Candy Bomber Returns

Ever hear of Gail Halvorsen?

Probably not. But students at St. Paul's Lutheran School in Stevensville have. They know him as "Uncle Wiggly Wings" or the "Candy Bomber," and he was on hand Tuesday at Southwest Michigan Regional Airport doing what the retired Air Force colonel does best: delivering goodwill in the form of candy.

It's how he delivers it - via tiny parachutes dropped from an airplane - that earned him his nickname. The year was 1948, and the Cold War was beginning to heat up in Berlin, where the Soviet Union attempted to starve city residents into submission by cutting off food supplies delivered by the Western Allies.

But the Russians couldn't put a halt to food parachuted from cargo planes under a campaign known as Operation Vittles. Halvorsen, who today is 92 and lives in Arizona, launched an offshoot - Operation Little Vittles - in the wake of an encounter the Army Air Corps pilot had with a group of about 30 hungry youngsters at a Berlin air base.

As Halvorsen recalled it, American servicemen at the time were constantly hounded by German children begging for chocolate. In contrast, the kids he met in Berlin that day were polite and asked for nothing, he said.

"Not one put out their hands for chocolate," he told the St. Paul's students as they awaited their own air drop of chocolate bars at the airport. "If one had said, 'Give me chocolate,' I wouldn't be here today.''

Remembering two sticks of chewing gum he had in his pocket, Halvorsen broke them in half and gave them to the children as a parting gift. To his surprise, they didn't fight over the gum but divided it into enough tiny pieces so they'd each get a taste.

Even more surprising was what they did with the gum wrappers.

"The kids got the wrapper and smelled it, then their eyes got big. Wow!'' he said. "When I saw that, I thought I got to do something.''

That something was Operation Little Vittles, an air drop of chocolate and other candy that earned the mission's pilots the nickname "candy bombers." But the children in Berlin knew Halvorsen as Uncle Wiggly Wings because he wiggled the wings of his cargo plane, calling attention to the aircraft containing the candy that Halvorsen initially dropped via parachutes he fashioned from handkerchiefs.

But there was a problem: Halvorsen had failed to clear his mission with his commanding officer.

"I almost got court-martialed. ... The colonel gave me a hard time, but the general said just keep going," Halvorsen said.

Before long, the happy recipients of the candy began sending Halvorsen thank-you letters addressed to Uncle Wiggly Wings. Other pilots became involved, as did the Confectioners Association of America, and by the time the Soviet blockade ended a year later some 23 tons of candy had been delivered.

One of those children receiving the tasty treats was Tom Lindenberg, who lived on the outskirts of Berlin and was 2 years old when the war ended. Today, he's 70, a resident of Stevensville and, coincidentally, a member of St. Paul's Lutheran Church where the students who studied about Halvorsen's exploits attend school.

Tears formed in the eyes of both men Tuesday when Lindenberg and Halvorsen met for the first time.

"I'd never had chocolate before,'' said Lindenberg, who immigrated to the U.S. in 1963. Asked how it tasted, he replied, "Pretty good."

Life was "difficult" in Berlin both during and after the war, he said, mentioning that his house was bombed by the Allies on three occasions. Each time, his father rebuilt it.

His father joined the German army, preferring that to a possible death sentence if he didn't, Lindenberg said. Captured by the Russians, he was fed meager rations and lost 60 pounds but managed to survive.

As for Halvorsen, he made the Air Force his career and in the early 1970s became commander of the same air base where he had provided the children with those two sticks of gum. A devout Christian, he told the children from St. Paul's that to lead happy lives they need to serve others.

He also recalled a conversation he had with a fellow pilot as the Berlin airlift unfolded.

"I said, 'How does it feel to be feeding the guys who were trying to kill you?' He said, 'It feels a whole lot better to feed them than to kill them,'" Halvorsen said.

He then boarded a small plane piloted by Tim Gaipa and dropped enough Hershey bars in the vicinity of the airport to supply each child. One of the first to pick one up was kindergarten student Addie Wetzel, who didn't hesitate when asked if she planned to keep it or eat it.

"Eat it!" she said.

Staff writer Lou Mumford: [email protected] 269-687-3551