''Some Punkins'' was the name of a
B-29 Superfortress (B-29-36-MO 44-27296,
Victor number 84) modified to carry an atomic bomb during
World War II.
Airplane history
Assigned to the
393d Bomb Squadron
The 393rd Bomb SquadronOfficially, the 393d Bomb Squadron is part of the 509th Bomb Wing at Whiteman Air Force Base, Missouri. It operates Northrop Grumman B-2 Spirit nuclear-capable strategic bomber aircraft.
The squadron was first organiz ...
,
509th Composite Group
The 509th Composite Group (509 CG) was a unit of the United States Army Air Forces created during World War II and tasked with the operational deployment of nuclear weapons. It conducted the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, in ...
, it was one of 15
Silverplate B-29s used by the 509th, ''Some Punkins'' was built at the
Glenn L. Martin Aircraft Plant at
Omaha, Nebraska, as a Block 35 aircraft. It was one of 10 modified as a Silverplate and re-designated "Block 36". Delivered on March 19, 1945, to the USAAF, it was assigned to Crew B-7 (Capt. James N. Price, Jr., aircraft commander) and flown to
Wendover Army Air Field
Wendover Air Force Base is a former United States Air Force base in Utah now known as Wendover Airport. During World War II, it was a training base for B-17 and B-24 bomber crews. It was the training site of the 509th Composite Group, the B-29 ...
,
Utah.
It left Wendover on June 8, 1945, for Tinian and arrived at
North Field, Tinian
North Field is a former World War II airfield on Tinian in the Mariana Islands. Abandoned after the war, today North Field is a tourist attraction. Along with several adjacent beaches on which Allied forces landed during the Battle of Tinian, ...
, on June 14. It was originally assigned the Victor (unit-assigned identification) number 4 but on August 1 was given the
large 'A' tail markings of the
497th Bomb Group as a security measure and had its Victor changed to 84 to avoid misidentification with actual 497th BG aircraft. It was named ''Some Punkins'' and its nose art applied after the atomic bomb missions. While a number of sources attribute the name to a 1930s comic strip, the nose art suggests a possible reference to the "
pumpkin bomb" missions the 509th Composite Group flew as combat rehearsal for the atomic bomb operations. However, the phrase was also in use by 1917, based on letters from Indiana referring to someone being 'some punkins' to be called first to an accident, meaning 'important.'
While on Tinian it was used on 13 training and practice missions and five combat missions to drop
pumpkin bombs on industrial targets on
Toyama
Toyama may refer to:
Places and organizations
* Toyama Prefecture, a prefecture of Japan located in the Hokuriku region on the main Honshu island
* Toyama, Toyama, the capital city of Toyama Prefecture
* Toyama Station, the main station of Toyama, ...
,
ÅŒgaki,
Shimoda,
Yokkaichi
is a city located in Mie Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 310,259 in 142162 households and a population density of 1500 persons per km². The total area of the city is .
Geography
Yokkaichi is located in north-central ...
, and
Nagoya. ''Some Punkins'' was the only B-29 of the 393d BS flown exclusively by its assigned crew on all operational missions, and is cited by Joseph Baugher as possibly dropping the last bomb of World War II in its attack on Nagoya on August 14, 1945.
In November 1945 it returned with the 509th to
Roswell Army Air Field
Roswell may refer to:
* Roswell incident
Places in the United States
* Roswell, Colorado, a former settlement now part of Colorado Springs
* Roswell, Georgia, a suburb of Atlanta
* Roswell, Idaho
* Roswell, New Mexico, known for the purported 194 ...
,
New Mexico. On March 1, 1946, while at
Kirtland Army Air Field in preparation for assignment to
Operation Crossroads, it was struck while parked by a taxiing B-29, incurring severe damage to its forward fuselage. The airplane was transferred to the 428th Base Unit at Kirtland in April 1946 and declared damaged beyond economical repair. In August it was deliberately set afire as part of
firefighting
Firefighting is the act of extinguishing or preventing the spread of unwanted fires from threatening human lives and destroying property and the environment. A person who engages in firefighting is known as a firefighter.
Firefighters typically ...
training and totally destroyed.
Other aircraft named ''Some Punkins''
Two
FB-111A
The General Dynamics F-111 Aardvark is a retired supersonic, medium-range, multirole combat aircraft. Production variants of the F-111 had roles that included ground attack (e.g. interdiction), strategic bombing (including nuclear weapons c ...
strategic bombers of the USAF
509th Bomb Wing
The 509th Bomb Wing (509 BW) is a United States Air Force unit assigned to the Air Force Global Strike Command, Eighth Air Force. It is stationed at Whiteman Air Force Base, Missouri.
The 509 BW is the host unit at Whiteman, and operates ...
, serials 68-0241 and 68-0246, carried the name and original nose art of ''Some Punkins'' on their nosewheel doors while based at
Pease Air Force Base
Pease, in Middle English, was a noun referring to the vegetable pea; see that article for its etymology. The word survives into modern English in pease pudding.
Pease may also refer to:
People
* Pease family (Darlington), a prominent family in D ...
,
New Hampshire, in the 1970s and 1980s.
Sources
* Campbell, Richard H., ''The Silverplate Bombers: A History and Registry of the Enola Gay and Other B-29s Configured to Carry Atomic Bombs'' (2005),
509th CG Aircraft Page, MPHPA
External links
{{B-29 family
Individual aircraft of World War II