This Military Service Page was created/owned by
Joseph Logan (Joe), AWF1
to remember
Ford, John (Jack), RADM USN(Ret).
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Contact Info
Home Town Cape Elizabeth
Last Address Hollywood
Date of Passing Aug 31, 1973
Location of Interment Holy Cross Cemetery - Culver City, California
Wall/Plot Coordinates Plot: M, L304, 5
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Unofficial Badges
Additional Information
Last Known Activity:
In civil life, Rear Admiral Ford wrote, directed, or produced more than 130 films in a career spanning four decades. He was awarded the Photoplay Magazine Gold Medal in 1928; the Critics Award in 1935 (for directing The Informer), in 1939 (for Stagecoach), and in 1940 (for The Long Voyage Home and The Grapes of Wrath); the Foreign Press Club Award and the Belgian Prix du Roi in 1935; and the Academy Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Directorial Award in 1935 and 1940. Additionally, he won Oscar Awards for The Informer, The Grapes of Wrath, How Green Was My Valley (1941), The Quiet Man (1952) and the documentary for the US Navy, The Battle of Midway (1942). In 1973 he received the American Film Institute's first Lifetime Achievement Award and the Presidential Medal of Freedom. He was a Member of the Motion Picture Directors Association and the Screen Directors Guild, and held various awards from foreign countries.
Rear Admiral Ford passed away 31 August 1973 in Palm Springs, California.
John Ford was born at Cape Elizabeth, Maine, on 1 February 1895. He was graduated from the public schools of Portland, Maine, in 1914, attended the University of Maine, Orono, Maine, from which he received an honorary degree of Doctor of Fine Arts in 1939, and directed motion pictures from 1920 on for the following Hollywood studios in Hollywood, California: Universal, Fox, United Artists, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Radio-Keiths-Orpheum (RKO), and Twentieth Century-Fox. He entered the United States Naval Reserve on 3 October 1934 in the rank of Lieutenant Commander and on 11 September 1941 reported for active duty. He was promoted to Commander, 7 October 1941, and to Captain on 17 August 1945 to rank from 10 June 1943. He was placed on the Honorary Retired List in the rank of Rear Admiral on 1 May 1951.
In 1940, while on inactive duty in the Naval Reserve, he received a Letter of Commendation from the Commandant, Eleventh Naval District, for his "initiative in securing valuable information on California." In September 1941, after completing the direction of the motion picture How Green Was My Valley, and twenty-five years in the motion picture industry, he reported for active duty in the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations, Navy Department, Washington, DC. He had additional duty in the Office of Coordinator of Information, Photographic Presentation Branch, and while serving in that assignment made a historical and pictorial record in motion-picture photography of the Pearl Harbor attack.
From December 1941 until May 1943 he had temporary duties, in addition to his assignment in the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations, in the Canal Zone, Caribbean, South Atlantic Areas (December 1941); the Hawaiian Area (January 1942 and May 1942); European Theatre (August 1942); and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (April 1943). In June 1942 he was in Midway during the battle for that island, observing and obtaining a photographic record from atop the Midway Island powerhouse, an obvious and clear target. He survived continuous attack and even though wounded was able to render a verbal report of the battle action, such information greatly aiding the Commanding Officer in the disposition of the defending American forces. In addition to photographing The Battle of Midway, later released by the War Activities Committee, he scored it and added dialogue.
He received a Letter of Commendation from the Commandant, Fourteenth Naval District "For distinguished service in the line of his profession when on June 4, 1942, the Naval Air Station, Midway Island, was severely bombed and strafed by Japanese aircraft. Despite his exposed position he remained at his station and reported to the Navy Command Center an accurate account of the attack, thereby aiding the Commanding Officer in determining his employment of the defending forces. His courage and devotion to duty were in keeping with the highest traditions of the Naval service."
He also was awarded the Purple Heart Medal for wounds received off Midway Island on 4 June 1942.
On 8 June 1943 he reported for duty in the Office of Strategic Services, Washington, DC, as Officer in Charge, Field Photographic Division, with additional duty as Director of Motion Pictures. The following August he had temporary additional duty as Technical Observer in the Burma-India-China Area. In April 1944 he served as Technical Observer with the Branch Office, Office of Strategic Services, London, England, in connection with the accomplishment of various reconnaissance flights in combat areas in preparation of strategic motion picture sequences from air.
In the Invasion of Normandy, June 1944, he organized the seaborne Allied photographic effort in the Invasion and was the Commanding Officer of the United States Navy and Coast Guard, and the Polish, French, and Dutch camera Crews. In November 1944, after his return to the United States, he was temporarily released form active duty to return to Hollywood to work with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer on production and direction of the motion picture They Were Expendable, which portrayed PT boat activity in the United States Navy.
Pacific Air Offensive (1942-45)/Doolittle B-25 Attack on Tokyo
From Month/Year
April / 1942
To Month/Year
April / 1942
Description The Doolittle Raid, also known as the Tokyo Raid, on 18 April 1942, was an air raid by the United States on the Japanese capital Tokyo and other places on Honshu island during World War II, the first air raid to strike the Japanese Home Islands. It demonstrated that Japan itself was vulnerable to American air attack, served as retaliation for the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941, and provided an important boost to U.S. morale while damaging Japanese morale. The raid was planned and led by Lieutenant Colonel James "Jimmy" Doolittle, U.S. Army Air Forces.
Sixteen U.S. Army Air Forces B-25B Mitchell medium bombers were launched without fighter escort from the U.S. Navy's aircraft carrier USS Hornet deep in the Western Pacific Ocean, each with a crew of five men. The plan called for them to bomb military targets in Japan, and to continue westward to land in China—landing a medium bomber on Hornet was impossible. Fifteen of the aircraft reached China, and the other one landed in the Soviet Union. All but three of the crew survived, but all the aircraft were lost. Eight crewmen were captured by the Japanese Army in China; three of these were executed. The B-25 that landed in the Soviet Union at Vladivostok was confiscated and its crew interned for more than a year. Fourteen crews, except for one crewman, returned either to the United States or to American forces.
After the raid, the Japanese Imperial Army conducted a massive sweep through the eastern coastal provinces of China, in an operation now known as the Zhejiang-Jiangxi Campaign, searching for the surviving American airmen and applying retribution on the Chinese who aided them, in an effort to prevent this part of China from being used again for an attack on Japan. An estimated 250,000 Chinese civilians were killed by the Japanese during this operation.
The raid caused negligible material damage to Japan, but it succeeded in its goal of raising American morale and casting doubt in Japan on the ability of its military leaders to defend their home islands. It also caused Japan to withdraw its powerful aircraft carrier force from the Indian Ocean to defend their Home Islands, and the raid contributed to Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto's decision to attack Midway Island in the Central Pacific—an attack that turned into a decisive strategic defeat of the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) by the U.S. Navy in the Battle of Midway. Doolittle, who initially believed that loss of all his aircraft would lead to his being court-martialled, received the Medal of Honor and was promoted two steps to Brigadier General.
My Participation in This Battle or Operation
From Month/Year
April / 1942
To Month/Year
April / 1942
Last Updated: Mar 16, 2020
Personal Memories
People You Remember Chief Photo Historian of the launch of B-25 bombers from USS Hornet
