Major
(Flight Officer when with the 2nd ERS) Vernon G. "Buzz"
Grosvenor, (1925-) was born in Carbondale, Pennsylvania on April 10, 1925 to Earl and
Maybel Grosvenor. Major Grosvenor graduated from Benjamin Franklin High School in 1942, he
was awarded a football scholarship to attend Scranton Keystone Junior College in La Plune,
Pennsylvania. Major Grosvenor attended for only a year before signing up for the Army Air
Corps on February 13, 1943 (he was still 17), but did not actually go in until April 1943
when he turned 18.
Major Grosvenor
went to basic training at Keesler Field, Biloxie, Mississippi (for a week or two) and then
headed off to the College Training Detachment at Syracuse University in Syracuse, New
York. (May 1943 - September 1943) He was classified as a pilot cadet in Nashville,
Tennessee and then went to Maxwell Field, Montgomery, Alabama for Preflight training. It
was off to McKellar Field in Jackson, Tennessee for basic pilot training. After
completion, he went to Stuttgart, Arkansas for Advance training where he graduated with
Class '44H on September 8, 1944.
Major Grosvenor next attended PBY (OA-10)
qualification at Keesler Field, Biloxie, Mississippi where he stayed until he joined the
Second Emergency Rescue Squadron in February 1945. He and his crew which consisted of (P)
Lieutenant Parks, (CP) Lieutenant Grosvenor, (N) Lieutenant Witts, and (E) Sgt Herrmann
left Keesler and went up to Hunter Field, in Savannah, Georgia where they picked up a new
PBY and headed on a flight which ended at Biak Island! He flew most of his combat missions
from Morotai in and around the Borneo area as the 2nd ERS moved North toward Clark Field,
Philippines in late 1945. Major Grosvenor left the South Pacific in March 1946 and was
separated from the military service in May 1946.
Vernon Grosvenor went back to Syracuse
University for about a year before being called back to active duty in the US Air Force in
1947. He retired nearly 20 years later on November 1, 1965. He was trained in such
aircraft as the OA-10A, C-46, C-47, C-119. Upon his retirement he had accumulated some
10,000 military flight hours in many different aircraft. In 1966, after he retired, he did
a short stint with Capital Airways flying the "Constellation" ferrying troops to
Vietnam before taking a job with Boeing as a test pilot. In his nearly 20 years with
Boeing he was qualified and flew such aircraft as the B707, B727, B737, B747, B757, and
B767. He retired at age 60 in 1985 with nearly 15,000 flight hours total time. Vernon Grosvenor has been retired since
1985 and enjoys spending time as this cabin in the Cascade Mountains.
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