Stuff & Things

Judy, a purebred pointer, was the mascot of several ships in the Pacific, and was captured by the Japanese in 1942 and taken to a prison camp. There she met Aircraftsman Frank Williams, who shared his small portion of rice with her.

Judy raised morale in the POW camp, and also barked when poisonous snakes, crocodiles or even tigers approached the prisoners. When the prisoners were shipped back to Singapore, she was smuggled out in a rice sack, never whimpering or betraying her presence to the guards.

The next day, that ship was torpedoed. Williams pushed Judy out of a porthole in an attempt to save her life, even though there was a 15-foot drop to the sea. He made his own escape from the ship, but was then recaptured and sent to a new POW camp.

He didn't know if Judy had survived, but soon he began hearing stories about a dog helping drowning men reach pieces of debris after the shipwreck. And when Williams arrived at the new camp, he said: "I couldn’t believe my eyes! As I walked through the gate, a scraggly dog hit me square between the shoulders and knocked me over. I’d never been so glad to see the old girl!"

They spent a year together at that camp in Sumatra. "Judy saved my life in so many ways," said Williams. "But the greatest of all was giving me a reason to live. All I had to do was look into those weary, bloodshot eyes and ask myself: 'What would happen to her if I died?' I had to keep going."

Once hostilities ceased, Judy was then smuggled aboard a troopship heading back to Liverpool. In England, she was awarded the Dickin Medal (the "Victoria Cross" for animals) in May 1946. Her citation reads: "For magnificent courage and endurance in Japanese prison camps, which helped to maintain morale among her fellow prisoners, and also for saving many lives through her intelligence and watchfulness".

At the same time, Frank Williams was awarded the PDSA's White Cross of St. Giles for his devotion to Judy. Frank and Judy spent a year after the war visiting the relatives of English POWs who had not survived, and Frank said that Judy "always provided a comforting presence to the families."

When Judy finally died at the age of 13, Frank spent two months building a granite and marble memorial in her memory, which included a plaque describing her life story.

Here is a book that tells more about their story...https://smile.amazon.com/No-Better-Friend-Ext…/…/ref=sr_1_1…

Bank of Canada is pleading with Star Trek fans to stop “Spocking” its five dollar bills. Since Leonard Nimoy’s death, Canadian folks have been “Spocking” the hell out of the five dollar bill that features a portrait of Canada’s seventh prime minister Sir Wilfrid Laurier.

Sir Wilfrid now sports, on certain bills at least, pointy ears, the signature Vulcan haircut and eyebrows and Spock’s mantra “Live long and prosper.”

According to Bank of Canada it’s not illegal to do this but:

“...However, there are important reasons why it should not be done. Writing on a bank note may interfere with the security features and reduces its lifespan. Markings on a note may also prevent it from being accepted in a transaction. Furthermore, the Bank of Canada feels that writing and markings on bank notes are inappropriate as they are a symbol of our country and a source of national pride.”

I say Spock the hell out of ‘em if it ain’t illegal. Sir Wilfrid Laurier’s face wasn’t that interesting, anyway. In fact, let’s just make this a permanent improvement to the Canadian five dollar bill.

Wesley “Wes” May, Frank Hawks and Earl Daugherty had a simple plan. First, Wes would strap the gas can onto his back. Then he would join Frank in the passenger seat of his Lincoln Standard biplane and the two would take off. Earl Daugherty would likewise take off in his Curtiss Jenny. Once airborne and at an altitude of around 1,000 feet, Earl would carefully approach the Lincoln Standard while Wes climbed atop the wing and worked his way out to the right wingtip. Then, as they had done at barnstorming events previously, Earl would come close enough and above the Lincoln Standard for Wes to grab hold of the bottom left wing’s under wing strut on the Curtiss Jenny. With luck, the three men considered, Wes would then pull himself up onto the lower wing, grab the struts and wires and, as Earl and Frank gently banked away from each other, he would work his way to the front passenger cockpit of the Curtiss Jenny. In this way, the fuel could be transferred from one plane to another. As Wes was a skilled stuntman and wing walker, he considered the transfer well within his skills and abilities.


The idea was that once in the Jenny’s cockpit, Wes would have access to the fuel tank that was located behind the engine. Thus, Wes would carefully undo the fuel tank’s cap, then set up the gas can spout to enable him to pour the contents in. Then, being careful to avoid the gas blowing off, he would pour the 5 gallons into the Jenny’s gas tank before sitting down in the cockpit and strapping in. After that, all that was needed was just a routine landing. To ensure that the stunt was captured for all posterity, the three also planned to have a chase plane fly behind and take a photograph of the stunt as Wes climbed from one plane to another.

As it happened, the plan was almost perfectly executed. In fact, the only problem encountered was that it took a lot longer than was expected to get the gas poured into the Curtiss Jenny’s gas tank! The transfer from one plane to another wasn’t that difficult, though Wes had a bit of a harder time of it than the usual simply because he was carrying another 30 pounds of dead weight on his back in the form of fuel. That required a bit more strength than it usually took to pull himself up onto the Jenny’s lower wing, but in the end, he managed it. If you’ve ever done chin-ups or pulled yourself up on a set of monkey bars, you know how this works — then consider how much more challenging it would be to put 30 pounds of weight on your back!

Later Efforts and the Breakthroughs that Resulted

The US Army Air Service didn’t wait another eight years to try out aerial refueling with the “Question Mark”. In fact, just a year and a half after the 1921 barnstorming trick, the Army did it more properly with two Airco DH-4B biplanes. One, the refueling aircraft, was flown by First Lieutenant Virgil Hine while First Lieutenant Frank Seifert gently released a fueling hose backward into the wind. A second Airco DH-4B biplane, flown by Captain Lowell Smith, approached from below and behind while Lieutenant John Richter, sitting in the second seat, grabbed hold of the flapping hose and affixed it to the top of the fuel tank. Once accomplished, he signaled to First Lieut. Seifert to start transferring fuel. In this way, on June 27, 1923, the two planes achieved the feat of a more proper aerial refueling.

Just two months later, on August 27 and 28, 1923, the US Army Air Service did it again, this time using three Airco DH-4Bs in a record setting attempt for aerial endurance. One plane would remain aloft and continuously fly while the other two planes (both “tankers” in modern parlance) flew alongside in shifts to transfer fuel and engine oil. As it happened, they managed 37 hours of flight time in the record-setting plane, though it required nine aerial refueling efforts during which 687 gallons of gas and 38 gallons of engine oil were transferred (such early planes bled off engine oil out of the exhaust of their radial engines at a rate of about a gallon an hour!).