Interesting (Unusual) USAF Script Engraved Air Medal with Prop Device to USN Officer

[Frank_Smith]

Last week I was fortunate to win a cased WWII-era slot broach Air Medal that came with a lapel pin, two extra ribbon cuts, and a Kenneth C. Royall, Secretary of the Army enclosure card.

 

The reverse of the medal was officially script engraved "Benjamin Levy" with a prop device centered underneath the name. In all my years of collecting, I’ve never seen a prop device engraved on an Air Medal. Prop devices are sometimes seen on Purple Hearts, but I’ve only seen Air Medals script engraved with a name and occasionally Rank/Name/A.C. on three or four lines.

 

What made the medal even more interesting is that I was able to obtain the award card before the auction closed. A scan of the card is shown below. It was issued "Levy, Benjamin - Lt (Senior Grade) 253107 - (Naval Reserve) - GO 36, D/AF, 9 June 1949". So here is an Air Medal awarded to a Naval Officer by the USAF in 1949.

I was unable to find anything out about Levy online. Perhaps it was awarded for the Berlin Airlift as I do know that Naval Personnel sometimes flew with Air Force crews or piloted Air Force planes. For now it’s a bit of a mystery.

 

The prop device is also very interesting. Another collector once told me that he believed that the prop devices were only engraved on medals by the Air Force starting in late 1948 or early 1949. While I’ve seen a few engraved on Purple Hearts, most of the time documentation has been tough to come by to determine when the medal was actually issued. However, all four that I have seen with transmittal letters or the like have been issued in 1949 adding credence to this theory.

 

If anyone has any research on Levy or USAF GO 36 for 1949, I would love to see it. Also, if anyone has any script engraved decorations with documentation to prove when the medal was issued, I would love to see the medals and the supporting material to see if we could pin the engraving of the prop device down.

[Frank_Smith]

Picture #2.

[Frank_Smith]

Picture #3.

[Frank_Smith]

Last photo.

[bobgee]

Interesting AM, Frank. Most unusual. I think you're probably right about it being a Berlin Airlift award. Bob

[Dave]

Now that's pretty darn unusual! Congrats! I've never seen an Air Medal engraved like that...and to a naval aviator as well...that fits into the "wild" category!

Dave

[Kadet]

Nice medal. It is also possible that he served in WWII in the USAAF but became an officer in the Naval Reserve after the war. If he applied for a retroactive award they may have used his current rank and service on the award card. It would be interesting to request that GO and his record.

[Dave]

Here's his entry from the Naval Register. I think he might also be in Who's Who...but I've unfortunately gotten rid of all my copies of that book due to space.

[Kadet]

Thanks Dave. He does seem to have been a Naval Aviator that probably served in the Navy during WWII. That would be a fun research project! BTW, here is the address to request the GO. They are very responsive:

 

Air Force Historical Research Agency

600 Chennault Circle

Maxwell AFB, AL

36112

[Frank_Smith]

Bob, Dave, Andy, thank you for the responses.

 

Dave - That page from the Navy Register was all that I could find as well. I didn't know about the "Who's Who" publications. I don't have them at my local library.

 

Andy - Thank you for the address of Maxwell. I haven't wrote them in quite some time. I used to get WWII AAF GO's from them, but haven't wrote off in years for something.

 

Does anyone else have any script engraved medals with prop devices that they can pin down as to when they were engraved?

[aznation]

 

Does anyone else have any script engraved medals with prop devices that they can pin down as to when they were engraved?

 

Source: http://www.usmilitariaforum.com/forums/index.php?/topic/165040-show-your-script-engraved-47-49-medals/

 

 

[Frank_Smith]

Thank you for the post. I am well familiar with Stenman as I tried to sell his group here on the forum a while back. Unfortunately, there was no original paperwork with the group and his personnel record was destroyed in the 1973 fire. Furthermore, as his last name begins with "S", his IDPF has not been released to the NPRC. As I've been waiting on the Army for other M-Z casualty files for nearly a year, I didn't bother sending off for his to see if there is a revised date of death document. With that being said, I wasn't able to use his medal as a data point as I have no exact or close date as to when the medal was issued.

[aznation]

Kenneth Claiborne Royall

 

Royall served as Undersecretary of War from November 9, 1945 until July 18, 1947. President Truman named him Secretary of War in 1947. He became the first Secretary of the Army two months later.

 

Royall was forced into retirement in April 1949 for continuing to refuse to desegregate the Army, even nearly a year after President Truman promulgated Executive Order 9981.

[aznation]

Source: FamilySearch.org

[aznation]

Source: FamilySearch.org

 

[aznation]

Source: FamilySearch.org

 

[aznation]

Source: FamilySearch.org

 

[aznation]

Source: FamilySearch.org

 

[Frank_Smith]

Thank you! That discharge is very interesting. So he wasn't a Naval Aviator. I wonder if he worked on some sort of joint technical project involving both the Navy and Air Force. I didn't know they had those on Family Search.

[Dave]

Thank you! That discharge is very interesting. So he wasn't a Naval Aviator. I wonder if he worked on some sort of joint technical project involving both the Navy and Air Force. I didn't know they had those on Family Search.

 

 

I should have looked up his designator...1355 is for an Air Intelligence Officer rather than an aviator. So that's...interesting...to say the least!

[aznation]

You're welcome. Yes, he obliviously had something to do with radar and was a technical observer of some kind. He was also an electrical engineer. No doubt Benjamin Levy was a very smart guy.

 

Here's some more on Benjamin.

 

Source: Fold3

[aznation]

Source: Fold3

 

[aznation]

One of Benjamin's duty stations was Airborne Coordinating Group, Washington D.C. This is just a wild guess, but I wonder if he could've had something to do with the Operation Crossroads Test on Bikini Atoll and Marshall Islands in 1946. Perhaps he was a technical observer after assisting in the set up of equipment. Just thinking out loud.

 

Source: https://apps.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a995213.pdf

Page 198

[aznation]

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[aznation]

Source: http://warfare.gq/PlanesAndPilotsOfWW2/USNair.html

 

31 December 1942

After pointing out that the need for airborne radar was so apparent and urgent that peacetime methods of procurement and fleet introduction could not be followed, the Chief of the Bureau of Aeronautics requested the Naval Research Laboratory to continue to provide personnel capable of assisting fleet units in the operation and maintenance of radar equipment until a special group of trained personnel could be assembled for that purpose. This special group developed within a few months into the Airborne Coordination Group which provided trained civilian electronics specialists to fleet units throughout the war and into the postwar period.