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| -Signs, Portents, and the Weather- |
| 'Preddi' fell from sky into island's heart |
| 2008-03-11 |
| As he looks back from his Grass Valley, Calif., retirement home, Hargesheimer says he often mused over the word "if." Why, for example, didn't the Japanese pilot finish him off as he floated helplessly down beneath his parachute? In 1999 he got an answer. With the help of World War II history buffs, he located Mitsugu Hyakutomi of Yamaguchi, Japan, the pilot who records show downed his P-38. He was suffering from Alzheimer's disease but his wife recounted by mail that her husband had said he could never shoot such defenseless enemy flyers. "The Japanese pilot gave me the opportunity to get involved in something worthwhile, and for that I'm ever grateful," he says. This modest man says he has many people to thank as he draws nearer the end of a long, perilous, challenging road from 1943. "These people were responsible for saving my life. How could I ever repay it?" It came down to that, and perhaps to the psalmist's words of gratitude, "My cup runneth over." "I wasn't a millionaire," says Mastah Preddi. "But I was very rich." |
| Posted by:Brig. Gen. Jack D. Ripper |
| #1 The tales of our brave troops never end. |
| Posted by: Icerigger 2008-03-11 15:01 |