[Milsurplus] Fwd: WWII Mobile Control Tower at Malang

[Mike Hanz]

That's an outstanding insight, Robert!  Many thanks!

I found the Edmonds book in Google Books in its entirety - the full 
title is:
_They Fought With What They Had: The Story of the Army Air Forces in the 
Southwest Pacific_... By Walter Dumaux Edmonds, Center for Air Force 
History (U.S.)

Reading through that, it's clear that they were American, though the 
specific information is only in a footnote.  Interesting book, which I 
bookmarked for later consumption.  I received a couple of other notes 
suggesting the Chevrolet panel truck as well, so that should satisfy 
her.  I'm assuming that means a 1941 Chevrolet G-7105 1.5-Ton 4 x 4 
Panel Truck. judging by the google images.

Here is the full footnote on page 365 for anyone interested:

/"Lt. Stancill M. Nanney, who had come out of Del Monte in the Funk and 
Wade evacuation flight, was in charge of communications at Singosari and 
has graphically described their setup.  When he reached Malang there was 
no control tower and Combs needed one, so Nanney and T/Sgt R. W. Stevens 
took a panel truck and installed a communications command set with a CW 
transmitter.  This made a mobile tower and in an alert it was their job 
to get out to the end of the runway and clear the planes and then clear 
off themselves for the woods.  They had a permanent antenna rigged in 
the woods and when they had high tailed it there, they would hook up the 
antenna and could monitor the planes, listen in on the pilots, and after 
the All Clear had sounded, they would go back to the field and call the 
planes in to land.  They called it the "Mobile Control Tower."  It 
worked so well that a similar outfit was used at Jogjakarta."/

That's all there is on it.  Would be nice to have that "graphically 
described" setup description referred to above. :-)

73,
Mike  KC4TOS

On 10/27/2010 10:41 PM, WA5CAB at cs.com wrote:
> Judging by the number of survivors, the Chevrolet (used in SCR-299) was
> more common.  The most common Dodges were probably the Command Car and the
> WC-51 Weapons Carrier.  Which was a rag top pickup.  The mix in Korea may have
> been different.
>
> In a message dated 10/27/2010 8:29:07 PM Central Daylight Time,
> gl4d21a at juno.com writes:
>> Were there other panel trucks in WW2 besides the ubiquitous Dodge?  In
>> films, they show up as ambulances, radio trucks, and ammo carriers to name a
>> few uses.  Next thing up were six-bys and half-tracks, right?
>>
>> 73,
>> George
>> W5VPQ
> Robert Downs - Houston
> wa5cab dot com (Web Store)
> MVPA 9480
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