Much historical value to an old Guam WW2 Navy flight logbook?

November 29, 2007 6:59 AM

My grandfather recently showed us an old handwritten flight logbook from when he served in Guam in WW2 with the Navy. Would scanning this serve any interest to someone? Might it be considered classified info?

It's a frailish, brown, pencil-written log books of flights, I presume in and out of Guam, in the WW2 time period. I thought scanning it might preserve the records made in it (no matter how scribbly).. is there someone who might benefit from its information?

posted by Quarter Pincher to society & culture (8 comments total)

It definitely was classified at the time. At this point, it's (almost) definitely not. Whether it's of interest to anyone is another matter.
posted by Tomorrowful at 7:05 AM on November 29, 2007

If you know the unit he was in you might check to see if they have a reunion/history website/forum. A lot of old WWII groups have them. A relative (or surviving member) who flew with him might be interested in seeing it.

There might also be a website dedicated to the aircraft type.

Even the tiniest bit of information can be fascinating for someone doing genealogy research. I recently came across my wife’s grandfather’s sea captain training logs and found them fascinating.
posted by bondcliff at 7:05 AM on November 29, 2007

(I would find a thesaurus fascinating right about now)
posted by bondcliff at 7:06 AM on November 29, 2007

Yes, scanning the logbook might be of interest to a lot of surviving WWII veterans and historians. One thing you might do is scan a small chunk of it, and wait around to see if you get emails about it.

As far as classified info, no, it's won't be... it would have had to been properly marked as such, and even so, generally anything beyond 25 years old is fair game unless it deals with special programs. Most general WWII-era stuff is at the "RESTRICTED" level, which is about equivalent to today's "For Official Use Only" and of no concern... there's a ton of restricted WWII maps being bought and sold every day on eBay, for example.
posted by chips ahoy at 7:10 AM on November 29, 2007

Back in the 70s my Mom did her Master's thesis on WWII troop movements in the Chuuk/Guam area of the South Pacific. So there are definitely scholars that might be interested. You might browse around on the University of Hawaii or East West Center website and see if you can find someone to email about it.
posted by MsMolly at 7:46 AM on November 29, 2007

scan it and put it up on ebay you'll get loads of money for it

or donate it someplace

or scan the whole thing and put it up on a site that you create

or all of the above

those log books are always in demand, from collectors, researchers and the sentimental
posted by Salvatorparadise at 11:07 AM on November 29, 2007

Somewhat related, I worked in a legal copy busness for a while. Had a little lady walk in with 14 large rice paper sheets, written in a tiny hand on both sides were two different logs, one was a daily activities diary and the other side was her husband's medical notes. We made her the best replicas we could. She needed to show her husband's duty dates for some retirement qualification I think.

The owner said make this right, it took several attempts to not have the two opposite sides of the papers blur into the final image. Well over an hour to do it.

Sad and wonderful. The "treament" for pneumonia was an asprin, some charcol and a warm brick for comfort. Most of the camp died.

Everything has a use in finding or exploring the past it seems.

We comp'ed her the service and felt proud.
posted by Freedomboy at 1:12 PM on November 29, 2007 [1 favorite]

the flight log is definately not classifed at this point (if it was you probably wouldn't have it). I know the one I have now (as I am currently serving in the mid east) is not classified in and of itself, though the missions can be.
posted by aggienfo at 5:51 PM on November 29, 2007