MORT SOLOMON
Age: 91
Hometown: Bronx, N.Y.
Residence: Rancho Mirage
Military branch: U.S. Army; U.S. Army Air Corps
Years served: 1939-1941 (U.S. Army, 113th Infantry, Company K); 1942-1945 (8th Air Force, 467th Bomb Group, 788th Bomb Squadron; B-24 bombardier
Rank: Staff sergeant
Family: Wife Beatrice; two daughters, Shelley (Neil) Kaye of Westminster and Laurie Solomon of Culver City; two granddaughters; one great-granddaughter.
About this series
Staff writer Denise Goolsby will profile desert veterans from World War II Wednesday through Sunday through the end of 2010 — the 65th anniversary of the end of the war. Contact her at (760) 778-4587 or via e-mail at denise.goolsby@thedesertsun.com
Coming tomorrow
U.S. Army Air Corps veteran Lloyd Mokler of Palm Desert.
More
U.S. Army Air Corps Staff Sgt. Mort Solomon, a bombardier, flew 36 combat missions over Germany in a B-24 Liberator, a four-engine heavy bomber the crew nicknamed “Bucket of Bolts.”
The creaking behemoth, carrying up to 8,000 pounds of bombs, was solid and dependable, but often sounded like it was falling apart.
“Every time we heard it rattling, we said, ‘There goes another bolt,'” Solomon said. “The minute we took off, we heard the noise. It shook like a leaf.”
Solomon was the man in charge of sighting the target and dropping the bombs. He also had extensive firearms training and manned the two guns in the plane's turret.
Solomon's expert marksmanship saved the crew from certain death on the group's 22nd mission.
“It was Christmas Day, 1944,” he said. “Twelve of us got lost going on a mission and here they (German fighter planes) come. They saw we were all alone.”
Solomon noticed one of the fighters was headed straight for the bomber and readied his .50-caliber machine guns as the pilot closed in on his target.
Solomon opened fire with the aircraft about 500 yards away.
“I waited until I almost saw the guy and I shot him,” he said. “He didn't shoot for some reason.”
Solomon said he unloaded about 1,000 rounds into the fighter plane, a Messerschmitt 109.
The plane caught fire and the pilot parachuted out.
Stress came with bomber gig
To steel their nerves after these missions — heavy anti-aircraft fire and enemy fighter pursuit greeted them on every bomb run — the men imbibed on the way back from battle.
“We took whiskey on the trips,” Solomon said.
The bottle of booze was safely tucked away under a seat on their way out to the target, but soon after the plane completed its mission and began its descent, it was time to party.
“The minute we hit 10,000 feet, they hit that bottle,” he said, adding, “I was the only one who didn't drink.”
The crew passed the bottle around all the way home, he said.
“That's why they had to go for coffee when they landed,” he laughed.
There were a couple of events during each mission that put all the men on edge, he said.
“Taking off with a bomb load and landing — those were the two times every bomb crew would worry about,” Solomon said. “On takeoff, we'd say, ‘Up, up, up, up!,' our voices would get louder and louder until we got over the trees.
“Prior to a mission, the crews attended religious services according to their denomination,” Solomon said.
Before the crew's first mission, Solomon was the only crewman whose religion was not represented at the services.
“I was the only Jewish boy that morning and they didn't have a rabbi on the base,” he said.
After the services, the crew's tail gunner, Herb Simmerly, told Solomon to wait and returned with a Protestant minister.
The minister asked Solomon if he had a Bible and Solomon showed the minister one that his mom had given him.
“The priest read the Hebrew service to me and demanded that I appear each morning before a mission,” Solomon said. “At takeoff time each mission, the minister was at the lookout station and gave me and the crew a thumbs-up.”
Vet finds long-lost friend
Simmerly, of Cleveland, and Solomon became friends, but lost track of each other soon after the war ended and they returned to civilian life.
After more than 50 years of searching, Solomon met a Cleveland couple at a social gathering and asked if they would look in the phone book when they got home to see if Simmerly was listed.
Several weeks later, Solomon received torn-out pages of a telephone directory that included several Simmerly listings. On New Year's Day of 1995, at Solomon's wife's insistence, he finally picked up the phone and called Cleveland.
The two men rekindled their friendship, shared memories and reunited at Thanksgiving of that year, surrounded at the dinner table by Simmerly's wife, Carol; eight children; and 23 grandchildren.
It turns out that Simmerly had also been looking for his long-lost buddy, but he mistakenly thought Solomon was living in New York.
The men stayed in close contact until Simmerly's death in March 2009.
Solomon, a 13-year veteran with the Rancho Mirage Citizens on Patrol — he's the group's captain pro-tem — was named Volunteer of the Year at the 13th Annual Peace Officers & Public Safety Awards ceremony in November.
