1883-1945 |
By GEORGE ROGERS of The Gazette You will find a brief mention of John Frost on this site of the Portage County Gazette in Stevens Point, Wisconsin.. To visit the site, just click on: John Frost You may want to use the "Find" function on "John Frost." |
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Private funeral services were held October 5, 1945, for John Frost, still young at 62, member of the
board of the Frost National Bank, San Antonio, after an illness of several weeks, concluded by a heart attack. John Frost was born at San Antonio, September 10, 1883. He graduated from Princeton in 1903 and entered the banking business. In 1916 he learned to fly at the Stinson School, bought his own airplane and had some 200 hours when commissioned directly from civil life as First Lieutenant, Signal Officers Reserve Corps, July 10, 1917. He passed his R.M.A. test October 15, 1917. He left the States for the A.E.F., via Liverpool, Jan. 24, 1918, after four months at Kelly Field. From commanding officer of the 24th Squadron at Romsey, England, he was ordered to St. Maixent, and, in February, to the 3rd A.I.C. at Issoudun where he was stationed until August of 1918, save for a period at Cazaux and temporary duties at various places. At Issoudnu he continued pursuit training and tested planes. He hated this testing at the time because he was so keen to get to the front; but the experience was undoubtedly of great value to him later. One can well imagine some of the jobs that came into that field to be tested in those days, and the test pilot had to take them up again and again, instruct the mechanics in the necessary work to be done to make them safer, then see that this work was done before he turned them over to the boys who had to fly them in combat. He once told his wife that he could sleep peacefully in his bed for the rest of his life because he knew in his heart that never once from pressure of work or impatience did he o.k. a plane until he knew that every thing had been done that could be done to make each plane as safe to fly as was then humanly possible. On August 26 he was ordered to the First Air Depot, Colombey-les-Belles for station, immediately to be ordered to the 103rd Squadron of the 3rd Pursuit Group, 1st Pursuit Wing, 1st Army, under Major "Bill" Thaw. He returned to banking after his discharge on January 24, 1919, buying a plane for his private use while a member of the Air Corps Reserve until 1928. He continued flying until several years before his death when his heart condition became too serious. He had a succession of planes which the family used as others use autos. He received the D.S.C. for extraordinary heroism in action near Verneville, September 17, 1918 AUGUST, 1946 - PESCO, CLEVELAND, OHIO - 1 Number 34 Courtesy of Steve Remington at COLLECTAIR If you have any information on this Early Bird, please contact me. E-mail to Ralph Cooper Back 
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