Handout photo of Capt. Theodore Van Kirk, center, as he and the rest of the crew return from the mission over Hiroshima, Japan Aug. 6, 1945. He was the navigator. Next to the left is Col. Paul Tibbetts, flight commander.
Sad to see the WWII generation go. RIP to Mr. Van Kirk, he did his job well. BTW, a couple of years ago, he passed on as well, but I knew a WWII vet who was on Tinian. He watched them load “Little Boy” on the Enola Gay although at the time he did not know what was going on. After the Enola Gay came back from bombing Hiroshima, he served Colonial Tibbits and the crew in the officer’s club and he remembers Tibbits saying over and over, “what have we done?” He also remembered “Bock’s Car” too. He also told the story where he fought two Japanese army men on the island where he shot one and bayonetted the other in the stomach.
RIP.