Scott Whitney
Karrie Gould
US History
Period 5
3-28-01
The Biography of John Ford
John Ford was born on the 12th of December, 1937 in Inglewood, New Jersey. He lived the first two years of his life in Cloister, New Jersey. He later moved to Long Island, New York with his family until the age of ten. His father was an engineer in the oil refineries and later on helped construct the plant in which the first atomic bomb was manufactured. In 1948 John Ford and his family moved to California West Los Angeles.
John attended sixth grade in Brentwood and later went to university high school and then to UCLA. In his high school years, John was a member of the Army JROTC program from 1955-1959. While he attended UCLA, John was involved in the Airforce ROTC program. At UCLA he majored in Theater Arts. In 1959, he joins the United States Airforce. Prior to this, John was a member of the Air National Guard since High school. While John attended high school and part of college, he worked for 20th century Fox under General Frank McCarthy the director of Public Affairs and was producer there at 20th Century Fox. General Frank McCarthy was the producer of the film Patton that won an academy award for best picture.
Vietnam War
In the United States Air Force, John Ford was assigned to a combat camera position. This position was responsible for documenting in motion picture and still photographs the war and information that was vital to the United States. John was stationed in Tan Son Uhut Air Base, just outside Saigon the capital of the republic of Vietnam.
In the summer of 1962, Lt. Ford left active duty, but remained in the Air Force Reserve. He became a production manager at Cascade pictures making TV commercials. He and his special effects crew invented the Pillsbury Doughboy.
On December 31, 1966, John was recalled to active duty and sent to a base called Da Nang, Vietnam. Here he flew combat photo missions in the country and in North Vietnam. Captain John Ford’s detachment and the base was attacked twenty-five times while he was there. On the 15th of July 1967 the worst of the attacks came. This particular attack destroyed one third of the Force. In 1972 Major Ford was assigned to the war place division at headquarters military aircraft command. John Ford was responsible for writing the plan to rescue the POW’s that were still held captive in Vietnam. This plan was later renamed to “Homecoming”. This was the only “warplan” we wanted to implement. When it was, it was an honor to be able to see the plan a huge success bringing home our “Returnees”
Desert Storm
During Desert Storm, Colonel John Ford had to leave his own family for the first time unlike what he had done during the Vietnam War. By this time, John Ford had received the rank of Colonel. In Desert Storm, John was assigned to General Schwarkopf’s operation center such as his mission to the Saudian Arabian MODA or the Ministry of Defense and Aviation. Another encounter John Ford experienced was on a mission behind enemy lines in Iraq, taking pictures of oil distribution facilities for the CIA. The goal was to see how long Sadaam would take to rebuild his oil supply system that the coalition air forces had recently destroyed.
Inside one of these distribution facilities, Colonel John ford and his men were taking pictures and John noticed CBU’s (cluster bomb units) on the ground. He had his men back away slowly one at a time. If he had not seen these, his men would not be here today. One final experience that John encountered during his deployment in Desert Storm was the time that he and his troops were given coordinates on a map and they were to go and take photographs of this spot. Little did he know that these coordinates given to him were behind enemy lines and that they would come face to face with the enemy. “We were in a helicopter slowly hovering closer to the Iraqi troops. Mentally, we all froze. I directed the helicopter to back off. That was one facility we did not need to land at.”
During his time in the Desert Storm, John documented some acts that were committed by the Iraqis that were atrocities. Some of his missions included taking photographs of the dead bodies that were casualties of the war. Another one of these missions was to take photographs of the war crimes committed during Desert Storm.
John Ford remembers his return to the United States from Desert Storm and he states that it was a happy one. The men were able to catch up on things that they had missed in the time that they were gone. Upon his arrival at Ontario Airport, a class of 2nd and 3rd grade classes that had been writing to him while he was overseas greeted him. Everyone in America had supported them during this time and John remembers being grateful for seeing Americans wearing their yellow ribbons.