Remembering Gale 'Buck' Cleven, 100th Bomb Group

In artist Scott Nelson's painting, Gale Cleven mans the left seat as his plane goes down over Germany and his crewmates bail out.

I recently bought an outstanding art print by North Dakota artist Scott Nelson. Scott knew 100th Bomb Group commander Gale 'Buck' Cleven quite well through a mutual friend, and Mr. Cleven told Scott his story. Scott in turn made a painting of the shooting down of Cleven's B-17, which was made into a limited edition print and signed by both.

When Scott sent me this print, he also sent more information about Mr. Cleven. As a former Wyoming resident with strong ties to the state, I was suprised to learn that Cleven was a Wyoming native, from the Sheridan area. And I was disturbed to find that when Scott sent the Wyoming papers an obituary about the passing of this great WWII veteran, none of the Wyoming papers ran the obituary, ostensibly because they had never heard of him and didn't think the obit was of any interest.

As a former Wyomingite, I am going to try to rectify this great wrong to a good man by running his story here. I will be adding the obituary Scott wrote in a day or so, plus more photos of Mr. Cleven.


GALE W. "BUCK" CLEVEN

ORIGINAL 100TH PILOT

350TH BOMB SQUADRON

COMMANDING OFFICER

ORGINAL 350TH SQ COMMANDER

WENT OVERSEAS WITH CREW #A-3 IN AC #42-29738. POW 8 OCT 43 BREMEN (INFO ON MISSION BELOW). ESCAPED AND RETURNED TO THORPE ABBOTS APRIL 1945, STANDARD PROCEDURES PROHIBITED HIS RETURN TO OPERATIONS.

Medals:Distinguished Service Cross- Sept. 10, 1943 for Regensburg Mission August 17, 1943 Distinguished Flying Cross- Nov 30, 1943 for Paris Mission Sept 3, 1943 Air Medal-Aug 6, 1943 OLC to Air Medal-Aug 22, 1943 OLC to Air Medal-Sept 24, 1943 OLC to Air Medal-Oct 20, 1943 Major Gale Cleven passed away on Nov 17, 2006 at the age of 87 years old.
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