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Solomon's wing ? Acorn-shaped "USN 20" custom wing?


Owen
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Hi friends

       Has anyone ever seen one of these?  I am told they appeared in the Solomons

when the CBs arrived to build airfields.  If anyone has seen one or seen one or some- 

thing

in print I'd be most grateful

 

HELP,

Owen

WM Wing1.jpg

WM Wing 2.jpg

WM Wing3.jpg

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Tod Rathbone would be the best one to speak with about Moody Brothers wings.  My two cents is that it's a jeweler modified Aerial Gunner wing.  I have no information about the Seabees.  

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rathbonemuseum.com

They are standard moody wings as a base but that has nothing to do with custom jeweler or shop made acorn device soldered on top. Don’t recognize the device or its meaning.

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Owen, I had a very close uncle who served with the Seabees in the Solomon's during WWII and can say there is a good bit of information available on the internet that might help someone to dig a little deeper into the subject. . .  and with a bit of luck they might learn a little more about that very unique badge of yours.  Here are a few leads:

 

The Construction of Airfields during the New Georgia Campaign of 1943-44: Lessons Learned by the United States Naval Construction Battalions. (etsu.edu)

https://dc.etsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3339&context=etd

 

https://www.ozatwar.com/usnavy/20thseabees.htm

 

The Manus Review: 20th Special U.S. Naval

Construction Battalion - 1946 (History)

https://digicom.bpl.lib.me.us/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1161&context=ww_reg_his

 

Recommended Citation

http://digicom.bpl.lib.me.us/ww_reg_his/156

20th Naval Construction Battalion .jpg

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This is a great wing, but...

 

As a CB construction battalion, it's  hard to imagine what role any pilots would have in the construction of an ACORN air base.  Perhaps some sort of liaison officer helping line up where various parts of the airfield and flight lines would be, but if any were involved, I suspect that there would have been only a few of them and more than likeley they would have been Navy aviators.  As any USN aviator will tell you, USAAF wings are (at best) made of lead... and probably wouldn't have been worn in ANY capacity.  A search of the documents that Cliff postes above for the key words "aviator" came up empty and "pilots" refered to the construction of pilot's camp (I assume that meant the housing areas of the pilots).  So, I suspect that the construction battalions probably didn't include any pilots who were assigned to the ACORN field. More than likely any Navy pilots assigned to an ACORN field as some sort of liaison during the construction phase wearing an USAAF wing (reputed to be made of lead, no less--lol) would have been unlikely.

 

Second it is even harder for me to imagine a Sea Bee construction battalion using a USAAF wing that DID NOT including the regular Navy and/or CB logo(s) (like an anchor). 

 

Also, once the CB's had constructed the ACORN airfield, I assume the flight operations would have been turned over to the "normal" Naval Departments (air group headquarter units) running an airfield.  As such, the ACORN CB personnel probably wouldn't have been involved in the actual flight operations (their role would have been more repair and maintenance).  Like Cliff said, I found similar unit histories for CB construction battalion unit histories.  I looked through them and didn't find a single aviator in any of them (it is safe to say that I may have missed some), but nothing jumped out. 

 

According to Wikipedia, Majuro Atol, Marshall Islands was captured in January 1944 and by March the SeaBees had begun to construct the field.  In April, 1944 the field was active, and by May ACORN 20 was inactive. So, at best, there would have been a few months of active ACORN work on the field.  It is hard to imagine that there was any time for them to go about figuring out "novelty" wings. 

 

Even before the field was finished, various Marine and Navy squadrons were using Majuro.  But again, I doubt that these guys had the time to start screwing around with novelty items.  It is true that there was a USAAF  presence going in and out of Majuro Atoll, the 41st  Bomb Group staged some raids against the Japanese during this time.  That could have been a source of a novelty wing, but again, why would a USAAF B-25 group member get a novelty wing for an USN construction battalion that had already been disbanded?

 

I love the wing, but I am thinking that it may have been something else.  Perhaps a training element.

Interestingly, there was a California link (which fits in nicely with the Moody Bro's wing) to the concept of an ACORNS (I am not 100% sure that the ACORNs in this setting are the same as the ACORNs in the CB setting.  But at Mira Loma, there is a clear link between pilot training and ACORNs as seen here:  www.militarymuseum.org/NAASVenturaCounty.html

 

"Oxnard is located approximately 50 miles northwest of Los Angeles. In 1935, the WPA built a 1,980-ft. runway on 35 acres one mile west of town. The airport's dedication was celebrated on July 4, 1935, with an air show. The airport was later enlarged to 242 acres and the runway extended to 4,517 feet. In June 1940, Cal-Aero Corporation, with headquarters at Glendale's Grand Central Airport, opened the Mira Loma Flight Academy, a primary training Contract Pilot School for the Army. The barracks and administration buildings were built in a very unusual circular layout. The Academy closed on June 28, 1944. The primary cadets present at that time were transferred to another Cal-Aero facility, the Polaris Flight Academy at Lancaster.


The Navy was attracted by the airport's proximity to the Advanced Base Depot at Port Hueneme, only five miles away. The Navy requested to take over the base and the Army obliged. The Army caretakers vacated the airport on July 7, 1944, and an ACORN Assembly and Training Detachment arrived six days later. The base was used for training of ACORNS, CASUs, and Seabees. On August 8, CAG 98 transferred aboard. CAG 98 conducted refresher training for pilots returning from combat, as well as training replacement pilots."

 

So, what I find interesting about this is that there are now a Los Angeles, flight training, pilot, USN, and USAAF connections to this wing that (at least to me) seems much more likely than the Marshal Island Majuro Atoll connection with the CBs.  One can imagine a USAA/ civilian pilot instructor at Mira Loma working with an ACORN unit. We know that Cal Aero used a number of modified wings.... So perhaps this is more related to a training wing?

 

Some other digging also shows this:

United States Navy Argus Units https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Navy_Argus_Units

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Also, you do periodically see WTS wings with both a USAAF and USN link. This is nicely seen in the CAA pilot instructor wing (likely to one of the civilian instructors at one of the schools) out of Russ' collection.  If I remember correctly, there may have been some pipelines for both USN and USAAF cadets to be trained concurrently in various college aviation programs. So I am leaning towards a stateside training/instructor wing or perhaps a novelty wing for a new graduate pilot going into one of the ACORN units after training.

 

One can imagine a quick trip into LA and having Moody Bros (or other jeweler) modifying a wing right around 1944.

post-7548-1271007586.jpg

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WOW fellas, thanks so much?  Lots of interesting theories in play.  I'm off

to look into some of the links.  [Please anyone else ?

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As I understand it, although an ACORN contained two construction battalions, it was not a SeaBee unit, rather a Navla Aviation unit. Additional personnel included four communications groups, of such size and composition as to be able to man communications facilities being supplied, a small Base Service Unit and two groups of aviation ground personnel, each group to be of such size and composition as to enable it to service one carrier air group and 12 VPB (patrol bomber) or transport airplanes.

You can find a full explanation here: https://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/Admin-Hist/021-AdvanceBases/AdvanceBases-6.html

 

As for the wings, I've never seen a similar set, but they have a vintage look to my eye. Just a guess, but being an unofficial insignia, maybe Naval Aviators wings weren't available in sufficient quantity for their purposes, but USAAF wings were at the particular time and place they were created?

 

In January 1944, ACORN 20 is shown on Majuro, in a support role for the pending invasion of Kwajalein.

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Owen,

I think the suggestions made by both Patrick and pararaftanr2 (Note: ACORN No. 1, 2, 3, ... 21 was used to designate the component parts of each group) have a great deal of merit.  Just don't completely count out the possibility that the wing may be related to something entirely different than having once been worn by a pilot.  During WWII the Seabees built a lot of airfields in the South Pacific, and many of them were completed in record time. They were very proud of what they were able accomplish and the badge may be related to a special event or related the building of airfields by the Seabees.  Therefore, on that theory, I would suggest that you continue looking outside the box. 

 

One suggestion would be to contact the U. S. Navy Seabee Museum in Port Hueneme, CA.  Opened in 1947, the museum is huge and may have a staff member there that might be able to help you. It also has a wonderful library.

 

Check out the website here:

https://www.history.navy.mil/content/history/museums/seabee.html

 

Good luck!

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Port Hueneme, for those of you who aren't from California is in Oxnard, just north of LA.  It is also about 5-6 miles (apparently) from Mira Loma....  (the California, USN, training

 

That kind of convinces me that it is a training wing. Maybe a souviner or perhaps an instructor/student presentation piece, or even a sweetheart item.  I'm still leaning towards a civilian instructor at Mira Loma myself (perhaps a residual employee left over from the Mosely company). 

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rathbonemuseum.com

Wow, that matchbook really points a finger, Russ. Still doesn't nail the purpose of the wing but I find its relationship to the field in Oxnard that Patrick uncovered highly compelling. And makes the Moody wing base easier to fit in the story. Also the pass off from AAF to USN offers a particular window of when a wing like this might have been a commemorative.

 

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Just an interesting note about Oxnard, after the Army gave up the airport.

When the Black Sheep VMF-214 was reformed in January 1944 at MCAS Santa Barbara, the Black Sheep used Oxnard for FCLP’s prior to shipping out on the USS Franklin.

Lot’s of history in the area.

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