Arnold N. Johnson
In August 1941, Arnold Johnson was a college freshman planning to become an accountant. By December, Pearl Harbor had changed everything.This memoir traces Johnson’s journey from a stunned university dormitory on the day of the attack through basic training, flight school, and into the skies over the China-Burma-India theater, one of World War II’s most grueling and least-remembered fronts. As a pilot in the Army Air Corps, Johnson flew missions delivering fuel, supplies, and troops from India into Burma and China, including harrowing runs over the eastern Himalayas that pilots grimly nicknamed 'the Hump.'Built from a six-inch-thick stack of letters Johnson wrote home to his parents, sisters, and grandmother-faithfully saved by his mother-along with photographs and memorabilia gathered from around the world, this is history preserved in a soldier’s own voice, unembellished by decades of retelling. Readers follow him through basic training in Oklahoma, preflight instruction in California, primary flight training in Arizona, transition training, the long transport overseas, and deployment across India, Myitkyina in Burma, and finally Shanghai and Peiping in China as the war drew to a close.Rounded out with appendices covering wartime geography, the CG-4A glider, foreign currency, bombing raids on Japan, Air Force combat units, and a glossary of military acronyms, along with an extensive photo gallery and reproductions of original documents, decorations, and patches, this memoir offers both an intimate personal story and a richly detailed historical record.Written for his family and preserved for future generations, Arnold Johnson’s account is a testament to a generation that answered history’s call-told plainly, honestly, and in his own words.
