BOB HEMPHILL

By Matt Nunamaker

I am here to tell you a story about an interview that I was part of recently with a wonderful man, Bob Hemphill.  When my class took on this assignment, I was overjoyed to get Bob Hemphill's name since he was actually in the service and had served overseas, which I found very interesting.  Bob was born in 1926 in San Angelo, Texas.  Bob liked it in Texas quite a bit, since he spent most of his life there.  He was in high school when America entered the war.  He can remember how everyone joined in the war effort back then.  He and other students would go out and collect scrap metals to be used in the war.  Bob also remembers how everyone seemed to be for the war.  He told me there was not an ounce of anti-war sentiment.  Like any other young man, he had aspirations of going off to war, and admits to naturally being a little excited.  From the beginning Bob had decided that he would want to be in the Navy.  When he turned eighteen and graduated from high school, he was off to enlist in the Navy.

It wasn't until 1944 that Bob entered the armed services, and when he did he was immediately sent off to Memphis, Tennessee for his Aviation Ordinance training.  However, he only spent six months there.  After Memphis, it was back to Texas to Kingsville where he earned his Aviation Gunnery Wings.  Bob was going to be a gunner in a patrol  bomber.  For his final portion of training, he was sent to a Navel Air Station in Corpus Christi, Texas where he joined a flight crew.  When I asked Bob if he had any interesting or funny stories about training, he mentioned that while he was in training they started running low on fuel and had to cut back.  He recalls the slightly nerve-racking feeling he got when the engines would cough and sputter in mid-air.

Once all of his training was finally over, Bob Hemphill was shipped over to San Diego, California to join a PBM flight crew.  Although a PBM is a bomber, as Bob explained to me, they are too slow and vulnerable to be used in offensive actions, so they are mostly used in search-and-rescue as well as in patrolling.  Bob was put in the nose gunner position, right at the front of the plane.  Initially, he flew patrol missions over the coasts of California, going about halfway out to Hawaii.  But Bob also got sent to Hawaii for more patrolling and was later sent to the Philippines. 

While in the Philippines, Bob's crew flew air-sea rescue missions.  He said it was very difficult since all they could do was just scan with their eyes.  They had no special technology.  While his plane never found anybody or saw any action, Bob still enjoyed flying.  When I asked him if he was ever afraid or got tired of flying, his answer was "No."

Bob loved flying in the PBM, although they sometimes had difficulties.  The PBM that he was on landed and took off from water.  While it was easy to take off in choppy water, when the water was calm the PBM would have to taxi around in circles for a bit of time to chop up the water.

The most remarkable part about Bob and his crew on the PBM was probably the fact that they sometimes flew for twelve to fifteen hours straight.  Fortunately, they had bunks on board and could take turns rotating shifts so that they did get some breaks.  The friendships were strong among Bob's crew.  I could sense that he really liked his experiences and enjoyed flying in the PBM.

When the A-Bomb was finally dropped on Japan, Bob and his crew were relieved.  Just prior to the bombing, they were scheduled to go in as part of the invasion force to the main Japanese islands.  While the A-Bomb was a catastrophic event, Bob pointed out to me that he may not have been here today if it wasn't for the dropping of the A-Bomb.

Bob Hemphill doesn't believe war is to be glorified or that it is a great thing necessarily, but he does believe that when needed, America does need to assert its power.  Bob told me that his two year stint in the service was a very good experience for him.  He said it was very maturing and definitely made him grow up fast.  Bob thinks all boys, and even those girls who wish to, should serve.  He thinks it helps them to grow up and prepare them for life.  Bob did warn me, however, that when you join up you must be ready to let someone else start running your life for you and tell you what to do.

After the war, Bob continued to serve out his two-year service with the Navy.  Once he was done with that, he went to college at Texas A&M.  He got married to a girl he knew from high school.  They have two kids, a boy and a girl.  Over the years, Bob was in a few different professions.  For quite some time he was a rancher, which was a family business.  He was also a contractor, building houses, and at one point he was a banker. 

Bob retired and moved to Reno in 1990.  About three and one half years ago he and his wife moved to Pullman since his daughter was getting her doctorate in archeology at WSU.  His son went into the Navy just as Bob did, however he followed a more scientific career and ended up being trained in the field of lasers.  The Hemphills are active members in the Pullman Senior Citizens Center.

Bob recently went to the Pena Air Museum at Tucson, Arizona.  The only remaining PBM known to Bob is located there.  All of the rest of the PBMs have been destroyed or scrapped.  Bob mentioned to me the book called Greatest Generation by Tom Brokaw.  I was familiar with the book since I've read it.  In part of that book, three of Bob's old training crew members are pictured and one of their stories is included.  He just thought it was kind of an interesting coincidence since he never kept in touch with any of his old crew members. 

Bob Hemphill never loved war, but he loved contributing to and serving his country.  Bob really is a part of the Greatest Generation and men like him shall never be forgotten.