John and Sue Paul, founders of the Warhawk Air Museum in Nampa, Idaho, have always placed a high priority on remembering veterans and those who died in service to the United States.
Each Memorial Day for about 15 years, an historic flight with the museum’s warbirds flies along a circuitous route that highlights the Veterans’ Cemetery, Veterans Memorial Park, other parks, hospitals, and other sites in the Boise, Idaho, Treasure Valley.
For Memorial Day 2025, the honors went to Warhawk Air Museum’s two P-40s and its P-51C.
Warhawk Air Museum’s longstanding collaborative efforts with the Planes of Fame museum in California saw Planes of Fame pilots John Maloney and John Hinton join fellow Californian Jim Thomas to fly the 30-minute Memorial Day mission.
Momentum favors active organizations like Warhawk Air Museum, and the Memorial Day flight that used to be a launch attended by a handful of friends of the museum has become a Treasure Valley event. This year, a special museum admission price for Memorial Day and the presence of food vendors served a crowd counted at 2,144, said Warhawk Air Museum Executive Director Carson Spear. That’s a jump from last year’s 1,600.
And one can only guess how many of the Boise region’s 850,000 residents heard the burble of Allison and Merlin engines, and looked up past the many flags flying on Memorial Day to watch the tribute in the sky.
For those in attendance at the museum, the three World War II fighters were parked just beyond a crowd rope line, affording a good view of the engine start-ups and the associated popping and roaring sounds that accompany the ritual of firing up a warbird.
The P-51C and two P-40s took off in time to form up and start their run over the community by 10:59 a.m. About a half hour later, their mission complete, pilots Hinton, Maloney, and Thomas made a memorable pass for the Nampa airport crowd before returning to peel off for landing.
Attendees at the museum’s Memorial Day event could see the former Warhawk maintenance and storage hangar stripped bare, with thoughtful changes underway to make the building a museum gallery in tribute to those who served in the Global War on Terror. The gallery is set to open Sept. 13, 2025.
Fred also created this video of the event:
For more information: WarhawkAirMuseum.org
Personal.
My dad flew 40’s in the CBI … early ’43 to ’44… with the 25FS [Assam Dragons] and the 80FS [Burma Banshees]. He was transfer from the 25FS to the 80FS… as a 1Lt with in-theater combat experience… to ‘help’ the 80th get into the action safely. As a senior [older] 1Lt he was designated combat flight leader, for awhile, as the more-senior 80FS officers got their feet wet in CBI environment, the long distance flying and combat. This upside-down rank-leadership role reversal… to say the least… was sorely accepted by some in the 80FS…at first… until the reality of the CBI flying ‘set in’. After 75 missions he rotated stateside in late ’44.
PS: After Dad was promoted to Major, he was assigned to command a P-51D squadron on the west-coast… with other seasoned combat veterans. His long distance flying over the vast, unforgiving and featureless CBI… was useful for training others for long-hours of over-water flying into combat… and then returning to an island base… in preparation for the invasion of Japan. He was deeply relieved the ‘Invasion’ never happened.
PS: He named his fighters for his mother + 1st-wife*+ 1st-kid** => SUE FAY
** my 1/2 sister
I have one grainy photo of one of his aircraft ‘SUE FAY’ on a muddy rainy park-spot during a break in the CBI monsoon weather. I had forgotten… CBI weather was a dangerous element for long missions.
Thanks for adding your father’s P-40 history. It is interesting to hear from the families of veterans involved with these warbirds.