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Norman Jack Kleiss | |
|---|---|
 Dusty Kleiss with his Distinguished Flying Cross, May 1942. | |
| Nickname | Dusty |
| Born | (1916-03-07)March 7, 1916 |
| Died | April 22, 2016(2016-04-22) (aged 100) |
| Buried | |
| Allegiance | United States |
| Branch | United States Navy |
| Years of service | 1938–1962 |
| Rank | Captain |
| Battles / wars | World War II |
| Awards | Navy Cross Distinguished Flying Cross Air Medal |
| Other work | Author |
Norman Jack "Dusty" Kleiss (March 7, 1916 – April 22, 2016) was a dive-bomber pilot in theUnited States Navy duringWorld War II. He was the only pilot to hit three Japanese ships with bombs during theBattle of Midway.[1]
Norman Jack “Dusty” Kleiss was born on March 7, 1916, inCoffeyville, Kansas. His parents were John Louis Kleiss and Lulu Dunham Kleiss. In 1934, Kleiss accepted an appointment to theUnited States Naval Academy. He graduated in June 1938,[2] standing 245 in his class of 438 graduating midshipmen. Of these, 421 served inWorld War II. One of his classmates wasRalph Weymouth.
At the time of Kleiss's graduation, the United States Navy restricted academy graduates from attending flight training for two years, requiring them to first serve in the surface fleet. From June 1938 to April 1940, Ensign Kleiss served on board three ships:USS Vincennes (CA-44),USS Goff (DD-247), andUSS Yarnall (DD-143). After passing his physical and psychological tests during his time on shore at Norfolk, he reported toNaval Air Station Pensacola for flight training. After eleven months and not a single crash, he earned his wings on April 27, 1941.
After graduation from flight school, Kleiss was assigned to Scouting Squadron Six (VS-6), the scout-bombing squadron assigned toUSS Enterprise (CV-6). Kleiss and the other Scouting Six pilots flew theDouglas SBD Dauntless Dive Bomber, a two-seat scout-bomber designed by Edward Heinemann. On May 8,Enterprise set sail for Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and upon its arrival, Kleiss and the other pilots began training for war, practicing their navigation, gunnery, and dive bombing in the waters around Hawaii. In June, Kleiss was promoted to the rank of lieutenant (junior grade).
On May 27, 1941, Kleiss earned his nickname when he made an unauthorized landing atMarine Corps Air Station Ewa, located on the south shores of Oahu. After serving as the tow-sleeve aircraft during a gunnery exercise, Kleiss landed his SBD in front of the tower, hoping to find a safe field to haul in the tow-sleeve. Unexpectedly, his plane's prop blast churned up a giant cloud of red dust, preventing two squadrons of Marine Corps fighter planes from landing on the runway. The tower control operator called over the radio, "Unknown dust cloud, who the hell are you?" Without responding, Kleiss took off forNaval Air Station Ford Island, hoping that no one had identified his plane. After landing, one of his squadron mates, Ensign Cleo Dobson, told Kleiss that he had seen the whole thing. Dobson joked, "Welcome aboard, Dusty!" For the remainder of his career in the Navy, Kleiss went by that nickname.[3][4]
On December 7, 1941, Kleiss's squadron, Scouting Six, became engaged with Japanese fighters during the surprise attack onPearl Harbor, losing six pilots and gunners. Kleiss did not encounter any enemy aircraft that day, but he did fly several patrols around his carrier task force and he was involved in a friendly-fire incident on December 8, when several United States destroyers shot at his plane, mistaking it for a Japanese dive bomber.
Kleiss fought his first battle on February 1, 1942, when he accompanied an air strike launched from USSEnterprise. The carrier's air group had orders to attack the Japanese base at Kwajalein Atoll. During the battle, Kleiss dropped his wing-bombs on a parked plane at Roi Airfield and later on, he dropped his 500-pound undercarriage bomb on the light cruiserKatori. Later that day, after returning toEnterprise to refuel and rearm his SBD, Kleiss accompanied eight SBDs led by LieutenantRichard Halsey Best against the Japanese base on Taroa Island. There, they bombed several structures. Kleiss's SBD was hit by machine gun fire and his gunner, Radioman 3/c John Warren Snowden, was wounded slightly in the buttocks.
Later that month, Kleiss participated in the air raid against Wake Island, February 24, 1942, bombing structures, and again in the air raid against Marcus Island on March 4. After USSEnterprise returned from a patrol in the South Pacific, Kleiss received theDistinguished Flying Cross from AdmiralChester Nimitz. He received the medal alongside several otherEnterprise pilots and MessmanDoris Miller in an elaborate ceremony on the flight deck of USSEnterprise, May 27, 1942.
On June 4–6, 1942, Kleiss fought in theBattle of Midway. On the morning of June 4, Kleiss accompanied thirty-two SBD dive bombers led byEnterprise's air group commander, Lieutenant CommanderC. Wade McClusky, on a search to find the Japanese carrier task force led by Vice AdmiralChuichi Nagumo. After several hours of searching, McClusky's group spotted a lone Japanese destroyer, theArashi, and changed direction to mirror its heading. In a few minutes, McClusky's pilots caught sight of the main body of the Japanese fleet. At 10:22 (Midway Time), Scouting Six attacked the Japanese carrierKaga. At least four pilots from Kleiss's squadron and the accompanying squadron (Bombing Six) scored direct hits. Dusty Kleiss was the second pilot to score a hit, putting his 500-pound bomb and his two wing-mounted bombs into the forward section ofKaga's flight deck, right near the Rising Sun insignia. In five minutes, three United States dive bomber squadrons had mortally damaged three of the four Japanese aircraft carriers.[5][6]
On the afternoon of June 4, Kleiss accompanied another dive bomber mission launched from USSEnterprise, this one led by Lieutenant W. Earl Gallaher. Gallaher's dive bombers located the fourth Japanese carrier, theHiryu, and fatally crippled it. Again, Kleiss scored a direct hit on the bow, one of only four or five pilots to do so.[7] On June 5, Kleiss accompaniedEnterprise's dive bombers on their third mission of the battle, one that failed to sink (or damage, for that matter) a lone Japanese destroyer, theTanikaze. Then on June 6, Kleiss accompaniedEnterprise's dive bombers in a mission that helped sink the Japanese cruiserMikuma. Kleiss's bombs struck nearMikuma’s smokestack.[8] Kleiss was the only pilot to score three direct hits with a dive bomber plane during the Battle of Midway. For his participation in the battle, Kleiss received the Navy Cross in November 1942.
After the Battle of Midway, Kleiss was transferred to shore duty in the United States. After marrying his girlfriend, Eunice Marie "Jean" Mochon, at a wedding chapel inLas Vegas, Kleiss became an instructor assigned to an Advanced Carrier Training Group (ACTG) squadron stationed atNAS Norfolk, Virginia. In the autumn of 1942, he transferred to the ACTG squadron assigned toNAAS Cecil Field, Florida. In October 1943, he resigned his position as instructor to accept a position at theNaval Postgraduate School, where he spent the next two years preparing for a career in aircraft design.
After the war, Kleiss served as Assistant Head of Structures Branch, Bureau of Aeronautics, under command of Rear Admiral Melville Pride.
When Pride retired in May 1947, Kleiss became the Head of Structures Branch. In May 1949, Kleiss changed duty again, becoming the Bureau of Aeronautics representative at the Lockheed Corporation in Burbank, California, supervising the Navy's aircraft inspectors, engineers, and test pilots. In June 1952, Kleiss was reassigned to the staff of Commander, Air Force, Atlantic (COMAIRLANT), serving under Rear Admiral S. B. Spangler. From 1955 to 1958, he served as Director of the Aircraft Structures Laboratory at the Naval Air Material Center in Philadelphia. From 1958 to 1961 he served as the Director of Catapults and Arresting Gear, Ship Installation Division, in Washington, D.C. After that, Kleiss served one year as an administrative officer for the Office of Naval Materiel under the command of Vice AdmiralGeorge F. Beardsley before retiring on April 1, 1962, at the rank of captain.
After retiring from the Navy, Kleiss worked as Senior Staff Engineer atAllegany Ballistics Laboratory in Rocket Center, West Virginia. He left that job in 1965 and became a part-time surveyor. For ten years, he taught mathematics, physics, and chemistry atBerkeley Springs High School. In 1997, he and his wife moved to the Air Force Village, a retirement community located nearLackland Air Force Base, San Antonio, Texas. Kleiss lived there for the rest of his life.
Kleiss died on April 22, 2016,less than two months after celebrating his 100th birthday, and was buried alongside his wife atFort Sam Houston National Cemetery. He was preceded in death by a son who died at the age of 19 in 1970, and his wife, who died at the age of 95 in 2006. He was survived by two daughters, two sons, seven grandchildren and ten great-grandchildren.
During the final decades of his life, Kleiss participated in several remembrance activities that brought attention to the Battle of Midway. In 1966, he participated in the “Midway Project,” completing a questionnaire that resulted in the completion ofWalter Lord'sIncredible Victory, the first popular book about the battle. Although mainly silent in the succeeding decades, in the 1990s, Kleiss became more outspoken. He began speaking at theNational Museum of the Pacific War and he participated in oral history interviews that resulted in several documentaries, most notablyBattle 360, which appeared on the History Channel in 2007.
Kleiss's remembrances of the Battle of Midway sometimes stirred controversy, particularly when he criticized the two United States admirals who commanded the carrier task forces. Often shy of praise, Kleiss hated to be called a hero or made the guest of honor. However, as time passed, and he realized that he might become the last living American pilot to have fought in the battle, he deemed it his life's mission to tell the story of those who lost their lives in the early months of the Pacific War. These aviators were the true heroes, he often said, and their families needed to know the story behind their sacrifices. In 2012, Kleiss wrote: "At age ninety-six, I wonder why the Good Lord has spared me ... The only thing I can presume is that He has not yet found me worthy to reach all those other Saints above us[,] ... all so I can tell relatives of those families who'd lost true heroes about their accomplishments."[9]
Kleiss died inSan Antonio, Texas, on April 22, 2016.[10]
For four years, Kleiss worked on a memoir,Never Call Me a Hero: A Legendary Dive-Bomber Pilot Remembers the Battle of Midway, which was edited and finally published posthumously by co-authors Timothy and Laura Orr on May 23, 2017, by William Morrow, a division of HarperCollins. The memoir focuses on Kleiss's experiences during World War II.
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