12-336 Garand Picture of the Day - Fort Campbell

[Bill Hollinger]

Wild Blue is very good also and for those who read it, the story about the 500 pound bomb stuck in the rack, 1943 in Mountain Home, Idaho? My dad told me that same story and how he crashed on his WLA between runways heading over to the B24 after it landed. Dad also told the same story about going to the officer's club and getting the drunkest he'd ever been afterwards. When I told dad who the pilot was dad simply said "if I'd have known it was George McGovern I'd have let him crash". Not trying to start anything by telling that other than how it came from the mouth of an 87 year man.

[ABPOS]

Excuse my ignorance. Who is George McGovern?

[HOOKED ON HISTORY]

I can piggy back that with "Citizen Soldiers" by the same author....

I am glad you mentioned that one. I think I have it and not read it yet. The search begins.

[Bill Hollinger]

George Stanley McGovern (July 19, 1922 – October 21, 2012) was an American historian, author and U.S. Representative, U.S. Senator, and the Democratic Party presidential nominee in the 1972 presidential election.

McGovern grew up in Mitchell, South Dakota, where he was a renowned debater. He volunteered for the U.S. Army Air Forces upon the country's entry into World War II and as a B-24 Liberator pilot flew 35 missions over German-occupied Europe. Among the medals bestowed upon him was a Distinguished Flying Cross for making a hazardous emergency landing of his damaged plane and saving his crew. After the war he gained degrees from Dakota Wesleyan University and Northwestern University, culminating in a PhD, and was a history professor. He was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1956 and re-elected in 1958. After a failed bid for the U.S. Senate in 1960, he was elected there in 1962.

As a senator, McGovern was an exemplar of modern American liberalism. He became most known for his outspoken opposition to the growing U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War. He staged a brief nomination run in the 1968 presidential election as a stand-in for the assassinated Robert F. Kennedy. The subsequent McGovern–Fraser Commission fundamentally altered the presidential nominating process, by greatly increasing the number of caucuses and primaries and reducing the influence of party insiders. The McGovern–Hatfield Amendment sought to end the Vietnam War by legislative means but was defeated in 1970 and 1971. McGovern's long-shot, grassroots-based 1972 presidential campaign found triumph in gaining the Democratic nomination but left the party badly split ideologically, and the failed vice-presidential pick of Thomas Eagleton undermined McGovern's credibility. In the general election McGovern lost to incumbent Richard Nixon in one of the biggest landslides in American electoral history. Re-elected Senator in 1968 and 1974, McGovern was defeated in a bid for a fourth term in 1980.

Throughout his career, McGovern was involved in issues related to agriculture, food, nutrition, and hunger. As the first director of the Food for Peace program in 1961, McGovern oversaw the distribution of U.S. surpluses to the needy abroad and was instrumental in the creation of the United Nations-based World Food Program. As sole chair of the Senate Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs during 1968–1977, McGovern publicized the problem of hunger within the United States and issued the "McGovern Report" that led to a new set of nutritional guidelines for Americans. McGovern later served as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Agencies for Food and Agriculture from 1998–2001 and was appointed the first UN Global Ambassador on World Hunger by the World Food Program in 2001. The McGovern-Dole International Food for Education and Child Nutrition Program has provided school meals for millions of children in dozens of countries since 2000 and resulted in McGovern's being named World Food Prize co‑laureate in 2008.

[Bill Hollinger]

Also mentioned in the Charlie Daniels Band song Uneasy Rider

[ABPOS]

Thank you!

[HOOKED ON HISTORY]

Excuse my ignorance. Who is George McGovern?

Glad the question got the wiki answer as I might have been tempted to violate some rules here.