How a 101-year-old WWII veteran from Barrington Hills brought a daughter closer to her late father

Kathy Rennie never got to meet her father, who perished in World War II when her mother was three months pregnant.

But through Rennie’s discovery of a 101-year-old veteran from Barrington Hills — and their friendship that has blossomed in recent years — she feels like she knows her dad a little bit.

Rennie’s mother spent years trying to find any of the five surviving crew members from the fateful Feb. 14, 1945, B-17 bombing mission over the North Sea between England and Germany. It was on that flight that four others — including Rennie’s dad, Sgt. Walter Mayer, a 30-year-old radio operator from a small town in Minnesota — had to bail after one of the plane’s engines caught fire.

Mayer parachuted into the cold waters below, and his body has never been recovered. He is still listed as missing in action.

Only about 15 years ago did Rennie learn of a museum in Tucson, Arizona dedicated to the history of her dad’s unit in the U.S. Army Air Forces: the 390th Bombardment Group. Officials there provided two names and phone numbers of possible survivors in his squadron, the 570th.

One number was disconnected, but Rennie was able to call and leave a message on the other.

“It was like about 10 o’clock, and we were in bed already, and I heard the phone ring out in the kitchen and this long message coming to us,” said Rennie, who lives in Bloomington, Minnesota. “So I ran out there, and it was him calling back — this man. And so then I picked it up, and we had a 20-minute conversation. And he told me that he was the pilot of the plane — the only one left. The pilot of the plane!”

The man on the other end of the line was George Hitchcock.

“She was so elated to find somebody who knew (her father), saw him, touched him, and that sort of thing,” said Hitchcock, who, as a 21-year-old captain, flew 27 missions in the European theater toward the end of the war.

That phone call led to a visit months later at Hitchcock’s Barrington Hills home, subsequent trips by two of Rennie’s children, a FaceTime with other Minnesota-based family members, and plenty of other phone calls, exchanges of emails and Christmas cards.

Rennie visited Hitchcock again in 2023 just before he turned 100, and now they often talk on the phone twice a week.

“We became very good buddies,” he said. “She felt sort of close to me for some reason.”

After the war, Hitchcock returned to Chicago, finished college at Northwestern University, and took a sales job before settling in Barrington Hills in 1962. Not too many have heard him tell stories of the war outside of close family and friends like Rennie, who have encouraged him to write memoirs or go to the newspapers.

During an interview late last week at his home office — adorned with mementos of his military service, including dog tags and black-and-white photos — Hitchcock’s account of the flight with Rennie’s dad remained vivid.

Then only the second or third flight since being dispatched with his crew to Europe, Hitchcock was behind the yoke of a B-17 bomber headed toward Germany in a formation with other planes.

Suddenly, one of his plane’s four engines blew up.

“I immediately said, ‘The enemy is shooting at me.’ And it wasn’t that at all. It was a malfunction of the engine, and it burst into flame and was right next to the gas tanks. The flames and the smoke came into the cockpit, and my plane was vibrating so badly because of the engine being out of sync with everything else.”

Hitchcock told crew members to “bail out,” fearing the whole plane could soon become engulfed.

“My tail gunner said that the four shoots opened, and so that was my first satisfaction. But the second was that they’re falling into the water, and it’s cold.”

He hoped his crew members would be rescued.

“We never heard anymore from the war department on the recovery of those four men. We always had hopes,” he said.

Hitchcock was able to put out the blaze with a fire extinguisher and gain control of the plane as he headed toward the Netherlands. But as he tried to approach for a crash landing, the plane took oncoming fire from the enemy.

“We did not get hit by them, but they frightened me enough that I said I don’t want to go there. So I made a 180-degree turn and aimed back for the White Cliffs of Dover.”

He maintained a smooth flight with just three engines, and landed safely at a base in England.

“There were certain obstacles you’re always confronted with, and you’re in harm’s way much of the time, but the good Lord brought me through,” Hitchcock said.

Back home in St. Joseph, Minnesota, Rennie’s mother Rose soon got word that her husband was missing in action. A year later, the town gathered for a Mass in his honor.

Walter Mayer is among the 1,722 names on Walls of the Missing at the Netherlands American Cemetery and Memorial, which Rennie has visited.

She says she admires Hitchcock, who “was just doing the best job he could do” on the harrowing war mission.

“He describes my father as a gentle, honorable patriot, and I see George as the same,” Rennie said.