David J. Thacker - $30.00

Mr. Thatcher joined the Army Air Corps in 1940, fresh out of high school, and one year later, after Japan bombed Pearl Harbor and pushed the United States into World War II, he volunteered for a top-secret mission that sent him on an aircraft carrier, the USS Hornet, headed straight for the coast of Japan. On April 18, 1942, then-Cpl. Thatcher was one of 80 aviators who participated in a daring daylight air raid on Tokyo and other cities, bombing factories, munitions depots and other targets in an effort to retaliate for Japan’s Dec. 7, 1941, attack on Pearl Harbor. Led by Lt. Col. James H. Doolittle, a former test pilot and engineer, the so-called Doolittle Raid brought Americans back from the brink of despair following four months of bitter defeats in Hawaii, Guam, Wake Island and the Philippines. 7 3/4" x 5 3/4" B&W Photo.