DOBBINS AIR RESERVE BASE, Ga. -- As Airmen played a medley of piano tunes, generations of 700th Airlift Squadron members gathered in the sunshine or took cover in the shade cast by the Squadron’s building on Dobbins Air Reserve Base. Live music alone is a novelty on the installation, where the recorded sounds of Reveille, Retreat and the National Anthem are the norm. More unusual still was the presence of an upright piano outdoors, its wood inscribed with names in thick marker, and its frame stuffed with straw. Most unusual was the smoke that drifted upward with the notes, as two Airmen in flight suits sat side-by-side on the piano bench, playing as flames leapt from the piano’s back.
Piano burning is a tradition that is believed to have started with the Royal Air Force and spread among its allies during World War II as a way of honoring fallen aviators. On this spring drill weekend, more than a dozen names of departed Airmen were handwritten with care on the piano before it was set ablaze.
“It’s a true honor and a privilege to be able to pay our deepest respects to those who have come before us for all they have endured and sacrificed,” said Capt. Douglas Trojanowski, 94th Airlift Wing Operations Support Squadron pilot, about the time-honored tradition.
Among the honorees of this World War II-era tribute was a World War II-era Airman. Toward the top of the piano were black and yellow bubble letters bearing the name SSGT Ralph Bode.
It was the 700th AS’s most recent tribute to Ralph H. Bode, who joined the U.S. Army Air Forces as an 18-year-old in November 1942 and served as a tail gunner with the 700th Bombardment Squadron. In 1944, Staff Sgt. Bode set off on a bombing mission targeting Kassel, Germany, and his B-24 Liberator was shot down by enemy aircraft.
It would be decades before his remains could be recovered, identified and returned, and his community and Squadron could welcome him home.
On the 80th anniversary of his final mission, Sept. 27, 2024, Bode’s remains were interred at Graceland Cemetery in his native Racine, Wis., next to his parents and brother, according to his obituary, as flags across the state flew at half-staff by order of Governor Tony Evers.
“Staff Sergeant Bode selflessly gave his life fighting for the freedoms of his fellow Americans and our allies abroad,” said Gov. Evers in a statement. “It is an honor to be able to help welcome him back to Wisconsin after 80 years, where he can finally be laid to rest in his hometown of Racine.”
Airmen of the 700th AS, as the 700th BS is known today, joined residents, school children, veterans and other military members along the procession route from the funeral home and at the cemetery to honor Bode’s sacrifice.
“Ralph needed to be recognized,” said Shawn Rivers, a veterans service officer in Racine County and retired U.S. Air Force master sergeant who estimates that several hundred people turned out to pay their respects. “They were there, recognizing that this was a young man who died on active duty.”
Bode had been declared dead by the War Department in 1945, one year after he went missing. Over the span of decades, investigators located fragments of crashed aircraft, clothing and bone in Germany, and, with the assistance of modern testing, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency announced in late 2023 that Bode’s remains had been recovered. The anniversary of his last mission was chosen as a fitting date to hold his burial.
A recovered piece of Bode’s downed B-24 Liberator aircraft was presented in a shadowbox to his niece, Tena Kruger, graveside at the burial.
Master Sgt. Michael Eubanks, a flight engineer with the 700th AS, traveled from Dobbins Air Reserve Base in Georgia to attend the burial and meet Bode’s family members in Wisconsin. He said the experience changed the way he perceives his squadron.
“Seeing his pictures, handwritten letters, and a piece of his downed aircraft made a direct link to the aviators that came before me,” said Eubanks. “Rather than merely a name on a plaque, he is now another fellow squadron mate whose legacy will be remembered on a personal level.”
It’s a sentiment shared by Lt. Col. John Johnston, Director of Operations for the 700th AS.
Speaking at a reception hosted by Bode’s family at Racine Country Club after the burial, Johnston told the assembled crowd that, in his experience, aircrew in combat are one team and one family. “Staff Sgt. Ralph Bode is a member of the 700th, and once a 700th member, always a 700th member,” he said.
Airmen of the 700th AS also paid tribute to Bode in the sky. At 10:03 a.m. on Sept. 27, 2024, 80 years to the moment Bode’s B-24 Liberator is believed to have been shot down by German fighter planes, a C-130H Hercules soared over Graceland Cemetery, honoring the fallen aviator in fitting fashion.