BOMAR, JACK WILLIAMSON
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Name: Jack Williamson Bomar
Rank/Branch: O4/US Air Force, NAV
Unit: 41st TRS
Date of Birth:10 June 1926
Home City of Record: Ft. Madison IA
Date of Loss: 04 February 1967
Country of Loss: North Vietnam
Loss Coordinates: 221546N 1055300E (WK910620)
Status (in 1973): Released POW
Category: 2
Aircraft/Vehicle/Ground: EB66C
Other Personnel in Incident: John O. Davies; John Fer (both released POWs);
Russell A. Poor (missing); Herb Doby; Woodrow H. Wilburn (remains returned)
Source: Compiled by Homecoming II Project 15 March 1990 with the assistance
of one or more of the following: raw data from U.S. Government agency
sources, correspondence with POW/MIA families, published sources,
interviews. Updated by the P.O.W. NETWORK 2009.
REMARKS: 730304 RELSD BY DRV
SYNOPSIS: The Douglas EB66C Skywarrior was outfitted as an electronic
warfare aircraft which carried roughly 5 tons of electronic gear in addition
to its flight crew of three and technical personnel. The EB66C featured a
pressurized capsule installed in the bomb bay, that accommodated four
technicians whose responsibility was to operate electronic reconnaissance
gear.
On February 4, 1967, an EB66C was dispatched on an operational mission over
North Vietnam. The crew and technicians that day included Maj. Jack W.
Bomar, 1Lt. John O. Davies, Capt. John Fer, Capt. Russell A. Poor, Capt.
Herb Doby, and Maj. Woodrow Hoover.
At a point about 40 miles from the China border in Bac Thai Province, North
Vietnam, the EB66C was shot down. Bomar, Fer and Davies were captured. The
fates of Doby, Poor and Wilburn were uncertain.
In the spring of 1973, 591 Americans were released from prison camps in
Vietnam, including Bomar, Davies and Fer. They had been POWs for just over
six years. Poor, Doby and Wilburn remained Missing in Action.
In 1977, the Vietnamese returned remains which were identified as being
those of Capt. Herb Doby, but denied any knowledge of the fates of Poor and
Wilburn.
In 1990, it was announced that the Vietnamese had "discovered" and returned
the remains of Maj. Woodrow Wilburn.
For 23 years, the Vietnamese have denied knowledge of the fates of the
missing from the EB66C they shot down on February 4, 1967. Among the entire
crew, only Poor remains missing.
Disturbing testimony was given to Congress in 1980 that the Vietnamese
"stockpiled" the remains of Americans to return at politically advantageous
times. Could Poor be waiting, in a casket, for just such a moment?
Even more disturbing are the nearly 10,000 reports received by the U.S.
relating to Americans missing in Southeast Asia. Many authorities who have
examined this information (largely classified), have reluctantly come to the
conclusion that many Americans are still alive in Southeast Asia. Could Poor
be among these?
Perhaps the most compelling questions when remains are returned are, "Is it
really who they say it is?", and "How -- and when -- did he die?" As long as
reports continue to be received which indicate Americans are still alive in
Indochina, we can only regard the return of remains as a politically
expedient way to show "progress" on accounting for American POW/MIAs. As
long as reports continue to be received, we must wonder how many are alive.
As long as even one American remains alive, held against his will, we must
do everything possible to bring him home -- alive.
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Jack Bomar retired from the United States Air Force as a Colonel. He and his
wife Kay reside in Arizona.
=======
"Michael Williamson Bomar passed away peacefully on Jan 4th, 2006 after a
long fight with cancer.  He was born in Pasadena Tx, on April 17, 1955.  He
worked for the state of Arizona for their ADOA fleet management.  Prior to
that he was employed by the Arizona Republican Party for 14 years.  Michael
attended the United States Air Force Academy ans was a graduate of Arizona
State University.  He is survived by his wife Shirley, daughter Melissa,
mother and step-father Ruth and Paul Giovannetti, father and step-mother Col
Jack Bomar and Kay Bomar. He has three brothers, Sam Bomar, Mark Bomar, and
Billy Bomar.  Funeral services are at Green Acres Mortuary on Saturday
January 7th at 2:30 PM."
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More info

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POW who communicated by code with McCain dies

by Art Thomason - May. 27, 2009 12:16 PM
The Arizona Republic

Jack Bomar, a retired Air Force colonel who communicated by code with U.S. Sen. John McCain while they were confined in a North Vietnamese prisoner of war camp, has died.

"He was a super neat guy," his wife, Kay, said Wednesday, recalling her husband's love of family, bravery and dry wit. "I was lucky to have him."

Bomar had been recovering in his east Mesa home from surgery performed last fall to remove cancer from his pancreas. Early this year, however, the disease spread before claiming his life on May 21. He was 82.

"Jack Bomar was a brave and wonderful friend whose courage was an example and an inspiration to all of us who had the honor of serving with him," McCain said Wednesday.

Bomar will be remembered in a celebration of his life at 11 a.m., June 10 at Melcher Mortuary Mission Chapel & Crematory, 6625 E Main St., Mesa.

"He had so many interests and hobbies," Kay Bomar said. "He was kind of quiet the last 10 years of his life, but he sure crowded a lot into the years before that."

As a child, Bomar was an avid model airplane builder, a hobby that grew into a love for flying and his purchase of two bi-wing airplanes.

"He was also an outstanding bowler and a very good golfer," his wife said. "The year he was released from Hanoi, he won a golf club championship."

He had spent eight months of solitary confinement in one of several camps and a complex derisively nicknamed the Hanoi Hilton where he held a water cup to the wall to listen to the Navy pilot communicating with him from the cell next door - now U.S. Sen. John McCain.

In all, Bomar's confinement spanned six years and one month, a seeming lifetime in a place where torture was dished out regularly, he once recalled during an interview.

Following his release on March 4, 1973, he never forgot those who were imprisoned with him and often praised the sacrifice of America's Armed Forces.

Every Memorial Day he would join his ex-POW buddies to lay wreathes in tribute to veterans buried in Valley cemeteries.

But this year, Bomar died four days before the annual commemoration.

The atrocities of war began for Bomar on Feb. 4, 1967, after a Douglas EB66C Destroyer carrying him and five other crew members was shot down more than 80 miles north of Hanoi by surface-to-air missiles.

Then-Maj. Jack Williamson Bomar, the mission's navigator, was thrust to the front end of the cockpit as the jet, its tail assembly destroyed, plummeted end-over-end.

Bomar ejected into the frigid air as another missile found its target, ripping through the plane and its fuel tank.

With shrapnel in his left leg, he managed to open the chute after cutting its shroud lines with his parachute knife.

Eight villagers stripped him to his shorts and wired his thumbs behind his back and beat him before turning him over to North Vietnamese troops.

"I want a military kind of funeral for him," his wife said Wednesday. "That's what we're striving to do."