Lt Col Owen F. Connolly USAF
Section #60 Grave #6229 in Arlington National
Cemetery ..Owen flanks the Pentagon & the Army-Navy Country Club ... a good
field grade officer ...
Arlington National Cemetery
OFC is interred in a mixed memorial, full grave,
and lesser gravesite area. For space-conserving purposes ... those eligible may
be interred after cremation .. memorials for the mssing (or those without
corposes to interr) & full graves. Lt.Col Owen F. Connolly was an eligible
internment by ANC rules as a retired career Armed Forces member ... other
eligibles include those of political note (as veterans); military personnel
killed in combat; and those by explicit exception per the rules.
Owen at home
June 22 1921 ... to ... September 13, 1996
..remembered as father, uncle, grandfather, husband, brother ...officer
& friend .. a few better photos later ...Owen died in Jacksonville, Fl.
after residing also in St Augustine, Fl. ... and in West Springfield, Ma
Served in the Medical Service Corps of the US Air Force .. after intital
service as a pilot in WWII US AA 5th Air Force
Entered the Army Air
Corps in Februray 1942 after a post-Pearl Harbor volunteer & signed up while
attending Boston University (Varsity football & hockey). He retired from the
Air Force, a Lt Col in February 1968; at Westover AFB, Chicopee, Ma.
Also a Company Commander 82d Airborne Airborne Engineers; Fort Bragg, NC
.. post-war ...served during WWI in the Pacific flying logistics to the Fiji
Islands, Guadacanal & the Solomons, Carolines, Australia & NZ; Port
Moresby & elswhere in New Guinea & the Phillipines (possessed 'true'
short' & 'long' snorters & the 1000 hour crush look.)
Major
bases stationed included training through 1942-3 in Phoenix, Az (Thunderbird I & II - Free China Officers also trained as aviators at Thunderbird II in 1942), and in Malfia Texas, Greenville
AFB, SC; New Braunfels,Tx; Westover AFB - Chicopee, Ma (1919-51 & 1966-68); AIr University - AViation Physiology Department -Head - at
Gunter AFS & Maxwell AFB - Montgomery, Ala 1953-58; USAF Hospital Burderop
Park, Wroughton (nr Swindon) Wiltshire UK; Dow AFB Bangor Maine.
After
retirement from the armed forces Owen was a Hospital Administrator .. Mary Lane
Hospital - Ware, Ma & Providence Hospital Holyoke, Ma.
Born in
Malden, Ma ..Owen was raised in Lexington, Ma where he met his wife Dorothy
McCormack ... Owen's parents [Joseph A. Connolly & Sarah E. Scott) were from
Portland, Maine - his father in the paper & boxboard business (plant
management & sales).
Owen attended Lexington HS; St John's Prep -
Danvers, Ma & Boston University - planning to become an engineer.
Owen & Dorothy divorced .. and Owen remarried to Patricia Chandler
Litke . both women survive him in Jacksonville, Florida and West Springfield,
Ma.
Owen's children - only by his first wife Dorothy ..all save one
infant daughter also survive him; and a livinig brother Joseph.
Photos via Charles M Connolly (Owen's third son)
Owen F. Connolly's Family History
Owen F. ConnollyCharles Scott/Mary A. Durgin Bryan Connolly/Winifred McGowan |
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