LA PLATA HOME PRESS, La Plata, Missouri
June 24, 1954
BOBBY C. FRANKS
---Funeral services for Lieutenant Bobbie Franks, killed June 16 in and airplane crash near Great Falls, Montana, were yesterday afternoon at Elmer Baptist Church, Rev. Eldon Johnson officiating and burial was in the Elmer Cemetery with full military rites provided by and Air Force escort group.
---The son of Mr. and Mrs. Clay Franks of Elmer, the 24-year-old Air Force Lieutenant was a product of the Elmer schools, Class of 1947 and of Northeast Missouri State Teachers College in 1951. After graduation from college, Franks taught for three years and then entered the Air Force. After serving about a year in Iceland, he returned to the states and, on May 8, married Miss Geraldine Hahn in Washington, D.C. He and his wife moved to Great Falls, Montana where he was stationed with the 29th Fighter Interceptor Squadron as a radar observer.
---The F94 Interceptor craft in which Franks flew is a rocket carrying plane designed primarily for night or high level interception of enemy bombers. It carries a pilot, and in the pitch black compartments of its nose, a radar operator, whose function it is to pick up the enemy craft on his screen and guide the plane toward the target. As the F94 nears its target, the radar controls the plane, guiding it into range and firing the rockets at the proper time.
---Reports say that Franks' plane, on a training run, radioed back to base that they were in trouble. They were instructed to jettison their rockets, which they did, prior to the crash. A farmer in a field some 15 miles north of the base reported seeing Franks jump from the aircraft at a low altitude. His parachute apparently did not have time to open. The pilot rode the plane on down to his death.
---It is probably that only the Air Force knows exactly what happened to cause the crash. The fact that Franks jumped at such a low altitude, coupled with the knowledge that the order to jump is supposed to come from the pilot, and knowing that the pilot himself did not jump, warrants a conclusion that something happened to the pilot.
---Mr. and Mrs. Clay Franks and her sister, Mrs. Harvey Gilstrap and husband of Macon returned from Great Falls Sunday night at 9:30. On Tuesday afternoon Franks widow, Mrs. Geraldine Franks, with her family, arrived in Elmer.
---The brother of the deceased, PFC Richard Franks, stationed with a medical detachment in Germany, was unable, at the time of writing, to get home.
---Franks was a nephew of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Wright of La Plata.
June 24, 1954
BOBBY C. FRANKS
---Funeral services for Lieutenant Bobbie Franks, killed June 16 in and airplane crash near Great Falls, Montana, were yesterday afternoon at Elmer Baptist Church, Rev. Eldon Johnson officiating and burial was in the Elmer Cemetery with full military rites provided by and Air Force escort group.
---The son of Mr. and Mrs. Clay Franks of Elmer, the 24-year-old Air Force Lieutenant was a product of the Elmer schools, Class of 1947 and of Northeast Missouri State Teachers College in 1951. After graduation from college, Franks taught for three years and then entered the Air Force. After serving about a year in Iceland, he returned to the states and, on May 8, married Miss Geraldine Hahn in Washington, D.C. He and his wife moved to Great Falls, Montana where he was stationed with the 29th Fighter Interceptor Squadron as a radar observer.
---The F94 Interceptor craft in which Franks flew is a rocket carrying plane designed primarily for night or high level interception of enemy bombers. It carries a pilot, and in the pitch black compartments of its nose, a radar operator, whose function it is to pick up the enemy craft on his screen and guide the plane toward the target. As the F94 nears its target, the radar controls the plane, guiding it into range and firing the rockets at the proper time.
---Reports say that Franks' plane, on a training run, radioed back to base that they were in trouble. They were instructed to jettison their rockets, which they did, prior to the crash. A farmer in a field some 15 miles north of the base reported seeing Franks jump from the aircraft at a low altitude. His parachute apparently did not have time to open. The pilot rode the plane on down to his death.
---It is probably that only the Air Force knows exactly what happened to cause the crash. The fact that Franks jumped at such a low altitude, coupled with the knowledge that the order to jump is supposed to come from the pilot, and knowing that the pilot himself did not jump, warrants a conclusion that something happened to the pilot.
---Mr. and Mrs. Clay Franks and her sister, Mrs. Harvey Gilstrap and husband of Macon returned from Great Falls Sunday night at 9:30. On Tuesday afternoon Franks widow, Mrs. Geraldine Franks, with her family, arrived in Elmer.
---The brother of the deceased, PFC Richard Franks, stationed with a medical detachment in Germany, was unable, at the time of writing, to get home.
---Franks was a nephew of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Wright of La Plata.
LA PLATA HOME PRESS, La Plata, Missouri
June 24, 1954
BOBBY C. FRANKS
---Funeral services for Lieutenant Bobbie Franks, killed June 16 in and airplane crash near Great Falls, Montana, were yesterday afternoon at Elmer Baptist Church, Rev. Eldon Johnson officiating and burial was in the Elmer Cemetery with full military rites provided by and Air Force escort group.
---The son of Mr. and Mrs. Clay Franks of Elmer, the 24-year-old Air Force Lieutenant was a product of the Elmer schools, Class of 1947 and of Northeast Missouri State Teachers College in 1951. After graduation from college, Franks taught for three years and then entered the Air Force. After serving about a year in Iceland, he returned to the states and, on May 8, married Miss Geraldine Hahn in Washington, D.C. He and his wife moved to Great Falls, Montana where he was stationed with the 29th Fighter Interceptor Squadron as a radar observer.
---The F94 Interceptor craft in which Franks flew is a rocket carrying plane designed primarily for night or high level interception of enemy bombers. It carries a pilot, and in the pitch black compartments of its nose, a radar operator, whose function it is to pick up the enemy craft on his screen and guide the plane toward the target. As the F94 nears its target, the radar controls the plane, guiding it into range and firing the rockets at the proper time.
---Reports say that Franks' plane, on a training run, radioed back to base that they were in trouble. They were instructed to jettison their rockets, which they did, prior to the crash. A farmer in a field some 15 miles north of the base reported seeing Franks jump from the aircraft at a low altitude. His parachute apparently did not have time to open. The pilot rode the plane on down to his death.
---It is probably that only the Air Force knows exactly what happened to cause the crash. The fact that Franks jumped at such a low altitude, coupled with the knowledge that the order to jump is supposed to come from the pilot, and knowing that the pilot himself did not jump, warrants a conclusion that something happened to the pilot.
---Mr. and Mrs. Clay Franks and her sister, Mrs. Harvey Gilstrap and husband of Macon returned from Great Falls Sunday night at 9:30. On Tuesday afternoon Franks widow, Mrs. Geraldine Franks, with her family, arrived in Elmer.
---The brother of the deceased, PFC Richard Franks, stationed with a medical detachment in Germany, was unable, at the time of writing, to get home.
---Franks was a nephew of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Wright of La Plata.
June 24, 1954
BOBBY C. FRANKS
---Funeral services for Lieutenant Bobbie Franks, killed June 16 in and airplane crash near Great Falls, Montana, were yesterday afternoon at Elmer Baptist Church, Rev. Eldon Johnson officiating and burial was in the Elmer Cemetery with full military rites provided by and Air Force escort group.
---The son of Mr. and Mrs. Clay Franks of Elmer, the 24-year-old Air Force Lieutenant was a product of the Elmer schools, Class of 1947 and of Northeast Missouri State Teachers College in 1951. After graduation from college, Franks taught for three years and then entered the Air Force. After serving about a year in Iceland, he returned to the states and, on May 8, married Miss Geraldine Hahn in Washington, D.C. He and his wife moved to Great Falls, Montana where he was stationed with the 29th Fighter Interceptor Squadron as a radar observer.
---The F94 Interceptor craft in which Franks flew is a rocket carrying plane designed primarily for night or high level interception of enemy bombers. It carries a pilot, and in the pitch black compartments of its nose, a radar operator, whose function it is to pick up the enemy craft on his screen and guide the plane toward the target. As the F94 nears its target, the radar controls the plane, guiding it into range and firing the rockets at the proper time.
---Reports say that Franks' plane, on a training run, radioed back to base that they were in trouble. They were instructed to jettison their rockets, which they did, prior to the crash. A farmer in a field some 15 miles north of the base reported seeing Franks jump from the aircraft at a low altitude. His parachute apparently did not have time to open. The pilot rode the plane on down to his death.
---It is probably that only the Air Force knows exactly what happened to cause the crash. The fact that Franks jumped at such a low altitude, coupled with the knowledge that the order to jump is supposed to come from the pilot, and knowing that the pilot himself did not jump, warrants a conclusion that something happened to the pilot.
---Mr. and Mrs. Clay Franks and her sister, Mrs. Harvey Gilstrap and husband of Macon returned from Great Falls Sunday night at 9:30. On Tuesday afternoon Franks widow, Mrs. Geraldine Franks, with her family, arrived in Elmer.
---The brother of the deceased, PFC Richard Franks, stationed with a medical detachment in Germany, was unable, at the time of writing, to get home.
---Franks was a nephew of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Wright of La Plata.
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