James Swett, RIP

James E. Swett of Redding, California died on January 18, age 89. You probably didn't hear about it; I only read about it today.

My question, for this blog on popular culture, is why didn't his death get mentioned on the network news, or a respectable headline in major papers? Why would only a very tiny number of schoolchildren know who he was, and probably even fewer teachers think he was someone whose example would be interesting to their students?

On April 7, 1943, Swett was a fighter pilot flying a Wildcat near Guadalcanal. A 150+ formation of Japanese dive bombers was reported approaching US positions, and 1st Lieutenant Swett was among the pilots who were scrambled to go intercept. It was his first combat mission.

First combat missions for fighter pilots are infamously dangerous. That's when an inordinate number of them get picked off by experienced opponents. The ones who survive that first clash have much greater chances of surviving subsequent encounters.

Swett downed three dive bombers, and got hit by friendly fire from anti-aircraft gunners on the ground. Going after a second formation despite the damage to his Wildcat, he shot down four more and was after a fifth when he ran out of ammunition and was wounded and his plane badly damaged by Japanese fire. He eventually ditched the Wildcat in Tulagi Harbor and was rescued to be sent to a naval hospital.

Lieutenant Swett's efforts that day didn't go unnoticed. He was promoted to captain and sent to train in the new Corsair fighter-bombers and to work from carrier decks in the future. And he was nominated for the Medal of Honor by Admiral Mark Mitscher personally.

Busy first day in combat: shoot down seven, lose your plane, get promoted, win the Purple Heart and the Medal of Honor.

So why don't we all know who James Swett was? Or Alvin York or Ernest Evans or William Barber?

I'm not suggesting that American's don't value these sacrifices in general; they do. I'm not suggesting that too much hero worship is a great idea in a republic; it isn't. But every schoolchild once knew who Alvin York was. Gary Cooper played him in a movie, in fact. There will be no movies about Swett (although he was mentioned in recent television programs); or Evans, a mostly Native American skipper who at one point on October 25, 1944 led his tiny little destroyer USS Johnston in a gunnery duel with Japanese battleship Kongo - not the most amazing exploit of Evans or Johnston that day, last day of Evan's life and many of his crew; or Barber who commanded his troops in a six day battle at Chosin Reservoir from a stretcher in December 1950.

Maybe there should be some more movies about them, instead of the recent crop of anti-war movies which, I notice, no one watches or cares about.

Even though most Americans today will never hear any of these names, we should note that people like Swett, Evans and Barber, and thousands of others, keep appearing when American forces go to war. We can't fully gauge what makes most American servicemen and women engage in brave, competent service; a good many in outright heroics; a few in what it takes to earn a Medal of Honor, which very often means not surviving to enjoy the accolade. Clearly it isn't the notion that your name will live forever in American culture, outside the military, which of course does remember these men.

Perhaps it is a good indication. While we celebrate musical performers and sports stars and politicians, and enjoy our mostly happy, mostly safe lives here in the States, people like James Swett not only serve but demonstrate unsuspected skills and qualities every time we go to war. If someday we go to war and no one does that, it will be then that we'll know our society, our culture, is doing something wrong.

Most people don't have to know anything about their exploits for there to be a Paul Ray Smith or a Jason Dunham or a Michael P. Murphy or a Michael A. Monsoor or a Ross A. McGinnis. But they deserve to be remembered, and they deserve to be examples of how to behave.