Who Was the Candy Bomber?

            My VIP for this week is Gail “Hal” Halvorsen who passed away last week at age 101 years. He is otherwise known as the Candy Bomber because he started dropping candy to the children around the landing strips as he flew in the Berlin Airlift. His gesture of kindness brought adoration from thousands of children in Berlin and gratitude from Germany and the United States. His actions also helped to heal the wounds of World War II. His story is remarkable. 

After the war, the defeated state of Germany was partitioned into zones administered by the victorious Allies. The American, British and French sectors combined to form West Germany. The Soviet sector became East Germany. Within East Germany lay the city of Berlin, which also was divided into two sections, east and west, eventually separated by the wall that came to represent the Iron Curtain that had fallen across Europe.

From June 1948 to May 1949, in one of the first major confrontations of the Cold War, Moscow blockaded West Berlin, blocking rail and road access to that part of the city. More than 2 million West Berliners, deprived of food, fuel, medical supplies and other basic necessities, faced starvation.

The Berlin airlift, one of the most massive humanitarian aid missions ever undertaken, circumvented the Soviet blockade by delivering goods to West Berlin by plane. More than 278,000 flights into Berlin — including 190 by Mr. Halvorsen, The Washington Post reported in 1998 — delivered more than 2 million tons of supplies to the city over 15 months. The accounting of casualties varies, but at least 70 American and British airlifters were killed during the operation, which ran day and night in often hazardous conditions, with planes sometimes landing every three minutes.

            Halvorsen volunteered to fly in the Berlin airlift and began making deliveries. On one delivery in July 1948 at the Tempelhof airfield in West Berlin, he met a group of children who were outside the barbed wire divide. He could tell that they were hungry, and he offered everything that he had in his pockets – two sticks of gum. He tore the two sticks of gum in half and gave them to four out of the thirty children. They were thrilled with the smell of the wrapper. He promised that he would return the next day and drop chocolate and other goodies. He told him that he would wiggle the wings of his airplane, so they could know it was him. He became known as Uncle Wiggly Wings.

            Halvorsen went back to his base and collected candy rations from other airmen. He attached them to handkerchiefs to float them down to the children. His continuing candy drops attracted other children and a German journalist. He had not consulted his superiors before making his candy drops because he knew about the bureaucratic red tape. He was “dressed down” by his commanding officer for making unauthorized drops. There may have been talk of a court-martial, but then the officer told him to carry on with his “good idea.”

            With official permission, Halvorsen’s private project became Operation Little Vittles, and “American candymakers donated tons of sweets for the effort.” Headlines were written about the operation, and cheers came from both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. “By the end of the airlift, pilots had dropped a reported 23 tons of candy over West Berlin.” The operation taught the children in Berlin that Americans were not the bad people who had destroyed their nation, but good people at heart.

Candy Bomber

                Colonel Gail Halvorsen of Provo, Utah, http://www.hill.af.mil/library/factsheets/factsheet.asp?id=5979 was about twenty-four years old when he became one of many American pilots to fly the USAF C-54 Skymaster during the Berlin Airlift of 1948-49.  The airlift was necessary because the Soviets closed the roads into Berlin, and Germans were starving.  Halvorsen became known as the “Candy Bomber” because he dropped candy from his aircraft when he approached the runways. 

                The idea to drop candy to the children came almost by accident. On one of his trips to Tempelhof Airport, Halvorsen decided to walk to the end of the runway and photograph other C-54s during their landing approach.  It was a tricky approach because several buildings were located outside the airport grounds.  While he was standing next to the barbed wire fence, he started talking with the German children who came to watch the airplanes land.  The children asked Halvorsen if he had any gum or candy.  He had only two pieces of gum in his pockets, but he promised to bring more on his next flight.  He told them that he would drop the gum as he passed over them on his landing approach.  The children wanted to know how they would know which airplane was his, and he told them that he would “wiggle his wings” as he approached.

                Halvorsen returned to his base and proceeded to make plans.  He decided to use his Candy Ration Card to obtain treats for the children, and other pilots donated their rations also.  He also made tiny parachutes out of handkerchiefs.  On his next mission to Tempelhof Airport, he instructed his Flight Engineer to push three bundles of sweets through the flare chute on the C-54 flight deck.  The small parcels floated down on the tiny, homemade handkerchief parachutes.  Halvorsen did not know if the children caught the packages because he was busy landing his aircraft.  When he prepared to depart the airfield and taxied to the end of the runway, he saw three white handkerchiefs waving back at him.

                Over the next few weeks Halvorsen repeated the airdrops, and the crowd of German children kept growing larger.  Letters arrived at the airport addressed to “Uncle Wiggly Wings – Tempelhof,” requesting special airdrops at other locations.  The story was picked up by the local newspapers, and Halvorsen became famous.  Other pilots joined the effort, and more candy was donated; volunteers made handkerchief parachutes.  Soon the tiny parcels of treats were falling all over Berlin.

                While on a brief trip back to the United States, Halvorsen was interviewed about his “Candy Bomber” operation.  During the interview, he was asked what he needed to continue it.  He replied, “box cars full of candy!”  Even though he was joking, soon after his return a train car loaded with 3,000 pound of chocolate bars arrived for `Uncle Wiggly Wings.’

                Other Americans joined the project and sent thousands of pounds of candy to support the airdrops.  Still more pilots volunteered to drop the packages.  Uncle Wiggly Wings received several letters from East Berlin, and a few airdrops were made to school yards there.  When the angry Soviet officials complained about the Americans’ “attempted subversion of young minds,” Halvorsen said, “kids are kids everywhere.”  When children wrote to tell him that they had never reached the “sweet gifts from the sky” before other children scooped them up, Halvorsen mailed packages of candy to them.  The “Candy Bomber” did not miss any children.  The candy airlift softened the attitudes of Germans towards Americans and improved relations between the two nations.