'They Got Their Wings,' as the headline reads from the Bismarck Tribune article dated April 28th, 1943. Cadet Ernest Anders Erickson graduated from Curtis Flying School at Brady, Texas and was heading to Waco to begin Basic Flight Training. Hometown newspaper following their local boys.

Ernest Anders would complete all his flight training by the Fall of 1942 and graduate from Blackland Airfield in early October of 1943. By late December he and the new crew assembled would be heading to England by the North Atlantic route. By early 1944 the crew of ten men would begin their combat flying and would complete their 35th mission on August 26th, 1944. Only one crewman was badly wounded and he headed home in early Summer of 1944 and survived the war.

Lt. Ernest Anders Erickson would return to the states in October to a very relieved family, especially his mother Clara Amelia (Nelson) Erickson. Their first homecoming was in October 1943 (below) just before her son was heading to England for combat duty. The reunion my grandmother Clara was looking forward to, in the Summer of 1945 was surely amazing.