The crew had no idea what they were practicing for. Nelson flew on three routine missions on the B-29, each time accompanied by two other planes. Plane and crew were sent to Tinian, one of the Mariana Islands. On June 14, he was among those who went to Omaha, Nebraska to pick up the silver-plated B-29 from the factory. “He thought: ‘I can’t be a pilot, but I can be on a plane.’” A sergeant looked at his papers and told him: “Oh, you’re meant for overseas.” “Dick was just elated,” Nancy said. In April 1945, he reported to the 509th Squadron in Wendover, Utah. Unbeknownst to him, he was being investigated by the Manhattan Project’s security team. Everyone else in his class received assignments and shipped out. Instead, he went to the Air Corps’ radio school in South Dakota and after graduation was sent to the B-29 base in Clovis, New Mexico to await orders. Army after high school, hoping to become a pilot like his older brother. Nevertheless, she heard her husband’s stories so many times in the years to come that in his speaking engagements, if he’d forget a detail, he would look at her and she would prompt him.īorn in Moscow, Idaho in 1925, Richard relocated with his family to Los Angeles at age 3 and enlisted in the U.S. Nancy Nelson was only 13 when World War II ended. We met Thursday, the 75th anniversary of the bombing.
