Date: Fri, 25 Mar 2005 18:51:42 EST
From: William Fitts Asbury

Subject: Pal

Dear Family,
 
A phone call from my niece, Coni, just after midnight, informed 
us that my only brother, Pal, had died.  Coni, along with Pal's 
other daughter, Judi, had been at Pal's bedside for several days.  
He had suffered congestive heart failure in recent months.  
 
Pal was my half-brother.  His mother, Vervian, and Pal's baby 
brother, Vernon, died of influenza during the global flu epidemic 
that killed millions just after World War I.  
 
Pal's given name was Joseph Lester Asbury, Jr.  He was named for 
our father, Joseph Lester Asbury (Sr.), commonly called "Ben".

After Pal's mother and baby brother died, Joe Sr. went to live with 
his brother (Charles) Emery and his large family on a farm near Puyallup.  
Taking in Ben and Pal was a kindness of great consequence by Emery, 
I was to learn.  

Emery had been appointed by President Woodrow Wilson and served as 
the American consul to Wales and likely could have looked forward 
to a promising career as a diplomat.  I believe Emery gave that up 
in large part to look after Joe and little Joe.  I mention this 
because many of you are progeny of Emery's children: Charles, 
Margaret, Fred and Frank.
 
Joe Sr. obtained a job teaching journalism and Spanish at Stadium 
High School in Tacoma, Washington.  The compensation wasn't much.  
He had but one suit of clothing whose trousers had been patched so 
often that he was humiliated.  When he wrote on the blackboard he 
always faced the students, and wrote at his side, to prevent the 
students from seeing his impoverishment.  
 
Baby Joe became his life in those hard years.  Dad began referring 
to him as "Daddy's little pal."  That name lasted the 86, almost 87, 
years of Pal's life which ended early this morning.
 
Pal made a career in the United States Air Force.  In his dress 
uniform as a lieutenant colonel his chest was laden with ribbons 
that honored his service.  One of them was the Distinguished Flying 
Cross.  As a military friend of Pal said, "they don't give those to 
just anybody." 

Pal flew the fearsome, powerful P-47 fighter-bomber during World 
War II in Europe.  His squadron was attached to General George S.  
Patton's Third Army as Patton's soldiers fought to liberate Europe.  
In that campaign Pal's plane was shot up and shot down by German 
antiaircraft gunners.  He was able with the mechanical skill I often 
saw in him, as his little brother, to coax his plane back to France 
and a crash landing which he survived.
 
After the war, Pal was discharged from the Air Force but re-enlisted 
in time for the Korean War.  He soon qualified to fly F-80's, the 
first operational American jets.  He actually flew the RF-80's - the
faster, stripped down reconnaissance version of that famous airplane.  

He flew many missions over North Korea, frequently coming back to 
his base with bullet holes in his plane's fuselage and wings.  

Before leaving Korea, Pal was appointed officer in charge of 
reconnaissance for the Fifth Air Force, the air wing of the 
Far East Command.  I saw Pal frequently in Korea where I was 
working with the Christian Childrens Fund on behalf of Korean orphans.
 
Pal and his family returned to the United States following the 
Korean conflict.  He was at one time in charge of operations 
for the SR-61, the supersonic reconnaissance plane whose awesome 
existence helped win the Cold War.  At one time Pal was commander 
of a jet reconnaissance squadron in Western Germany.
 
Besides Judi and Coni and their husbands Glenn Mason and Dr. Kim 
Holland, Pal is survived by three granddaughters, Judi's Samantha 
(and her husband Chris) and Laura, and Coni's Jessamy.  
 
Services haven't been decided.  They will likely include a military 
service at Honolulu's Military Cemetery at the Punch Bowl, and perhaps 
also at the Arcadia Residence where Pal and his wife, Barbara, lived 
for several years.  I shall let you know.
 
Barbara preceded Pal in death.  And I cannot end this recitation 
of Pal's life without mentioning the devotion of Pal to Barbara 
and Barbara to Pal.  The story of their love must be writ large 
somewhere.  Its duration of 60 years only hinted at their dedication 
to one another.
 
The American writer Vachel Lindsay wrote a poem about Lincoln's 
life and death.  I cherish one line.  He wrote that when Lincoln 
died it was "as when a lordly cedar falls and leaves a lonesome 
place against the sky."  In this time, Pal's first absence from 
my life of 81 years, I see and feel that lonesome place against 
the sky.  Ah, what memories! 
 
We can talk more of all this at our next family reunion here in 
Tumwater on July 17.  I know Pal will be with us.
 
Bill