Last Raider will dedicate exhibit

EGLIN AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. – The co-pilot who sat next to Jimmy Doolittle during the bombing run over Japan five months after Pearl Harbor will be on hand to dedicate the newly remodeled Doolittle Raiders exhibit at the Air Force Armament Museum. Retired Lt. Col. Richard E. Cole will attend the July 30 ceremony at the museum just outside Eglin Air Force Base. The ceremony begins at 9:30 a.m. Lt. Gen. Marshall "Brad" Webb, commander of the Air Force Special Operations Command at nearby Hurlburt Field, will be the featured speaker. Cole, who is 100, is the last surviving member of the Doolittle Raiders. (Source: Northwest Florida Daily News, 07/26/16) Eighty airmen took off from the USS Hornet April 18, 1942, to bomb the Japanese homeland. The attack helped lift U.S. morale early in the war. The crews trained at Eglin.