 1945. The detailing
is exceptional: working bomb bay
doors (including mock parafrag
bombs), fully functional upper
turret, 50-cal gun pack in the nose
with all belts and cans, waist guns
and even the radio position
complete with folding table and
Morse code key!
Taking to the air
again in March
1999, Bettys
Dream is a
flying

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museum in her own

right. On March
11, 2011 B-25J
45-8835 was
acquired

by the Houston-based Texas Flying

Legend. It is flown around the
country to honour the past and
inspire others in the future.
www.texasflyinglegends.org