oracle
05-26-2001, 03:16 PM
Before the U.S. entered WWII, the Flying Tigers were already in the fight (http://seattlep-i.nwsource.com/local/24835_tigers26.shtml)
Saturday, May 26, 2001
By MIKE BARBER
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER
Emma Jane Hanks lets you know straight off that she prefers to be called "Red."
It's the nickname she got 60 years ago for her red hair, when she became an original member of the famed Flying Tigers fighter plane group.
Known as the American Volunteer Group -- and to the Chinese, Fei Hu or Flying Tigers -- its members fought for China against Japan. Formed before the United States entered World War II, they inflicted the first setbacks felt by the Japanese military in five years of warfare, stopped the invasion of southern China and formed a bond with Chinese people that transcends modern government tensions.
As the only surviving woman -- one of two nurses -- among the 278-member AVG, Hanks braved primitive conditions in Burma. She battled tropical diseases and comforted the wounded, dragging them from their beds to ditches when the base came under attack.
And she sacrificed as much as anyone. Her husband of five months, an AVG fighter pilot, was shot down and killed. Pregnant with their only child, Hanks within a year was a single mom at a time when to be one drew harsh social judgments. She faced a lifetime of Memorial Days.
"There were a lot of hardships, a lot of sadness in those days, but that's life. You move on," says Hanks, a Yale-educated nurse. "I have a lot of pride in what we did, in what they all did."
Now 85 and living in Maryland, "Red" is in Seattle this Memorial Day weekend with two dozen of the 45 surviving Flying Tigers. She hopes for a world where Memorial Days aren't needed.
"When you've been through a war, you know that people have to learn not to fight," she says.
...
Click here to read more (http://seattlep-i.nwsource.com/local/24835_tigers26.shtml)
Saturday, May 26, 2001
By MIKE BARBER
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER
Emma Jane Hanks lets you know straight off that she prefers to be called "Red."
It's the nickname she got 60 years ago for her red hair, when she became an original member of the famed Flying Tigers fighter plane group.
Known as the American Volunteer Group -- and to the Chinese, Fei Hu or Flying Tigers -- its members fought for China against Japan. Formed before the United States entered World War II, they inflicted the first setbacks felt by the Japanese military in five years of warfare, stopped the invasion of southern China and formed a bond with Chinese people that transcends modern government tensions.
As the only surviving woman -- one of two nurses -- among the 278-member AVG, Hanks braved primitive conditions in Burma. She battled tropical diseases and comforted the wounded, dragging them from their beds to ditches when the base came under attack.
And she sacrificed as much as anyone. Her husband of five months, an AVG fighter pilot, was shot down and killed. Pregnant with their only child, Hanks within a year was a single mom at a time when to be one drew harsh social judgments. She faced a lifetime of Memorial Days.
"There were a lot of hardships, a lot of sadness in those days, but that's life. You move on," says Hanks, a Yale-educated nurse. "I have a lot of pride in what we did, in what they all did."
Now 85 and living in Maryland, "Red" is in Seattle this Memorial Day weekend with two dozen of the 45 surviving Flying Tigers. She hopes for a world where Memorial Days aren't needed.
"When you've been through a war, you know that people have to learn not to fight," she says.
...
Click here to read more (http://seattlep-i.nwsource.com/local/24835_tigers26.shtml)