COLONEL GEORGE E. "BUD" DAY (RETIRED)
Colonel George E. Day is a veteran of more than 30 years service in the Armed Forces of the United States.
Colonel Day was born in Sioux City, Iowa, on February 24, 1925. He holds a Bachelor of Science Degree and Doctor of Humane Letters from Morningside College in Sioux City, Iowa. He has also been awarded a Master of Arts degree from St. Louis University, a Juris Doctor from the University of South Dakota and a Doctor of Laws from Troy State University. Col. Day was admitted to the South Dakota Bar in 1949 and in Florida Bar in 1977.
Col. Day joined the Marine Corps in 1942 and served 30 months in the South Pacific as a noncommissioned officer. He received an appointment as a Second Lieutenant in the National Guard in 1950.
Col. Day was called to active duty in the Air Force in 1951 and entered jet pilot training. He served two tours in the Far East as a fighter-bomber pilot during the Korean War.
In April 1967, Colonel Day was assigned to the 31st Tac Fighter Wing at Tuy Hoa Air Base, Republic of Vietnam. He later moved to Phu Cat Air Base where he organized and became the first commander of the "Misty Super FAC's," an F-100 Squadron.
Shot down over North Vietnam on August 26, 1967, he spent 67 months as a Prisoner of War. Colonel Day was the only POW to escape from prison in the South. He is also credited with living through the first "no chute" bailout from a burning jet fighter in England in 1955.
At the time of his shoot-down, Colonel Day was one of the nation's most experienced jet fighter pilots, with 4,500 hours of single engine jet time, and more than 5,000 hours of flying time. He has flown all of the modern Air Force jet fighters including the F-80, F-84, F-100, F-101, F-104, F-105, F-4E, A-4J Mongoose, A-7, F-106, FB-111, F-15, F-16, CF-5, CT-33, and CF-18.
Col. Day holds every significant combat award and is the nation's most highly decorated officer, as well as the most decorated since General Douglass MacArthur. He holds nearly seventy military decorations and awards, of which more than fifty are for combat. Most notable are: the Medal of Honor, the Air Force Cross, the Distinguished Service Medal, the Silver Star, the Legion of Merit, the Distinguished Flying Cross, the Air Medal with nine Oak Leaf Clusters, the Bronze Star for Valor with two Oak Leaf Cluster, the Bronze Star, and the Purple Heart with three Clusters. Col. Day was presented Vietnam's highest medal by President Thieu, two Vietnamese Gallantry Crosses, and Vietnamese Wings, and wears twelve Campaign Battle Stars.
He is a member of the Medal of Honor Society, Legion of Valor, was the first President of NAM-POW's (the Vietnam POW organization), President of the MISTY SUPER-FAC Association, and a member of numerous military and fraternal organizations. Colonel Day was a member of the Code of Conduct Review Board, established by the Department of Defense in 1976 to review POW conduct.
Col. Day has taught World Politics, International Law and Political Geography at St. Louis University and Parks College of Aeronautical Technology. He taught Constitutional Law, Politics of the Middle East, and Communism in Eastern Europe at Troy State University.
Col. Day is a member of the Okaloosa/Walton Bar Association, Academy of Florida Trial Lawyers, American Bar Association, and American Trial Lawyers. He is a visiting lecturer at the Freedom's Foundation program at Valley Forge for both St. Francis College and the University of Scranton, and lectures young officers at the Air University at Maxwell AFB, AL several times each year.
Bud is married to his childhood sweetheart Doris Merlene Sorensen of Sioux City, Iowa, and has four children. Steven Michael of Shalimar, Florida, Capt. George Everette, Jr. (Class of '85 Air Force Academy) F-16 pilot, twin daughters Sonja Smith of Fort Walton Beach, Florida and Sandra Mathers of San Diego, California (whose husband is Navy helicopter pilot). George Day has two grandsons Jacob and Joshua, three granddaughters Noel Elizabeth, Victoria Leigh, and Audrey Marie. He resides in Shalimar, Florida and has a law firm in Fort Walton Beach, Florida where he is a trial Lawyer.
Col. Day is a past Florida State Republican Committeeman, and a past member of the Board of Directors of the Medal of Honor Society. He is a past National Commander of the Legion of Valor and was a delegate to Republican Conventions, Chairman of the Reagan Committee in Okaloosa Count, Florida. In 1984, he was National Chairman of Veteran's for Reagan and campaigned extensively for and with the President. He campaigned nationally for President Bush in 1992.
Col. Day received the BUSINESS ASSOCIATE OF THE YEAR 1988 from the American Business Women's Association.
Col. Day has published numerous articles on fighter performance, an article in the Saturday Evening Post, Air Force Magazine, and is the author or "RETURN WITH HONOR" his POW autobiography.
Governor Martinez appointed Col. Day a Commissioner of Veterans Affairs. He is a past Secretary of Florida Veterans Affairs Commission.
Senator Connie Mack placed Col. Day on the Defense Advisory Committee and he serves as a director of the Air Force Armament Museum.
He is a past advisor to the Air Force Association, Washington, D.C.
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