Parks, Reid Grover, 1923-1945.

Reid Grover Parks (1923-1945) of Davidson County, North Carolina, served as a pilot in the United States Army Air Forces during World War II. Based in Foggia, Italy, from November 1944 to February 1945, he flew 28 missions as pilot of a B-24 Liberator bomber in the 325th Bomb Squadron.

From the description of Reid Grover Parks scrapbook and other material, 1924-1947 [manuscript] (North Carolina State University). WorldCat record id: 606637528

Reid Grover Parks was born on 1923 July 31 to Henry Grover and Minnie Young Parks. He graduated from Southmont High School in the class of 1940 and Brevard College in the class of 1942. He was attending North Carolina State College in Raleigh in 1943 when he enlisted in the United States Army Air Forces. In 1944, he received his officers commission and pilot wings at Stuttgart Army Air Field in Stuttgart, Arkansas.

In the fall of 1944, Parks was assigned to the 325th B-24 Liberator Bomber Squadron at Foggia, Italy. There he received his 1st lieutenant commission and the Air Medal.

On 1945 February 17, as Parks was returning from a bombing run over Graz, Austria, his 28th sortie mission, engine problems developed which could not be remedied. Parks did, however, manage to return the crippled aircraft to within 40 miles of the air base at Foggia. When he realized that he could not reach the base, Parks ordered the crew of eight to bail out, but he elected to remain with the aircraft and attempt a crash landing. In this attempt, Parks was fatally injured, but the plane did not burn. His body was recovered immediately and interred in Naples, Italy, until 1948, when the government returned the body to Lexington, North Carolina. It is interred in Beck's United Church of Christ cemetery.

From the guide to the Reid Grover Parks Papers, 1924-1947 1923-1991, (Special Collections Research Center)