In Chapter 10 of Be Home By Dinner, the protagonist, Garvey Nolan, notices a newspaper article hung up in the back of his Dad’s shed. The article details how his Dad saved a General from a fiery plane crash back in his U.S. Air Force days. Garvey’s dad introduced intuition and gut instincts to Garvey, which he later uses in the book multiple times in order to survive the emotional turbulence of adolescence, avoid being captured by crazed adults and escape risky peer influencers.
In reality, my Dad did indeed save a general from a fiery crash at Scott Air Force Base in Illinois, back in 1961, while enlisted in the U.S. Air Force as a medic. Below is a newspaper article from The Philadelphia Bulletin, an old evening newspaper that was published from 1847 to 1982. Enjoy the story:
