world-war-ii – The Mighty 8th Air Force at Shipdham

February 22, 2024April 20, 2024 Mara Truslow Storey Uncategorized

Masters of the Air: On Screen vs. The Real Thing (Episode 1)

The big and small historical details the show nails.
A side-by-side look at images from the war and the series.

It’s no surprise the long awaited series Masters of the Air has skyrocketed to the top of the charts – with more viewers in its opening weekend than any Apple TV+ series (in its first season) to date.

It masterfully – and accurately – tells the story of the Bloody 100th, one of forty heavy bomber groups of the 8th Air Force during WWII. They were pioneers of the air war, fighting Hitler from the skies above Europe and dropping bombs on strategic targets almost two years before Allied troops landed on the beaches of Normandy.

The show portrays a true story. Behind the scenes, production was laser focused on getting the historical details – big and small – exactly right.

So, how did Masters of the Air do in mastering the history? Impeccably well, if you ask me.

This blog series will go episode by episode, comparing stills from the show to wartime images – so you can decide for yourself.

**ON SCREEN vs. THE REAL THING**
**Top** – Egan and Cleven stand in front of the B-17 ‘Our Baby.’ (Photo by Apple TV+).
**Bottom** – A wartime image from the heavy bomber base at Shipdham of an airman mission ready.

Let’s get into Episode 1, where we meet the protagonists Egan and Cleven, airmen assigned to the 8th Air Force who are en route to war. Their destination is England, where their first harrowing missions begin.

In this episode, we’re introduced to the heavy bomber base at Thorpe Abbotts, the place they’ll call home during the war. We meet their machine of war – the B-17 bomber, with its claustrophobic, primitive interior, and the combat gear they must don to fly at altitude where temperatures hover at negative 50 degrees.

Getting Around Base – Jeeps

**ON SCREEN vs. THE REAL THING: Top Brass on Base got around Base by Jeep**

On screen, we see Egan pick Cleven up in a Jeep after landing at Thorpe Abbotts. Having access to a vehicle to get around a sprawling 8th Air Force base was a luxury reserved for the top brass of a bomb group – including the likes of Egan.

Everyone else on base walked, and they walked miles everyday. Getting between the airfield, the living site, and the mess hall alone required multiple miles of walking, often through mud and rain. Cleven has yet to face England’s dismal weather.

As the episode progresses, Jeeps buzz around the airfield, transporting men and material in the frenzied activity before a mission, dropping airmen off in the far corners of the airfield, where their bombers were parked on hardstands circling the runway.

Urgent news traveled by Jeep, too. A ground crewman at another 8th AF heavy bomber base recalled the tense moments waiting for the bombers to return: “The many stories of stragglers being jumped by enemy aircraft continued to send chills up my spine. And hope was almost gone. Too upset to leave the line, I kept busy moving things around, making sure everything was in readiness for her return; kicking the weeds, watching the sky, and then the Jeeps and power wagons as they busily traveled the perimeter, returning the crews for debriefing. Then suddenly, one of the Jeeps turned in and screeched ‘They’re safe!’ They landed on the coast with just an engine out. I almost needed a parachute to bring me safely back to earth.”

IN WAR: 44th BG personnel piled on a Jeep, which was common practice for ground crews to “sweat out” the end of a mission, parked beside the runway, counting in the returning bombers.

Getting Around Base – 2.5 Ton Trucks

**ON SCREEN vs. THE REAL THING: 2.5 Ton Trucks used to Transport Airmen to and from Missions**

Episode 1 brings the Bloody 100th to England. Crosby arrives at Thorpe Abbotts after mistaking the French coast for England – and running into flak. Bubbles greets Crosby from the back of the truck, which has been sent to the hardstands surrounding the runway – where the bombers park.

Airmen rode in the bed behind the cab, seated on two wooden benches. A canvas canopy sometimes was strung above. It was designed for eight men – but more were often squeezed on board.

2.5 ton trucks were needed to transport crews between their living sites and the airfield in the pre-dawn hours before a mission. Miles could separate the two because 8th AF bases were designed as dispersed sites to make it harder for Luftwaffe attacks to destroy the entire base.

2.5 ton trucks did more than transport men to and from war. Airmen happily hopped aboard in pursuit of fun. Liberty Runs took airmen from their rural airbases in East Anglian villages to larger surrounding towns like Norwich – where pubs, restaurants, dancing clubs – and women – offered a reprieve from war. They got three hours of freedom – from 7 to 10 PM – when pubs closed and the airmen were collected.

Riding in a 2.5 ton truck was not comfortable. An 8th AF veteran recalled, “We bounced around on those hard wooden seats in the back end. On he way back to the base we often were eating fish and chips, wrapped in newspapers, and it was a hot delicious delight.”

ON SCREEN: 100th BG Airmen stand on the bed of a 2.5 ton truck. (Photograph by Apple TV+)

‘Sweating out a Mission’ on the Runway

**ON SCREEN vs. THE REAL THING: Waving Crews off to Combat & Sweating out a Mission** **on their Return**

On screen, we see Cleven’s first mission begin. B-17s file into line on the perimeter track around the runway, taking off at 30-second intervals. The signal caravan on the runway flashes its light (the black and white checkered trailer), signaling the pilot on deck to push the throttle. This sequence is historically spot on – artfully capturing the complex choreography of a mission.

As Cleven and Biddick speed down the runway, a bevy of ground crewmen stand on a jeep, waving and cheering the crew on to their target. Even though they’re just beside the concrete runway, they’re nestled in the tall grass of this former farmland, against a backdrop of blue skies. It’s an idyllic scene, a place where the machines of war are out of place.

This scene is a carbon copy of how missions began at 8th AF bases across East Anglia – at least during the few short months when England’s skies were as sunny and clear as we see in this episode. More often than not, the scene beside the runway was a cold, damp, muddy mess – as seen in the real wartime image below.

At the end of a mission, when bombers were expected to land, ground crews once again lined up beside the runway, anxiously awaiting the group’s return. Ambulances and medical staff waited there too, ready to rush toward ailing bombers and injured men before their props even stopped turning, just like we saw in episode 1.

It came to be known as sweating out a mission. They waited anxiously, peering skyward, squinting to spot the bomber stream on return. Then, the counting began, hoping to count all the ships that left at dawn.

On Cleven’s first mission, three crews didn’t return.

ON SCREEN: Airmen at Thorpe Abbotts wave bombers onto a mission. (Photograph by Apple TV+)

The Cockpit & the Captain

**ON SCREEN vs. THE REAL THING: The Cockpit of a Heavy Bomber**

Episode 1 introduces us to the vehicle of the strategic bombing campaign. The B-17 Heavy Bomber is a character in its own right says writer John Orloff.

And the cockpit is its nerve center, from which the Captain orchestrates the intricate 10-man dance of a heavy bomber mission, all the while manning the controls of an incredibly complex machine.

As Cleven takes off for Bremen, we get an up close look at the cockpit – and the instrument panel teeming with gauges and switches. It’s undisputed the series nailed reproducing the B-17’s cockpit, and that was no small task. The B-17’s sister ship (the B-24) had 81 cockpit gauges and controls, a 57-item checklist for takeoff, and a 27-item checklist for landing.

The cost to produce one heavy bomber in wartime was $120,000 – or $2.2 million dollars today. Challenging to operate and expensive to replace, the B-17 required a steely, competent leader in the cockpit. Over Bremen, we see Cleven reckon with the horrors of the air war for the first time – flak, fighters, and bombers in flames. He grapples with fear, frustration, shock, and sadness – but never loses his cool or composure.

As the air war began in earnest, 8th AF top brass struggled how to evaluate a pilot’s ability in combat, where survival hinged, “not the mechanics of reading gauges and flipping switches, but the manipulation of flight controls and power settings for optimal efficiency and safety of the airplane. The even more difficult aspect of piloting to measure was judgment. How will would a pilot decide whether to land or to go around whether to bail out or attempt a dangerous landing? How easily would he panic?” (Mahoney, Reluctant Witness)

Cleven did not panic. But he lands in a state of shock – tracing his hand over the holes flak pierced in his bomber. Why didn’t you tell me what it was like, he asks Egan back on base. Here, we see the roots of combat fatigue (the AAF’s wartime vernacular for PTSD) planted in Cleven.

ON SCREEN: Biddick and Cleven in the cockpit of a B-17, along with their Flight Engineer. (Photograph by Apple TV+)

The Flying Clothes

**ON SCREEN vs. THE REAL THING: Flying Clothes**

Egan’s first mission comes at the top of Episode 1. On the hardstand before it begins, airmen are swollen from all the gear they’re wearing.

At altitude, temperatures hovered around -50 degrees Fahrenheit – the same temperature as the South Pole. Flying clothes were all that protected airmen from the deathly bitter cold.

Drying Rooms were specially heated buildings on base where airmen got dressed. “Getting dressed for altitude flying is quite a job,” said 8th AF veterans Gerald Gross during the war.
“First came our electrical flying suit, an extra pair of wool socks, heated shoes, summer flying suit, leather flying shoes, a 45 pistol slung gangster fashion around the chest, Mae west life jacket, parachute harness, silk gloves, electric gloves, flying helmet, goggles, and lastly an oxygen mask strapped to the side of the helmet.”

All told, it was 80 pounds of gear.

IN WAR: Egan after his first mission, clutching his parachute harness. (Photograph by Apple TV+)

(Check out the Episode 2 Recap here.)

What do I know? I’m the granddaughter of an 8th Air Force veteran who flew 42 missions from Shipdham on a B-24 Liberator (the arguably better bomber – but we’ll leave that for another day). Over the last six years, I uncovered my grandfather’s war that he took to the grave – then sought to make it easier for others like me to find long lost stories from the war – by building a data dashboard and digital archive for my grandfather’s group. I’ve also written extensively about the 8th Air Force during WWII, for publications like NatGeo and Insider.

February 22, 2024March 11, 2024 Mara Truslow Storey masters of the air

Masters of the Air: On Screen vs. The Real Thing (Episode 2)

The big and small historical details the show nails.
A side-by-side look at images from the war and the series.

(Episode 1 recap available here.)

In episode 2, Cleven flies a mission to Bremen that’s scrubbed when the target area is obscured by cloud cover. Bombs are dropped in the Channel. Men are lost. The mission is for naught. Egan successfully seeks a demotion to get back into combat, joining Cleven as a Squadron Commander. The hellish conditions at high altitude send more of Cleven’s men to the hospital with wounds never seen before in combat. Yes, we see missions in this episode. But we also see life on base. We get a glimpse into HQ, the nerve center of mission operations. We see the bomber boys unwind – with a dance on base and an electric bike race. It’s the moments between missions where the historical details shine in this episode.

Post-Mission interrogation started with scotch and a sandwich.

**ON SCREEN vs. THE REAL THING: Post-Mission Interrogation on Base**

At the opening of Episode 2, we see the 100th Bomb Group crews return to base, herded into 2.5 ton trucks, and driven to interrogation. “Not another word,” officers say over and over, silencing any talk of the mission until debriefing.

During the war, the pre-debriefing ritual was just like what we saw in the show: “[Crews] first went through the medical debriefing to see who might have been hurt or shaken physically or psychologically. This was usually just a quick once over, then a medic handed each crewmen a 3 ounce shot of scotch in a paper cup,” according to Mahoney, a Squadron Commander in an 8th Air Force Group, the same role Cleven and Egan held in the show.

The scotch was given to calm nerves. In the show, Cleven is portrayed as a teetotaler. He would’ve been in the minority of airmen who didn’t drink. “We had a couple of the teetotalers on the crew. This resulted in a bonus for the rest of us,” said one airman at Shipdham Airbase during the war.

Red Cross girls also would’ve offered something to eat, often a donut or sandwich. It’s the latter that we see in this episode.

Then, interrogation began on the HQ site. In a room just like we saw in the show, the men who survived would’ve been seated by crew. The mission was recounted – the conversation led by an interrogation officer seated with each crew, just as we saw at the beginning of this episode. Top priorities were summarizing enemy action (when and where flak or fighters hit), accuracy of the bomb drop, and details about crews shot down. That intel was critical in the creation of a MACR – or Missing Air Crew Report – which tracked everything known about the status of downed crews. Were they confirmed dead (an unsurvivable explosion)? Possibly alive (chutes seen opening)?

J. Good Brown, an 8th AF Chaplain, spoke of the mood at interrogation: “We sit here waiting. The place gets empty after a while. You look for faces and they are not here. They did not come back. The atmosphere in the interrogation room is sad beyond words. I have actually seen the members of the crew crying. I see men’s faces when they walk off alone. I walk over and stand by a man’s side. Perhaps I do not say a word. I just walk out of the building with him.”

ON SCREEN: Interrogation after an aborted mission to Bremen. (Photograph by Apple TV+)

There actually was a hospital on base at Thorpe Abbotts.

**ON SCREEN vs. THE REAL THING: Station Hospitals on American Heavy Bomber Bases in England**

In this episode, we see Cleven visits his men in the hospital. Frostbite seems the predominant wound.

We learn from Cleven’s conversation with the Flight Surgeon that aerial combat medicine was a new and evolving field when the 8th Air Force began flying missions in late 1942. “Flight surgeons had to learn about war and war injuries by experiencing the unique and yet unknown conditions airmen faced in the bombing war,” commented a post-war report on aerial combat medicine.

Each heavy bomber base had its own hospital, with up to 25 beds, where minor injuries could be treated and short-term care provided. For more serious cases – like the frostbite and flak wounds we see in this episode – injured airmen were sent off base to one of five nearby hospitals that specialized in aerial combat medicine. In the first two years of war, frigid temperatures at high altitude caused half of all casualties in the 8th Air Force. Flak and fighters were far from the only foe the 8th AF encountered, particularly for the pioneers of the air war, like Cleven and his men. Conditions at altitude were deadly, too.

By V-E Day, 26,000 8th AF airmen were killed – and 7,000 more wounded. The 8th Air Force lost more men than the Marines lost in every theater of war.

IN WAR: Station Hospital Entrance Sign at 44th Bomb Group.

HQ Site – Where Top Brass Worked

**ON SCREEN vs. THE REAL THING:** (Left) 100th BG HQ, as portrayed in the show, Masters of the Air. (Right) At Shipdham Airbase, Major Hart shows General Andrews charts in the operations block.

At HQ, the Group’s top brass planned missions from beginning to end. It was a place of high intensity, where planning and execution were the focus.

IN WAR: Aircraft status board at Shipdham Airfield, detailing which B-24s were flyable. (Photograph from Shipdham Museum)

Officers had their own Mess Hall on Base – featuring white tablecloths.

**ON SCREEN vs. THE REAL THING: The Officer’s Mess Hall featured in Masters of the Air vs. a wartime officer’s mess at an 8th AF Base during the war.**

We see Cleven and Egan eating breakfast at the Officer’s Mess Hall in this episode. The set is a carbon copy of images capturing the real thing during the war.

On 8th AF bases during the war, mess halls were split – one for Officers and one for Enlisted men.

White table cloths, wooden chairs, and cloth napkins were staples in the Officer’s Mess Hall. It was austere, but elevated, just like we see in the show.

With a reported budget of over $250 million, the production’s attention to detail isn’t surprising. Series writer John Orloff says some sets, like the Station Theater and the Mess Hall, were built for just a handful of scenes. Props like cups and plates were authentic to the time period.

While the mess hall scene wasn’t one most would call noteworthy, it’s yet another example of no detail overlooked in the series.

**ON SCREEN: Cleven eats breakfast at the Officer’s Mess. (Photograph by Apple TV+)**

Dances were frequent affairs on base – and women were brought in from surrounding English villages.

**ON SCREEN vs. THE REAL THING: Dances on Base**
(Right) Officer’s dance at Shipdham.

We see Cleven and Egan at an Officer’s dance at Thorpe Abbotts in this episode. Such occasions were a staple on 8th Air Force bases.

The American Red Cross club on base typically organized these evening events, separated by officers and enlisted men.

In the series, the men tap their toes to live music, thanks to the station band who plays on stage. A band on base was not unique to Thorpe Abbotts. Most 8th AF bases cobbled together a band from ground crews and airmen who moonlit as musicians.

IN THE WAR: Station Band at Shipdham, a B-24 Airbase.

**Bomber boys did anything for a bike – then did anything on a bike.**

ON SCREEN vs. THE REAL THING: (Left) Cleven (played by Austin Butler) at the beginning of an electric bike race on the 100th BG’s Communal Site. (Right) Ground crewmen at Shiphdam Airfield on a bike.

In episode one, Egan’s antics at a local pub score him two bikes.

At this episode’s close, we’re treated to a bike race through the Communal Site buildings, led by Egan and Cleven.

Bikes are here, there, and everywhere in the show. And that’s historically spot on. With the sprawling size of 8th AF bases, coupled with the British rationing of gasoline, bikes were a necessity in the English countryside for Americans and English alike.

For American bomber boys, a bike came with a steep price tag. But it was a necessity.

In this episode, the boys of the Bloody 100th invent a new way to pass the time on base. A bike race. It’s an electric scene, a rare moment of joy in a war plagued by loss. It’s fun that screams of youth, reminding us just how young these boys fighting the war were.

At a nearby 8th AF base during the war, bomber boys held a similarly electric bike race outdoors. Thick, dense, hedgerows lined many of the narrow East Anglian roads. The bomber boys invented a rather violent game where an airman started on a bike, on either side of the hedgerow. Bets were placed on who would reach the end first and knock their opponent off his bike. Ribs were broken. Bikes were ridden backwards. But fun was had.