Crew of the "Stupifier" a.k.a. "Madame Pissonya" A/C 42-29890.
The best I can find out about the name change was that the 379th had several aircraft with Nose Art that had just a little bit too much of a hint of rough & course rhetoric or subjective language thought to be unsuitable by an officer supposedly from Doolittle's geneal staff. So a few of the aircraft got a name change. (
I cannot verify this, it came from a ground crewman's recollections). He seemed to think that was the skinny on this.
Although many crews wanted name changes when they were assigned a ship it became thought of as bad luck to do so by 1944. Also many air combat crews were aware that some of these aircraft were named by the ground crew & they felt it was their rights to do so. Therefore it may not be a good idea to demand a change in the nose art.
Many units such as the 379th BG held around 25% of the combat personnel as a reserve component to fill-in for the sick & wounded or just to fill-in for an assigned crew who maybe attending training or standing down. These crews never had an assigned ship at first or sometimes never. If the unit was to have 25 ships in the air for a mission & an assigned crew was on leave or elsewhere another crew flew what ships were available. As the war neared it's last 6 to 8 months the practice of assigning a ship was fading & the crews started giving themselves
Crew Names like these reserve crews were doing. Names such as the Reich Raiders, The Nasty Nine, The Wolf Pack & Stauch's Stompers.
This Crew flew around 13 missions on the "Stupifier".
Martin L Hooper - Lieutenant - Pilot
Robert F Haughy - Lieutenant - Co-Pilot
William F Condon - Lieutenant - Navigator
James A Bolling - Lieutenant - Bombardier
Eugene G Hall - Staff Sergeant Left - Waist Gunner
Everett J Hoge - Tech Sergeant =-Top Turret Gunner
Warren E Furness - Staff Sergeant Ball - Turret Gunner
Harold A Richmond - Staff Sergeant - Right Waist Gunner
John H Sedivy Jr. - Tech Sergeant - Tail Gunner
Victor R Ghesquier - Tech Sergeant - Radio Operator Gunner
Here are two sites that will be helpful in your research. One is of an air heritage site that was created by a Veteran of the 379th BG & his son. The other site is a tribute site I am working on that will feature info & photos on the Aircraft, Airmen & Nose Art of the 379th BG. Please forgive the erratic layout on my site. This one is sort of a storage & test site. I start on what I hope to be the sites permanent home in August. You will find this aircraft on the far left column.
http://www.8thairforce.com/ https://sites.google.com/site/379thbgnoseart/
post edited by cody1947 -