John Shearer: Dean Hutson, Pam Miller Recall Memorable Plane Crash Of 75 Years Ago

Although they were young children at that time, both Dean Hutson and Pam Harless Miller will never forget the unusual and horrifying event they witnessed on Sept. 30, 1949.

A B-25 military plane crashed loudly and violently just a few yards from where they were at their nearby Missionary Ridge homes that afternoon after they initially feared they might get hit. They had been enjoying the innocence of childhood at ages 5 and almost 8, respectively, and they were quickly or at least temporarily brought into the harsh reality of having to experience a grownup feeling of shock and sadness after what they witnessed and heard that Friday afternoon.

“It was always embedded in my mind,” recalled Ms. Miller. “It was that shaky and so close to my home.”

As the two recently gathered at the nearby Bragg Reservation on Missionary Ridge on the actual 75^th anniversary day after Mr. Hutson sent an email to Chattanoogan.com mentioning the anniversary, it quickly became obvious the event of long ago was still a vivid part of their lives. That is, even though they have both gone on to enjoy rich and rewarding lives.

The crash occurred about 4 p.m. that day, and both were at home after school enjoying the pleasures of being children. Unbeknownst to them, though, a plane piloted by 30-year-old Capt. William E. Blair of the U.S. Air Force was headed in their direction with a crew of eight others, six of whom had been taking part in military police training at Fort Gordon in Augusta, Ga.

They were headed to Spokane, Wa., and were planning to stop for the night in Nebraska before heading on to Spokane, and Chattanooga was not on their minds at all. But it would soon be on their radar in an unfortunate way, and they would all remain connected with the Scenic City for the rest of their lives, particularly Capt. Blair.

News reports said that as the plane was nearing Chattanooga from the south, the left engine of the plane developed a serious oil leak that caused it to catch fire. It soon spread to the inside of the plane, at which time Capt. Blair reportedly and courageously ordered everyone else to bail out.

Seven were able to do that and with their parachutes landed safely in places just west of Missionary Ridge. One person who was not used to strapping on a parachute fell 6,000 feet to his death, landing in the playground of the now-razed Ridgedale Elementary, which was across Dodds Avenue from what is now the John P. Franklin Funeral Home.

It was at about this time that both Mr. Hutson and Ms. Miller became witness to one of the more memorable tragedies in the city’s history. As Mr. Hutson recounted in a Facebook post and shared similarly during the interview, “I was playing in our front yard when my attention was drawn to an airplane flying in a southerly direction parallel to Missionary Ridge and Dodds Avenue. Initially I thought the plane was a skywriter, as it was leaving a trail of white smoke.

“At 5, I didn’t know what a parachute was and thought I saw white umbrellas being dropped from the plane. I went in the house and told my mother what I’d seen. She told me to go back outside and continue playing.

“By the time I returned to the front yard, the plane flew over our house. In less than a minute there was a tremendous explosion coming from the direction of where the plane was heading. My mother quickly came out on the porch inquiring about the explosion. I told her it was probably the plane that I told her about.”

Mr. Hutson lived at the time at 248 S. Crest Road just south of Bragg Reservation in a home that was later torn down with others to make way for a large home for local carpet and business entrepreneur Bud Seretean.

Ms. Miller, meanwhile, lived a short distance south of his home at 260 S. Crest Road in a home that sits back by East View Drive, while her grandmother lived at 254 S. Crest Road, where she later moved.

She said she was upstairs in the home talking with Dean’s sister on the phone after getting home from the nearby Missionary Ridge Elementary when everyone heard a rumbling sound. “Mother (Wilma Harless) called up and asked, ‘Are you roller skating?’ ” she recalled.

No, a tragic plane crash was about to occur, and Ms. Miller and her mother knew exactly when it happened. “It rattled our house,” she remembered.

The plane had evidently taken an eastern turn, perhaps during the emergency, and had landed in a small undeveloped area between what is now the end of Chickalilly Drive and the back of the current Ridge Apartments that were later built near the Bachman Tubes off Ringgold Road.

Capt. Blair had jumped shortly before the crash but was unable to open a parachute and died. He was found about 200 yards from the crash site. “I read that he didn’t have time to secure the parachute leg straps and he and it were separated when he bailed out,” Mr. Hutson said.

Ms. Miller later deduced that the plane flew over their house while perhaps trying to avoid the still-standing water tower just south of their home on a high point in the ridge.

Both Ms. Miller and Mr. Hutson remember the utter chaos after the crash, with traffic jams from people wanting to get near the burning plane site and the simple panic about what had happened and what numerous people had seen take place in the sky. It was also when a lot of people were trying to get home in the late afternoon for the weekend from their jobs in the pre-interstate days.

Mr. Hutson said that Central High teacher Clarence Towry was a photography enthusiast who spotted the plane and the parachuters from the school, and he took a picture that ran a few days later in the Oct. 10 edition of Life magazine as the picture of the week.

Ms. Miller said her father, George Harless, worked at Valley Supply Co. west of the ridge and saw the excitement unfold and feared their home had been hit. He had a few anxious moments trying to get home amid the excitement before realizing they were OK. Ms. Miller, meanwhile, had gone down with her mother to look for the crash site shortly afterward, she said.

While remembering the anniversary last Monday, Mr. Hutson and Ms. Miller drove me around to show me where the crash site was after pointing out the former site of the old and gone fire hall across the street from the southwest corner of Bragg Reservation. They had also mentioned that the road that cuts through Bragg Reservation and the now-razed Missionary Ridge School was actually the original South Crest Road.

Regarding the crash site, they said a lot of people think it occurred at the large sloping and vacant lot across East View Drive from the old Hutcheson home belonging to the Peerless Woolen Mills of Rossville family. It is a tract that was originally part of the Hutcheson property, although another nearby homeowner now owns it, they said.

But the crash site was just east of that beyond the end of Chickalilly Drive in an area where the black servants of the Hutcheson family, including the Tillers, once lived in the pre-mid-century days of segregation and more tightly defined employment opportunities for minorities. Only about one now-vacant bungalow style home appears to remain from the older era, with newer homes of modest appearance now located on the dead-end street.

To the surprise of Mr. Hutson, a plaque has been placed recently at the old Hutcheson sloping vacant lot remembering the event. It includes a circular photo of him and says, “On September 30, 1949, Captain William E. Blair, after ordering his crew to bail out, sacrificed his life by steering his stricken B-25 bomber into this uninhabited area avoiding Missionary Ridge School and surrounding homes.”

Yes, as became obvious, Capt. Blair was considered quite a hero and had tried to avoid disaster and crash the plane, if possible, into an uninhabited or undeveloped area, even if it meant possibly sacrificing his own life. If only he had been able to do that and possibly bail out safely himself, he could have enjoyed the plaudits thrown his way.

Instead, his wife and two young children were left to mourn his life, although in a proud way that included receiving military praise toward her husband. He received posthumously a Distinguished Flying Cross and a Cheney Award for bravery in the air, the latter presented by well-known Air Force Gen. Hoyt Vandenberg.

The William E. Blair American Legion Post 95 was also established in his memory in 1951 on Ringgold Road just feet from the crash. It includes a plaque that had originally been at the now-razed Ridgedale fire hall off Dodds Avenue between Main and 14^th streets and was later moved to the Ridgedale School.

That plaque reads, “To the memory of Captain William E. Blair, heroic Army pilot who, on Sept. 30, 1949, sacrificed his life by refusing to abandon his burning plane as it passed over Ridgedale, thus saving precious lives and property. The grateful citizens of Ridgedale erect this plaque as a symbol of their everlasting debt, as a testimonial to his courage, bravery and selfless sacrifice, and as an expression of their appreciation and eternal gratitude.”

The Chattanooga City Commission led by Commissioner Roy Hyatt had also recognized his bravery shortly after his death.

I had actually written about the event in 1989 on the 40^th anniversary while I was with the Chattanooga News-Free Press, and I remember talking with a parachuting survivor, Pfc. Robert Hamby, who was then living in Montana after formerly being from Crossville, Tn.

“That was the most terrifying thing that ever happened to me,” he recalled, expressing gratitude toward Capt. Blair, who had grown up in Dallas and attended SMU and Texas A&M and served in Okinawa after World War II.

I had also unsuccessfully tried to contact others involved, including family members. One Seattle article from the 50^th anniversary in 1999 and passed along by Mr. Hutson said that his wife learned of the sad news when she saw three military personnel come to her home.

When I wrote the 1989 article, I also talked with current Hamilton County Clerk Bill Knowles, who said he was playing in a field in Highland Park when he noticed the slow-moving and smoking airplane. “It was one of the biggest events I’ve ever witnessed in our town,” he said at the time.

Countless Chattanoogans recalled the events first-hand as well in varying levels of shock and somberness, with Mr. Hutson and Ms. Miller among the few other remaining witnesses still living.

After the horrific crash, Ms. Miller went to Girls Preparatory School but finished at Central High, where she became well acquainted with such people as schoolmate, attorney and Chattanoogan.com contributor Jerry Summers and football coach E.B. “Red” Etter.

Mr. Hutson, whose other acquaintances while growing up on Missionary Ridge included Jere Meacham, the father of noted journalist and author Jon Meacham, went on to what is now St. Andrews-Sewanee School. But after his father died, he finished at Chattanooga “City” High.

He then went on to military service, which helped him become more closely connected with the actions of Capt. Blair. “I was in Army Intelligence in Ethiopia and Northeast Thailand on the Laotian border from 1965-68,” he said. “I then returned to UTC, majoring in industrial management.”

He said he went on to be the corporate credit manager for a steel distributor headquartered in Birmingham for 30 years. He retired in 2011 and now lives on Signal Mountain.

But through all the experiences, neither Ms. Miller or Mr. Hutson has forgotten that harrowing day of 75 years ago.

“We were talking about it the other night after my brother (Butch Harless) died,” said Ms. Miller. “We were still thinking about it before realizing it had been 75 years.”

Added Mr. Hutson, “Capt. Blair made the ultimate sacrifice by continuing to fly the plane looking for an open field to put the plane in avoiding schools, businesses and homes where people would likely be killed.”

And for that, residents of Chattanooga still give thanks to this young man who sacrificed his life for others.

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Jcshearer2@comcast.net