AZ: The History of Arizona podcast · David Rookhuyzen

Episode 245: War Heroes

·37 min·2 clips

Felix Sparks begins as the grounding figure. The host first places him as a copper miner from Miami, Arizona, then moves him into command of the 3rd Battalion, 157th Infantry Regiment, with the kind of blunt turn history tends to make. By 1945, Sparks is in Bavaria. His 45th Division Thunderbirds have already been through Sicily, Italy, southern France, and Germany before they reach a brick-walled place that looks like a military post at first. Then they get over the wall. Sparks and his men enter Dachau and understand what they have found: a concentration camp where at least 32,000, and possibly about 50,000, Jewish and political prisoners never walked out. Sherman comes up, and the old "war is hell" line lands hard here. It is not decoration. It is the episode's way into Arizona men meeting the worst machinery of the war. Turley gets the faster, stranger chapter. The host tracks him through escort missions, strafing runs, German airfields, and the practical little shock of hearing that 17 gallons of fuel was all he had left in a fighter plane. That detail keeps the heroics from getting too clean. The story keeps coming back to machines, fuel, flak, records, and bodies. Turley becomes an ace. The press notices the "flying cowboy from Arizona," NBC gets the dry "all in a day's work" line, and the Arizona Republic calls him the "Snowflake Storm." Then the timing turns cruel. When the paper's March 26, 1944 story runs, Turley has already been shot down during a March 6 escort mission. He disappears into a cloud bank. German forces recover his body, bury him properly, and after the war he is reburied in a military cemetery in Belgium. He was 22. The closing turns to Ira Hayes, not polished into a symbol, but described as a victim of the war even after Iwo Jima. The host ends by admitting that line is hard to follow, which feels about right.

As heard by us

Arizona war stories without the polish.

Felix Sparks keeps the episode grounded as it moves from a copper miner from Miami, Arizona, into the pine forests of Bavaria, where the Thunderbirds scale a brick wall, clear the remaining guards, and enter Dachau.

Read the full review in PlayNext →

Why you'd press play

You want Arizona WWII history that keeps Felix Sparks, the 45th Division, and Dachau in the same frame.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

Listen to the show on

Apple Podcasts Spotify

Play clips from this episode More from AZ: The History of Arizona podcast