ROBERT T. FORREST, born in Chicago, Illinois, graduated from Lehigh University in Bethlehem, PA- in 1938 with a degree in Business and Economics.

With an ROTC Commission, the Infantry called him in August of 1941. He was accepted into Flight Training at Maxwell Field in May, 1942 and graduated in single engine, from Napier, in Dothan, Alabama in January 1943.

He was first assigned to Dive Bombers, flew several hundred hours in A-24, A-25, A-35 and A-36 types. After transitioning into P-39's and going through P-47 RTU in Tallahassee, he was assigned as a P-40 Instructor in Woodward, Oklahoma and Ft. Sumner, New Mexico.

In the Fall of 1944 he helped form the new 507th fighter group in Bruning, Nebraska, which moved into the Pacific in the Spring of 1945 with the new N Model.

Flying out of Ie Shima off the coast of Okinawa in the closing months of the war, his missions took him over Korea and the Japanese Empire. The missions could run 6 to 8 hours over water and the General Electric auto pilot in the P-47N a first in fighters, came in very handy.

Never shot down, or even shot up (superior skills? luck?). He watched the Nagasaki Atom Bomb while over Kyushu on a mission unrelated to that historic event. Then, on the war's last day, returning from a sweep over Korea, he released his flight to return directly to Ie and took himself across the sea of Japan to get a close look at Nagasaki. He Criss-crossed the city eight times at 50 to 100 feet trying to imprint the impressions forever.

"I didn't think of trying to assess the long range implications of atomic power during that flyover, but I remember thinking that war would never be the same again." Although it has never been carefully researched, he is considered to have been the last fighter pilot to return from a combat mission during WW II. By the time he flew back from Nagasaki and landed on Ie Shima, the war was over.

In 1946 he began a career in retail man. agement and operations with the Ohrbachs group of Department Stores retiring in June of 1980 after 34 years.

Following WW II he joined the N.J. Air National Guard flying Jugs and in 1951 was recalled with the 108th Fighter Group for 21 months flying F-84's and T-33's.

He is one of the founders'of the P-47 Thunderbolt Pilots Association and served as president from 1967 to 1970. Married to Kit, who was named an Honorary Life Member of the Association because of her vast amount of work in its behalf, he has two children, Bob and Stephanie and four grandchildren at the present time.