Joan Seekins Golden McDermott had lunch with Nancy Ardiff Boulter, Ginny Davis Pearce, Barbara Starr Wolf, Gloria Gordon Goldman, and Connie Foxcroft Perrigo recently. She told them about her trip to France for the 67th reunion of the 1944 crash of a B24 on which Paul Golden ’49 flew as a navigator during World War II. Paul was Joan’s first husband, who died in 1974 of a sudden heart attack. Joan traveled to the Cote d’Azur and Maritime Alps with her oldest son, Kevin Golden, and her husband of 25 years, Frank McDermott. The story of the crash begins May 27, 1944, when the B24 Liberator 252399, The Flak Finder, flew from Toretto Field, south of Foggia, Cerignola, Italy, on its 23rd mission. The pilot was Lt. Gerald Maroney and the navigator Paul Golden ’49. The target was the airdrome at Salon De Provence, France. A nest of Ju-88 aircraft had been raiding shipping in the Mediterranean. The group was greeted by heavy flak at the French coast near Nice. The Flak Finder was hit in the wing and tail and left the formation, turned toward land, hoping to fly to Switzerland. The engine caught fire and Paul informed the pilot that they were losing altitude and couldn’t clear the mountains. Ten men parachuted and the plane crashed into the Pic de l’Aigle east of Thorens near Le Mas, 30 kilometers north of Grasse. The plane burned for three days and the airmen were scattered over an area of 20 miles. The Germans captured four of the airmen but the other six were hidden by the French Resistance and given food, clothing, and some shelter for three months. All 10 safely returned to the U.S. after the war. Fast forward to the present, when Paul’s grandson found an account of a memorial and anniversary celebration of this rescue in a French newspaper and also a PBS personal oral account by O.B. Streepers, the tail gunner and only living crew member. Joan’s son, Kevin, met in Illinois with Streepers and his daughter, who knew the granddaughter of Edouard Parmelin, the Frenchman who hid Paul, Streepers, and the radio operator. A trip to France was planned, and Joan, Frank, and Kevin were guests of Parmelin’s extended family. They visited the remains of bunkers along the Mediterranean coast that delivered the flak, the American landing site near San Raphael, and then spent five nights in Le Mas, a town on the mountainside at the site of castle ruins with only 30 year-round residents. Parmelin bought the monastery in Le Mas after the war and his granddaughter now owns it. Joan’s family climbed and picnicked at the crash site on top of Pic de l’Angle May 27, 67 years to the date of the crash. They visited the ruins of the stone house where the three were hidden and saw the building in Le Mas where a sheet was displayed to warn the airmen to hide and not enter the village. Next they drove to Grasse, where they had lunch with Claudette Rouguier and Laurent, the wife and son of the then 10-year-old who climbed the mountain and hid food for the airmen. The last night there Joan’s family took the Parmelin family to dinner in Cannes. Joan said, “We will be forever grateful to the Parmelin family for their generosity and true friendship. We have many facts and stories, including pictures from 1944, 1992, and 2011, which we’re assembling, including some further research. At the very least, we have something of value to hand down to our family.”