BEAN, JAMES ELLIS

Name: James Ellis Bean
Rank/Branch: United States Air Force/O6
Unit: 388 TFW
Date of Birth: 05 December 1923
Home City of Record: Coxs Creeks KY
Date of Loss: 03 January 1968
Country of Loss: North Vietnam
Loss Coordinates: 213600 North 1052700 East
Status (in 1973): Returnee
Category:
Aircraft/Vehicle/Ground: F105D
Missions:
1942 -- joined the U.S. Army Air Corps.
Assigned later to the European Theater where he flew 41 combat
missions in the P-47 in France and Germany.
Other Personnel in Incident:
Refno: 0962

Source: Compiled by P.O.W. NETWORK from one or more of the following: raw
data from U.S. Government agency sources, correspondence with POW/MIA
families, published sources, interviews.

REMARKS:730314 RELEASED BY DRV

SOURCE: WE CAME HOME copyright 1977
Captain and Mrs. Frederic A Wyatt (USNR Ret), Barbara Powers Wyatt, Editor
P.O.W. Publications, 10250 Moorpark St., Toluca Lake, CA 91602
Text is reproduced as found in the original publication (including date and
spelling errors).

JAMES E. BEAN
Colonel - United States Air Force
Shot Down: January 3, 1966
Released: March 14, 1973

Colonel James E. Bean is currently a student at the Industrial College of
the Armed Forces. He is enrolled in an intensive ten-month program of
graduate level training for selected military officers and civilian
personnel in the study of the management of resources for national security.

Colonel Bean was born December 5, 1923 on a farm at Cox's Creek, Kentucky,
near Stephen Collins Foster's "Ole Kentucky Home." He graduated from
Bardstown High School, Kentucky, in 1942 and was elected President of
Kentucky Future Farmers of America. He entered the University of Kentucky in
the fall of 1942 where he joined the U.S. Army Air Corps in November. In
February 1943 he was called to active duty and was commissioned a Second
Lieutenant in January, 1944. He remained at Foster Field, Texas, as an
Advanced Flying School instructor. He was later assigned to the European
Theater where he flew 41 combat missions in the P-47 in France and Germany.

Returning to the United States in 1947, Colonel Bean spent the next 12
years in various assignments flying and testing the Air Force's newest
fighter aircraft. In 1960 he was assigned to Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada,
to establish and operate the F-105 aircraft flight training program for all
Air Force units. His next assignment carried him to Japan with the 8th
Tactical Fighter Wing from which he served several short tours in Southeast
Asia. He served as an Air Force duty officer in the Pentagon in 1966 and
1967 until he volunteered and was assigned to the 388th Tactical Fighter
Wing, Korat Royal Thai Air Base, Thailand, in October, 1967.

On January 3, 1968 while flying an F-105 combat mission over North Vietnam,
his aircraft was shot down 30 miles north of Hanoi. Colonel Bean was
captured by the North Vietnamese and held in Prisoner of War status for more
than five years until his release on March 14, 1973.

November 1996
James Bean retired from the United States Air Force as a Colonel. He resides
in Kentucky.

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