Reviews for Candy Bomber: The Story of the Berlin Airlift's "Chocolate Pilot"

The average rating for Candy Bomber: The Story of the Berlin Airlift's "Chocolate Pilot" based on 2 reviews is 3.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2016-12-28 00:00:00 Seth Bacon When one thinks of the top kids' historical nonfiction authors from the first two decades of the twenty-first century, Michael O. Tunnell doesn't come right to mind. There's Russell Freedman, Newbery Medalist and recipient of multiple Newbery Honor citations, who set the gold standard of his era for historical exposition on topics ranging from World War I to the life of the Wright brothers and their invention of the airplane, from the uphill struggle for civil rights in America to the complex narrative of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War. There's Susan Campbell Bartoletti, whose thoroughness and versatility earned rousing acclaim for each nonfiction work she produced. There's Phillip Hoose, Steve Sheinkin, Jim Murphy, Albert Marrin, Deborah Hopkinson, Candace Fleming, Marc Aronson, Sally M. Walker, Tanya Lee Stone, Carole Boston Weatherford, Karen Blumenthal, James L. Swanson...the list could go on and on before one thinks of Michael O. Tunnell. Yet in 2010's Candy Bomber: The Story of the Berlin Airlift's "Chocolate Pilot", the author performed at a level equal to most of those giants of the youth nonfiction pantheon, illuminating an adventure from history that is interesting, emotionally gratifying, and has relevance to readers in any historical era. The story of candy being airlifted over war-torn Berlin and dropped to kids who hadn't tasted sweets for the majority of their lives is more than a happy episode of children not being forgotten amidst concerns of a global war that had just claimed upwards of fifty million lives; it's about the indomitable nature of hope even beneath thunderclouds of tyranny, the resilience of ordinary citizens willing to endure any hardship so long as they don't lose their freedom. This is the surprising drama that unfolded in Germany only a few years after the nation had been led by one of the most depraved fascists in history, the story of the German people casting off their ominous recent past to create a new future for themselves, unencumbered by Hitler's record of ethnic extermination and despotism. Candy Bomber is a beautiful reminder that our past controls us only as long as we let it. The conclusion of World War II left the Allies with some sensitive issues to address. Germany's leadership structure was no more and the country lay in ruins, unable to take care of itself. The Allies knew from what happened following World War I that prolonged sanctions against Germany would cause resentment that could lead to the rise of another demagogue like Adolph Hitler, so they chose instead to adopt responsibility for Germany by dividing its care among the main Allied powers. The United States, Britain, France, and Russia each assumed control over a section, and though the city of Berlin lay entirely within the Russian sector, its administration was so important that they also agreed to apportion that city among the four Allies. Consensus over this arrangement didn't last, however, as Russia grew resentful of its partners in stopgap bureaucracy and cut off all travel over ground and water to anywhere in Berlin. They were counting on starvation to force the Berliners under American, British, and French supervision to beg their new leaders to cut ties so the Russians would take over their care, but the Allies weren't about to give up that easily, and neither were the hungry Berliners. They saw firsthand the devastation wrought by Russia's communism on East Berlin, how it impoverished the people and robbed them of basic freedoms they had only just regained after Hitler's demise. Determined not to forsake West Berlin, the Allies launched "Operation Vittles", sending airplanes to fly over their half of the city and drop sacks of food and fuel for the Germans, who used these resources to stave off Russian advances on their territory. Russia wasn't ready to end their hostile takeover of Berlin just yet, but the threat was neutralized for now, and denizens of West Berlin wouldn't starve or freeze to death. Upon his reassignment from South America to Rhein-Main Air Force Base in Berlin for Operation Vittles in 1948, American Lieutenant Gail S. Halvorsen took a tour of the ruined German countryside, seeing for himself the toll exacted by the war. As Lt. Halvorsen waited for the jeep to pick him up for his tour, he snapped photos near the Tempelhof airfield where planes dedicated to Operation Vittles took off and landed each day. On the other side of the fence separating civilian land from the American airfield, a group of ragtag children watched him, right up against the fence. Lt. Halvorsen conversed with the quiet youngsters in English, answering questions about Operation Vittles. They were skinny and shabbily dressed, victims of the Russian blockade and exorbitant prices on the black market, but recognized the importance of not bowing to Russian authoritarianism. "Though they worried about going hungry, the children seemed to agree that they were just as concerned about losing their newfound freedoms. 'These young kids [gave] me the most meaningful lesson in freedom I ever had,' Lt. Halvorsen later said. The American pilot hesitated before saying goodbye to the kids at the fence, wishing to do something for them to reward their faith. Though it wasn't nearly enough for the number of children there, Lt. Halvorsen pulled two sticks of Doublemint chewing gum from his pocket and distributed them to the kids, who calmly accepted the gift and then shredded the wrapper to pass around so those not fortunate enough to receive any gum could at least inhale the sweet aroma of the stuff. Their joyful appreciation for Lt. Halvorsen's limited gesture moved him to want to do more. What if he made an unscheduled airlift over Berlin just to drop candy for the kids? He could use his own candy rations and those of his fellow officers if they agreed to donate, tie the candy in makeshift parachutes, and drop the bundles for the kids below. Lt. Halvorsen worked out a signal so the kids would know which plane was stocked with sweets: he would wiggle the wings, a wink and a nod to the young Germans that would be clearly visible from the ground. The inaugural candy drop worked so well that Lt. Halvorsen decided to make additional candy runs, and the crowd at the fence quickly grew. When Lt. Halvorsen's commanding officer discovered what he was doing and called him into his office to account for it, Halvorsen figured that was the end of his confectionary philanthropy, but Colonel Haun had no intention of halting the candy airlifts. Rather, he devoted extra resources to the lieutenant's endeavor, and "Operation Little Vittles" was officially underway. Word spread of Lt. Halvorsen's compassionate response to the underserved children of Berlin, and donations of candy and of cloth to make miniature parachutes began pouring in, easing any worries that there were insufficient materials to sustain Operation Little Vittles as its notoriety swept across the huge city of Berlin. Other pilots were sent, too, and candy rained down on the euphoric young ones, some of whom had never tasted sweets. But even with numerous pilots going on candy runs, there were so many kids that most never got a parachute, so it was a rare blessing if that weighted cloth fell into one's hands. Uncle Wiggly Wings; the Chocolate Pilot; our Chocolate Uncle; these were the affectionate names the children called Lt. Halvorsen by in the letters he received, gratitude arriving en masse as he bombarded the city with candy parcels. Lt. Halvorsen was called on to do radio and television appearances promoting Operation Little Vittles, telling his story and asking for donations from abroad so the sweet dreams of pint-sized Berliners could continue being fulfilled. He visited German children's hospitals full of hurting orphans whose eyes lit with newfound energy to meet their Chocolate Uncle, whether or not they got candy out of the deal. Lt. Halvorsen took care of that whenever possible, bringing boxes of gum and candy on his hospital visits, accompanied on one occasion by American health officer James Gibson, a skilled bubble gum blower who demonstrated his technique to hospitalized youngsters who had never seen gum in action. Lt. Halvorsen even made special candy airlifts once in a while when he received a letter from a kid thankful for Halvorsen's kindness but who hadn't been lucky enough to snag a parachute, and tried his best to make a drop near their house so they could grab the parachute before older kids intervened. When this didn't work, Lt. Halvorsen mailed them candy directly, as in the case of nine-year-old Peter Zimmerman and seven-year-old Mercedes Simon. Of all the children Lt. Halvorsen catered to, the stories of these two are focused on in Candy Bomber, and it's easy to see why: theirs are the cutest and most charming of the book. Gail S. Halvorsen recalls story after story of Operation Little Vittles, some humorous, others sweet, and some of them poignant. Young Klaus Rickowski dove into a pond for a parachute and emerged covered in slime and mud, but ecstatic to get his candy. A man who lived in poverty wrote Lt. Halvorsen to say he'd been distraught to have no present for his son's birthday...until the day he looked out the window and spotted a tiny parachute filled with candy on the edge of his roof. The care package made the boy's birthday more memorable than he thought possible. Many such anecdotes are recorded in Candy Bomber, showing in a variety of ways the role Lt. Halvorsen played in buoying the spirits of a city that had reason to doubt its future as a place of freedom. "All this for two sticks of gum!" Lt. Halvorsen often repeated in disbelief, but his charity had extended far beyond that, touching every boy and girl of Berlin in one way or another. As the war's hostility faded and Germany strove for a return to normality, the Americans stood right beside them. Lt. Halvorsen just happened to express that solidarity in a unique and particularly pleasant manner. Halvorsen's days as Chocolate Uncle to Berlin's youth couldn't last forever, but when he accepted reassignment to Mobile, Alabama in January 1949, Operation Little Vittles was not abandoned. Its administration was put in the capable hands of Captain Eugene Williams, whose bigheartedness toward Berlin's littlest citizens was as indefatigable as Lt. Halvorsen's. By the time Russia admitted defeat and lifted the blockade on West Berlin in May 1949, Capt. Williams had orchestrated a greater number of candy runs than Lt. Halvorsen, continuing to please Berlin's youth with sweet treats until the airlifts were no longer necessary. But it was Halvorsen who retained a special place in the heart of every young Berliner who received candy from the sky because he cared about them. In 1969 Halvorsen was asked to return to Berlin for a candy airlift to commemorate the twentieth anniversary of Operation Little Vittles, which he happily agreed to do, showering German little ones with sweets for the first time in two decades. In 1970 he was re-stationed at Tempelhof in Berlin, where he served the remainder of his career. Halvorsen was invited by dozens of Germans for dinner at their homes in his honor, many of whom were kids when Lt. Halvorsen started Operation Little Vittles and wanted to thank the man who did so much to lift their spirits. Halvorsen forged friendships during these years that would last a lifetime, and all, as he routinely said, for two sticks of gum. He participated in several more anniversary candy airlifts to delight the new children of Berlin, grandchildren and later great-grandchildren of the generation he served in 1948, and even led the German athletes into Eccles Stadium for the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2002 Olympics in Salt Lake City, Utah. The people of Berlin had not forgotten their Chocolate Uncle more than fifty years after the fact. A highlight of Candy Bomber is the Prologue written by Gail S. Halvorsen, a succinct and moving commentary on what Operation Little Vittles meant to him and to preadolescent Germans of the 1940s. Writes Halvorsen: "This book is special to me because it tells about the people of Berlin who valued freedom over food. The Russians promised them food if they agreed to live under Soviet rule, but they refused. They wanted to be free, even if that meant going hungry. Children felt this way, too. 'I can live on thin rations but not without hope,' one ten-year-old boy told me. The Berlin children taught me to put principle before pleasure'to stand by what is important to you." What a magnificent lesson to learn from a ten-year-old, who had witnessed the opposite of freedom and knew nothing should be valued above liberty. Halvorsen always appreciated the love and gratitude the little Berliners gave him, reinforcing his faith in a world so recently marred by catastrophic violence. "I was able to give them a little candy and a little hope, but they were able to fill me up with so much more." That sentiment is reflected in the words of a German boy who spoke years after Operation Little Vittles about what it was like at age ten to see a parachute containing a Hershey chocolate bar come drifting out of the mist into his hands on his way to school. The candy was worth more than pure gold to the boy. "The chocolate was wonderful, but it wasn't the chocolate that was most important. What it meant was that someone in America cared. That parachute was something more important than candy. It represented hope. Hope that someday we would be free. Without hope the soul dies." Operation Vittles and Operation Little Vittles were successful because they kept alive the flame of hope in Berlin, from adults down to the smallest children. They weren't left to wonder if, after the horrible, bloody war instigated by their leader, the world still cared about them. Candy Bomber is a soul sibling to Claire Huchet Bishop's 1948 Newbery Honor book Pancakes-Paris, a story set after the trauma of World War II that sustains a similarly hopeful tone throughout. While Pancakes-Paris is about the healing of the common spirit in France as a boy named Charles figures out how to make pancakes for a small party to remind his mother and sister of the precious days "Before" the war swallowed them up, Candy Bomber points to the example of an American pilot who loved the children of Germany before ever meeting them, to show that a second global war could not wipe out hope and humanity, that international goodwill was still alive despite the efforts of the world's worst madmen to stamp it out. There was laughter and generosity and friendship yet to take root in our world, and it would be a soothing sight for eyes exhausted by images of a war that slaughtered untold masses. There was, and still is, reason to believe in humanity. Something grand and altogether wonderful really can come from something as small as two sticks of chewing gum. I adore Candy Bomber, and would compare it favorably to almost any nonfiction offering of its day. The story leaves readers feeling positive not just for the sake of their comfort, but with good reason, a feeling that will translate into kids picking up on the Gail S. Halvorsen spirit and demonstrating compassion to the world in their own thoughtful ways. Any book capable of that has achieved something extraordinary. Way to go, Lieutenant Halvorsen, and way to go, Michael O. Tunnell.

Review # 2 was written on 2011-06-02 00:00:00 Chad Martin When this book popped up on the main page of Bibliocommons (our library's new catalog) I knew I had to read it. My wife worked for Colonel (Ret.) Gail Halvorsen when he was an Assistant Dean of Student Life at my alma mater. Due to this association I knew the story of 'ol "Wiggly Wings" and I just wanted to read it in print. The photographs in this book were an added bonus. This story is so heart-warming and reassuring of the goodness in human-kind that everyone should read it. Tunnell tells the story very well and in a tone that focuses on the relief brought to the people of Berlin by the Airlift amid the Soviet blockade, and the special joy that the children of Berlin got from what was called "Operation Little Vittles" in 1948. In this operation, then Lt. Gail Halvorsen, USAF, started dropping candy from his C-54 transport plane to the children just outside of the airbase where he and his fellow pilots were airlifting food, fuel and supplies to the residents of Berlin, because the city was sealed off from the West. The story continues from there and grows and expands to encompass much more than a few candy bars and sticks of gum in one war-torn city. On a deeper level, it also shows that people can come from opposing sides and learn to live together in peace, harmony and even love.