US Army Air Forces Staff Sergeant Kermit I. Olstad was born January 23, 1922 in Westfield, Dodge County MN. He was the first-born son of Olaf and Lula (Bagg) Olstad. His paternal grandfather Peter Olstad immigrated to Minnesota from Norway. His mother Lula was adopted by Norwegian immigrants in 1902 from North Dakota and her family later moved to SE Minnesota.

His father rented farmland in Westfield, Dodge County Minnesota. Kermit was a farmer’s son; he grew up farming and that was his families only source of income. He was the second born and had three sisters and three brothers.

By 1940 he had completed his 2nd year of high school and graduated in 1941 from Blooming Prairie HS. After graduation he moved out of his family home and was employed as a laborer for LE Lynse Construction Company before enlisting in the Air Corp. He never married. According to draft records he was a slight man at 5’ 9” and 140 lbs. He had brown hair and eyes.

He joined the Air Corp as a mechanic and before being sent to England he was stationed in Iceland. Since his high school days, he always had a yearning to fly and did not wait long before joining the Air Corp after HS. He was held in high esteem by all who knew him and was popular with his classmates. He was awarded The Distinguished Flying Cross and The Air Metal with the last of the 3 Oak Leaf Cluster issued in March 1944. The Oak Leaf Cluster is awarded for completing bomber operational missions over enemy occupied Europe.

He was assigned to the 547th Bomber squadron, 384th Bomb group heavy. The USAAF B17 bomber “Flying Fortress” named “Jean” which had a 10-member crew. 4 officers and 6 sergeant gunners. Their mission was to the Dornier Aircraft factory. Their aircraft received a direct hit to the cockpit and disintegrated over the target Operpffenhofen near Munich on April 24, 1944. Eight crew members perished when the ship exploded. The radio gunner and left waist gunner survived by parachuting out. The left waist gunner reported that Kermit and another crew member were getting in their chutes and getting in position to bail as he parachuted out of the aircraft. That was the last he seen them.

Kermit and the crew were reported missing in action until April 27, 1944. His trip over Germany, which cost him his life, was with a new crew. His old crew with which he had made many missions had broken up. Six of his former buddies were home on furlough and three were German prisoners of war.

The eight perished crew members were originally buried in the POW cemetery on May 3,1944 in Furstenfeldbruck. Kermit is commemorated in perpetuity at Ardennes American Cemetery and Memorial in Neupre’, Belgium. Grave marker C 10 5322.

8 casualties related to the #42-38158 incident on April 24, 1944.

Elroy A Altendorf :: Top Turret Gunner

John S Cox :: Ball Turret Gunner

William J Hautz :: Co-Pilot

John D Lynch Jr :: Bombardier

William G MacKichan :: Pilot

Kermit I Olstad :: Right Waist Gunner

John P Pastorella :: Tail Gunner

Neil E Walling :: Navigator

This story is part of the Stories Behind the Stars project (see www.storiesbehindthestars.org). This is a national effort of volunteers to write the stories of all 400,000+ of the US WWII fallen here on Fold3. Can you help write these stories? Related to this, there will be a smart phone app that will allow people to visit any war memorial or cemetery, scan the fallen's name and read his/her story.

Kermit Olstad, I