US Army Air Force Navigator. He was killed in action over Germany during World War II. Born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, he was the only son of Verner Clive Glenn and Elizabeth Schauer Glenn. He had two sisters, Helen and Ruth. In 1931, the family moved to Bay City, Texas, and Jack graduated as class salutatorian from Bay City High School in 1940. He attended Texas A&M University for a year, before enlisting into the US Army Air Force in October 1942, and was called to active duty in January 1943. He attended initial training at Sheppard Field, Wichita Falls, Texas for his first two months, and attended gunnery training at Harlingen Army Air Field, Texas, graduating in September 1943. Having a year of college, he was selected to learn aerial navigation, and was trained at the AAF Navigators School at Hondo Army Airfield, Texas, graduating as both a Navigator and commissioned as a Second Lieutenant, in February 1944. He then completed bomber training at Westover Field, Chicopee, Massachusetts, in February 1944, and upon graduation, was assigned to the 566th Bomb Squadron, 389th Bomb Group (Heavy), 8th Air Force in Hethel, England. Among his duties in the squadron he was assigned as Mail Censor, a wartime duty that required him to read all letters from the base personnel to ensure that no classified information was inadvertently passed on through personal letters. His last letter to his parents, dated 5 July 1944, indicated that he was happy and well. After several bombing missions, his B-24 Liberator was severely damaged on a mission to Halle, Germany, and crashed near Halberstadt, Germany. Of the ten-man crew, one died with the plane, two were killed before the plane crashed, and the remaining seven were captured, to spend the rest of the war as Prisoners of War. While escaping from the damaged aircraft, Jack forgot to secure the leg harness of his parachute, and when the chute deployed, the force of the wind opening the chute ripped the harness from his body. He hit the ground without his parachute and died instantly. The German government notified the American government of his death through the International Red Cross, in accordance with procedures at the time. In September 2009, a German man, Heinz Kruse, turned over Glenn's silver identification bracelet (these were personal items that some airmen purchased as additional means of identifying their bodies should their plane explode or be destroyed) to be returned to Mrs. Helen Foreman (Glenn's sister) in Anchorage, Alaska. As a young, 16 year old boy in 1944 Germany, Kruse had been directed to pick up Glenn's body from the field where it landed. As a remembrance of the incident, the town mayor gave Glenn's ID Bracelet to Kruse as a souvenir. Following the war, Glenn's body was buried at the US Ardennes American (American Battlefield Monuments Commission) Cemetery in Liege, Belgium.
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Army Service No. (ASN): O-711388