DEDICATION
It appeared on the front page of Fort Walton’s weekly Playground News, Thursday, July 28, 1949. The article was painfully brief in contrast to the shock and stunned sadness we felt on Eglin Air Force Base’s Auxiliary Field #1 at dawn’s roll call Wednesday morning.
Bulletin
First Lieutenant Roy H.
Amidon, Jr. was killed Tuesday night during a routine training mission from an auxiliary field at Eglin Air Force Base. He was a member of the 117th Fighter Group, Alabama Air National Guard.
The cause of the crash is not known immediately. A board of Air Force officers has been appointed to investigate. Amidon is survived by his wife Geraldine S. Amidon, 1509 44th Street, Bellview Heights, Birmingham Alabama and his father A.H. Amidon of Lakeland Florida.
The July 28th edition of the unit’s hometown newspaper, the Birmingham News, with a photo showing him to be a fine looking young man, offered a bit more.
Amidon, in fact a Second Lieutenant, had been in Birmingham for only two or three years and a pilot in the Air Guard unit for just nine months. He was the first local Air Guard pilot to die in a crash since the unit had been formed after World War II.
The article explained that his P-51 fighter crashed as it came in for a landing, that he was 24 years old, had served as a fighter pilot in the Air Corps during World War II...,and that he was part owner of Central Park Garage at 1416 Bessemer Road.
Also made clear was that funeral services would be held in Lakeland, Florida.
More of his life was shared in Wednesday evening’s July 27th edition of the Lakeland Ledger.
Roy was, in fact, a Floridian, born and reared in Lakeland, graduated from Lakeland High School, where he and his soon-to-be-wife Geraldine played in the school band. He was the son of prominent Polk County Criminal Judge Roy H. Amidon, Sr and Mrs. Amidon, as the paper termed it in those more formal years. His age, better defined now, was actually 25.
Members of the 160th Fighter Squadron of the Alabama Air National Guard..., to which Lt. Roy Amidon’s 117th Fighter Group was attached...were to fly in formation over the grave at Oak Hill Cemetery during interment.
His parents and his grandfather L.E. Amidon had been summoned home from a vacation in New Hampshire because of the tragedy. Sadly, they had intended to stop by in Birmingham to visit Roy and Geraldine the following Sunday during their planned trip home at the end of their vacation.
A few sentences of the article point out the confusion which often surrounds such a sudden calamity.
"It was assumed..." the article said, "...that Lt. Amidon’s wife had been notified by the National Guard of the death and had in turn called Judge Amidon in New Hampshire."
That’s the one facet of Roy Amidon’s story this writer knows. When we drew to attention at roll call that dawn, our unit leader was missing. He was a best friend of Roy and Geraldine. Immediately, in late night hours, he left Eglin’s Auxiliary Field #1 to make the five hour drive home... to tell her personally of Roy’s passing.
Our ache was not only for Lt. Roy Amidon’s crash and death...but for her shock and sorrow..., and the painful moments our friend and unit boss would face in the breaking of terrible news.
There is nothing of the Angel, of this curious story, that speaks of Roy Amidon’s experiences in life. 17 year old privates never ...never... hobnob with officers. This writer never met Roy, knew nothing of him until that awful morning. In truth, we found only after his passing that our unit leader was his best friend.
Details of his life were discovered only in recent days, through research in three now aged newspaper articles... long after this story was written.
I wonder why the sense of shock and sorrow of that morning has lingered for more than a half century? Is that what separates one who yearns to write from those not so inclined?
It is surely true that the anguish of that long ago morning..., awe of the magnificent P-51..., and maybe the hope of Angels ..., were the wellspring from which this strange tale flourished.
You may see now, though, why this story is dedicated not only to the memory of Second Lt. Roy H. Amidon, Jr..., to past and present fellow members of his Alabama Air National Guard at Birmingham...but to all of America’s brave citizens who give of their time, and face the risks, of serving as Guardsmen and Reservists...vital, immediate back up to Armed Regulars..., America’s massed second line of defense.
