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“To search and learn and live on the varied fruits of experience.” This is Bill's motto. Amiable, active, spontaneous, yet strongly emotional when hit deep...with an insatiable desire to try the new and explore the old...Chaplain Kinsolving aptly put it, ‘a man of great abdominal fortitude.'''</div>
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The above quoted from our 1934 <em>HOWITZER</em> provides a most appropriate and stimulating expression of <em>Bill Brugge’s</em> philosophy.</div>
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He was born on 15 December 1908 in Brooklyn, New York, and later lived in Ozone Park, Queens. The Philip Brugge family, of Dutch and Swedish ancestry, had two other sons, Philip, Jr. and Joseph, who established an engineering firm and were associated with Grumman Aircraft. Their daughter, Rose, died in a train accident near Philadelphia. After graduating from Brooklyn Technical High School in 1926, Bill attended Columbia University for two years and then enlisted in the Army with station at Mitchell Field. He attended the West Point Prep School at Fort Totten and in 1930 was one of the twenty or so selected for appointment to the United States Military Academy. During those formative years he had been mechanically inclined, and intensely interested in motors and aircraft. His appointment was the attainment of a long, sought goal.</div>
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At the Academy Bill engaged in football, lacrosse and wrestling. He and I would go riding in the hills, and also tried skiing when it was a little known sport. He was a quick learner, a great reader, and one of broad and deep philosophies. However, he was by no means a “bookworm.” Weekends were for dates and fun. We both enjoyed many of them together.</div>
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He graduated thirty in a class of 250 and immediately went to flight school. Upon completion at both Randolph and Kelly Field in 1935,<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>his first assignment was Hamilton Field, California, stopping by to spend a few days with his long time friend and classmate at Fort Douglas, Utah. It was not long before his courtship of Miss Madeline Tinker, daughter of Colonel Clarence L. Tinker, the commanding officer of Hamilton Field, and Mrs. Tinker, blossomed into a wedding on 1 May 1936.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>In January 1937 we stopped by for a visit with the Brugges on our way to Panama.</div>
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In 1937 the family was transfered to Chanute Field, Illinois, where Bill was a student arid later an instructor at the Engineering School. Their son, David C., was born on 1 March 1939. In the late spring of 1939 on a cross country flight Bill stopped by Fort Benning, Georgia, for a short visit. This was the last time Bill and I were together.</div>
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From 1939 to 1943 the family was stationed in Panama, first at France Field then to Howard and Albrook. Bill advanced from first lieutenant to colonel. He served successively as operations officer, commanding officer of the 3rd Squadron of B-18s and commanding officer of the 7th Squadron of B-17s. Stephen A. was born on 4 January 1941. Midge and the boys had gone home for Christmas and were not permitted to return after World War II broke out on 7 December 1941.</div>
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Perry Griffith writes in a letter to Chick Andrews. “I came down here on my first tour a few days after the war started, commanding a reconnaissance squadron. The first guy I ran into was Bill Brugge. He was at David, Republic de Panama, commanding the 7th Recon Squadron at the time. A few days afterwards Bill was pulled out and made assistant A3 of the 6th Air Force with headquarters at Albrook Field. He subsequently became A3 of the Air Force, which position he held until his departure from this area, I believe in early 1943. During that time I can tell you that most of the sound thinking that went on in operations lines in the 6th Air Force was generated in Bill’s mind. As you may recall, he had a quick, discerning, analytical and mathematical type of brain. While he was intolerant of minutia, his grasp of the big picture approached brilliance in my opinion. He was very thoughtful of all the guys in the field who had to do the flying. When I became a group commander and later the commanding officer of the 6th Air Support Command, I never heard Bill render a decision, put out an order or paper that was not thorough or complete in every respect. I know General Davenport Johnson, who was commanding general at the time, held an exceptionally high regard for him.”</div>
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In 1943 and 1944 Bill served in the Army Air Forces Headquarters in the Pentagon, planning and placing Air Force units where they would be needed. It was this knowledge, although later obsolete, that led to the intensive interrogations by the Japanese while in prison. In August 1944 he served in the 21st Bomber Command at Colorado Springs. The commanding officer was Brigadier General Emmett O'Donnell, Jr. Later that year he moved into Saipan in advance of the arrival of the 73rd Bomber Wing as part of the 20th Air Force to prepare runways and other facilities, still with “Rosie” O’Donnell as his commanding officer and Bill as the deputy chief of staff. On 3 December he flew as an observer on the third strike mission of B-29’s over Tokyo. Colonel Dick King, Class of 1933, was also on this flight with the pilot, Major Robert F. Goldsworthy, now a retired major general.</div>
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After releasing the bomb load and enroute home, a Japanese fighter shot out the number two engine. Finally with two engines out the aircraft began losing altitude and was smoking. The members of the crew were able to evacuate the aircraft and were picked up later, kicked and beaten by civilians and transported to prison.</div>
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King, Brugge, and Goldsworthy were interrogated—Bill quite extensively. Quoting from Bob Goldsworthy, “We can assume that Bill died of malnutrition...but much more than just that. Bill was a "man’s man’ and he suffered for it. He resisted them. He defied and fought them. He was that kind of a man. He did not survive. But I think that no other man, receiving the same treatment, could have survived for so long.”</div>
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Of their two sons, Stephen attended West Point for a year or so, then entered California Institute of Technology and is with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration; David became a pilot and is with Delta Air Lines in New Orleans. Midge, now remarried, is Mrs. William L. Gorman of Treasure Island, Florida.</div>
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Bill was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal, the Bronze Star Medal and the Purple Heart. To this day we all mourn the loss of a courageous and devoted friend.</div>
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<em>Hallett D. Edson</em></div>