6 replies to this topic

[WreckWench]

He wanted to be a Marine fighter pilot. The US was building up their
military force, but they were not at war yet and the Navy required all
its potential Navy and Marine pilots to have two years of college. So
Ed started classes at Boston College.

When Pearl Harbor was attacked the Army and the Navy both dropped the
college requirement and Ed applied to the Marines. His primary flight
training was in Dallas and then he went to Pensacola, Florida. He was
carrier qualified, which means he knew how to perform a controlled
crash of his single engine fighter, onto the rolling deck of a Navy
floating runway.

It took Ed almost two years to get through all the Navy flight
training. His problem was he was a very good pilot and the Marines
needed flight instructors. He had a great command presence and public
speaking ability, which landed him in the classroom, training new baby
Marine pilots.

His orders to the Pacific fleet and the chance to fly combat missions
off a carrier came in the spring of 1945, on the same day the Atomic
bomb was dropped on Hiroshima. Of course his orders where changed.
He never went to sea and he was out of the Marines in 1946.

Ed stayed in the USMC as a reserve officer. He became a successful
personality in the new TV medium, after the war. His Marine command
presence helped. He was recalled to active duty during the Korean
War. He never got to fly his fighter aircraft, but he saw his share
of raw combat. He flew the Cessna O-1E Bird Dog, which is a single
engine slow-moving unarmed plane. He functioned as an artillery
spotter for the Marine batteries on the ground and as a forward
controller for the Navy & Marine fighter / bombers who flew in on fast
moving jet engines, bombed the area and were gone in seconds. Captain
Ed was still circling the enemy looking for more targets, all the time
taking North Korean and Chinese ground fire.

He stayed with the Marines as a reserve officer and retired in 1966 as
a Colonel.

The world knows Ed as Ed McMahon of the Johnny Carson, Tonight Show.
One night I was watching the show when the subject of Colonel McMahon
earning a number of Navy Air Medals came up. Carson, a former Navy
officer, understood the significance of these medals, but McMahon
shrugged it off, saying that if you flew enough combat missions they
just sort of gave them to you. McMahon flew 85 combat missions over
North Korea; he earned every one of those Air Medals. The casualty
rate, for flying forward air controllers in Korea sometimes exceeded
50% of a squadron’s manpower. McMahon was lucky to have gotten home
from that war.

Once a Marine, always a Marine.

When the public was spitting (taking their personal safety into their
own hands) at Marines on the streets of Southern California during
Vietnam, Colonel McMahon was taking Marines off the streets and into
his posh Beverley Hills home. I spoke to a retired Marine aircrew
member the day Colonel McMahon died and he personally remembered
seeing McMahon at numerous Marine Air Bases in California in the
1960s. He was known for going to the Navy hospitals and visiting the
wounded Marines and Sailors from this country’s conflicts, even in the
last years of his life.

Colonel McMahon presented awards and decorations to fellow Marines and
attended many a Marine ceremony and the annual Marine Corps Birthday
Ball. He stayed true to his Corps as a board member of the Marine
Corps Scholarship Fund and as the honorary chairman of the National
Marine Corps Aviation Museum. After retiring from the Marine Reserve,
one night on the Johnny Carson show, members of the California Air
National Guard came on stage.

Colonel McMahon was commissioned a Brigadier General in the Air Guard
in front of millions of Americans who watched it happen live. You
will not see anything like that on TV anymore.

The three core values of a United States Marine are; honor, courage
and commitment. This is what a Marine is taught from the first day of
training and this is what that Marine believes. That was Colonel
Edward P. McMahon Jr. USMCR Retired. Before he was a national figure
he was a true combat hero and a patriot the nation needed then and
this country needs now.

Your war is over. Thank you Colonel McMahon. Semper Fi sir.

23 June 2009
Major Van Harl USAF Ret.

[dustbowl diver]

[Hipshot]

Thanks for posting.

Once a Marine, always a Marine.

I was once admonished by a Marine for using the term "ex-Marine." She corrected me and explained that the only living "ex-Marine" is John Hinkley...and I think we all know why.

Rick



Here's Johnny
(Heeeerrrrss Johnny)
- Ed McMahon (1923 -2009)

[Neptuner]

Thanks for your honorable service Colonel Ed, you will not be forgotten.

[WreckWench]

McMahon flew 85 combat missions over
North Korea; he earned every one of those Air Medals. The casualty
rate, for flying forward air controllers in Korea sometimes exceeded
50% of a squadron’s manpower. McMahon was lucky to have gotten home
from that war.

This I can attest too as my father did essentially the same thing...he flew recon in training planes NOT suited for battle and took gunfire on all 99 missions he flew including the one that shot him down and captured him. I'm sure the same happened to Ed...it was just the way it was.

The death toll for pilots such as these averaged 50% by the end of the war but exceeded almost 80% in the beginning. My father and Ed were there in the early years....no small feat at all.

I would have loved to meet him...I'm sure he was a lot like my dad in many respects...low keyed and all about his participation in the war.

He represents the foundation many of us have grown up on and the 'world as we know it'...one led by quiet men of greatness who had 'been there and done it' and we are thankful!

[pir8]

Sadly I did not know the extent of his service. I did know that he had been a Marine but that was it. He will definetly be missed. I really see to love the interaction between him and Johnny.

[Bubble2Bubble]

In today's World Rock, Pop and Movie stars get most of the pubic attention when they pass away, and there is nothing wrong with that but...But the true hero's seem to serve honorably, retire peacefully and lead mild manner life's and just fade away with-out any fan fair..and I think this is a travesty. If it wasn't for this post I would have never known about Colonel McMahon !

TY and Semper Fi sir



Mike