Lucky Bag Yearbook

From the 1921 Lucky Bag:

James Valentine Carney

Jimmie Mick Steve Sook

Buzzard.

OUT from the land where corn husking is the national pastime came “Sook” alias Jimmie Valentine. Young “golden-ear” girded about him three innocent roommates and hardly had Plebe year been underway when we began to hear of Nebraskey. “What! Never heard of O’Neill. Well———” and he was good for hours. He has faced death itself in defending that famous podunk and as the argument waxed warmer, the tighter became that grip and the more violently he slashed the air with that index finger in his efforts to convince, a mannerism that has added to his fame.

By chance this was not the one finger he lost in the notorious looting of the Kaydet’s artillery, following that 6-0 battle of 1919. The accident, however, caused him two long months in the hospital where he acquired that finesse which has made him the envy of his wife and all who dared to swap stories.

Occasionally the Academics have slipped over an on-side kick on the boy but the game has been mostly in midfield, and the final whistle will find Jimmie among the fold staging that old uphill fight that must ultimately land him success.

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The Class of 1921 was the last of the wartime-accelerated classes. 1921A was graduated on June 3, 1920; the second half, 1921B, was graduated on June 2, 1921. James was graduated with 1921B.

Loss

James was lost on December 16, 1942 when the SBD Dauntless he was piloting developed engine problems¹ and crashed near Guadalcanal.

He was the commanding officer of Naval Construction Battalion 14, which had repaired Henderson Field and was nearly complete in completing an emergency runway at Koli Point, Guadalcanal, when James was lost. (He had landed and taken off earlier to test the work.) The crewman aboard was also killed.

Other Information

He was designated naval aviator #3195 in 1925.

From researcher Kathy Franz:

As a young man, James attended St. Mary’s Academy and O’Neill High School. He also worked in the Sanitary Market and Gallagher’s store. He had a small part in the high school play “At Yale” in May, 1915, and he played Beau Carter in the senior class play in May, 1916.

Per The Frontier newspaper, O’Neill, Nebraska, May 17, 1917:

James Carney, who was appointed to the Annapolis Military Academy by Senator Hitchcock last winter, took the examination for admission the forepart of the month and came through with flying colors. He has been ordered to report at the academy the forepart of June. James is a hustler and we predict that he will more than make good in his chosen profession.

Per The Verdigre Eagle, Verdigre, Nebraska, November 17, 1927:

O’Neill Army Aviator Has Novel Experience.

Miss Mary Carney recently received a letter from her brother, Sr. Lieutenant James Carney, who has been in the aviation service for the past three years and is now stationed at San Diego, Cal., telling of an experience that was rather unusual. A short time ago, Mr. Carney writes, he was sent to Seattle to oversee the construction and test out a battery of thirty planes; following the completion of the planes he took one of them for an altitude test; when he had ascended 20,000 feet he got into a dense fog; after flying about for a time trying to get out of the fog he decided to fly over the Cascade mountains which he did and alighted in a field about one hundred miles distant. After visiting with the residents of the farm upon which he alighted he mentioned the fact that he was from Nebraska, whereupon the farmer inquired if he knew anyone at O’Neill, Nebraska; James assured him that he knew almost everyone in O’Neill a few years ago; the farmer then told James that he was a brother of Mrs. C. P. Uhl, at O’Neill. James says that he was treated royally and enjoyed his two days stay at the Wohl farm near Ellensburg, Washington. –O’Neill Frontier.

James married Natalie Kibler in November, 1927, in San Diego. Their daughters were Elizabeth (Betty Ann) and Margaret (Peggy.) In 1940, the family was staying at the Hotel St. George in Brooklyn.

His father Thomas, 1850, was a farmer who died in November, 1905. His mother Mary died in July, 1900. His brother was Thomas, and sisters were Mary, Julia, and Margaret. Other siblings who died young were Edward, Bridget, and Charles.

Per The Frontier and Holt County Independent, June 3, 1938:

Lieut. Commander James V. Carney Has Narrow Escape in Plane Crash

Washington, D. C., May 13 – Friday the 13th proved both a lucky and unlucky day for Lieut. Commander James V. Carney, nationally known aviator of the United States Navy. The premier flyer in the late afternoon was returning alone to Bolling Field in a high speed pursuit plane of the latest design from a detail in Norfolk, Va. As he approached the field for a landing he found that it was impossible to lower the retractable landing gear which was folded up into the fuselage of the plane. After circling the field for sometime and signaling that he was in trouble he decided to attempt a landing on the fuselage although the landing speed of the plane was in excess of 70 miles per hour.

An ambulance and fire truck stood by waiting for the inevitable crash. Carney zoomed onto a grassy strip of ground next to the runway, the plane skidded at terrific speed for some distance on the wet grass and then nosed over with a sickening thud. Attendants rushed to the wrecked plane and were amazed when Commander Carney stepped smilingly from the wreckage unharmed.

An examination of the plane revealed that a steel band slipped from an emergency gas tank and locked the mechanism of the apparatus used for lowering the landing gear.

Aviation experts explained that in such an emergency Carney could have abandoned the plane in mid-air by leaping with his parachute but in such an event the falling derelict ship would have endangered the lives of those below. Rather than jeopardize the safety of others he chose to risk his own life in making the hazardous landing.

The above item was carried in Washington and Eastern papers on May 14. . . .

Remembered by his local friends as a quiet and extremely unassuming boy, he has probably gained greater fame in the world than any native of O’Neill.

Per The Frontier, December 24, 1942:

Captain Carney, O’Neill Native, Loses Life In Southern Pacific

“ . . . The writer had known the deceased since boyhood and knew him to be an honest, industrious young man, who worked hard for what he received. He was made of the material that the American aviators, who are giving such a good account of themselves on the world’s battle fronts, are made of, the best in the world. James was rated as one of the best aviators in the Navy. For several years he was a test pilot and a man must be good to get a position like that in the fighting forces of the Navy.”

Per The Frontier and Holt County Independent, January 22, 1943:

A letter to the editor, in part:

“Mr. Mayor and gentlemen of the Council, Jim Carney climbed to success and fame the hard way. When he was still very young his parents died and he was reared to young manhood by a wonderfully kind elder sister. As a boy he worked in the stores of O’Neill, one of them being the very market now conducted, I believe, by Mayor Kersenbrock. He had a storybook career. He was, by nature, modest and unassuming, as all heroes and great men are. His life and memory should be kept up to the oncoming generations in O’Neill as an example of love of country and the success any boy or girl may attain in a chosen field in these United States.

“Quite naturally, you will ask, ‘What can we, the City Council, do to honor his name and memory?’ That’s easy. You can by appropriate action change the name of 4th Street (which means nothing) or Douglas Street (which means less) to ‘CARNEY STREET’; or you can by appropriate resolution apply the name ‘CARNEY PARK’ or ‘CARNEY FIELD’ to the recently acquired city park.

“Perhaps it is because Captain Carney and I were boys together that I feel this should be done, but I don’t think so – Captain Carney was the only native of O’Neill ever to graduate from Annapolis; he was one of the greatest aviators of all time; he was the first native of O’Neill proper to die in action while fighting for his country in time of war (this war or any other war); his was the kind of life and career that deserves to be honored by his native town – these are the reasons that motivate my suggestions to you.”

Respectfully, DONALD GALLAGHER

His wife was listed as next of kin. He was originally buried in Guadalcanal, but is now buried in California.

Namesakes

The airstrip his battalion constructed was named “Carney Field” in his honor.

Carney Park in O’Neill, Nebraska is named for James.

Navy Directories & Officer Registers

The "Register of Commissioned and Warrant Officers of the United States Navy and Marine Corps" was published annually from 1815 through at least the 1970s; it provided rank, command or station, and occasionally billet until the beginning of World War II when command/station was no longer included. Scanned copies were reviewed and data entered from the mid-1840s through 1922, when more-frequent Navy Directories were available.

The Navy Directory was a publication that provided information on the command, billet, and rank of every active and retired naval officer. Single editions have been found online from January 1915 and March 1918, and then from three to six editions per year from 1923 through 1940; the final edition is from April 1941.

The entries in both series of documents are sometimes cryptic and confusing. They are often inconsistent, even within an edition, with the name of commands; this is especially true for aviation squadrons in the 1920s and early 1930s.

Alumni listed at the same command may or may not have had significant interactions; they could have shared a stateroom or workspace, stood many hours of watch together, or, especially at the larger commands, they might not have known each other at all. The information provides the opportunity to draw connections that are otherwise invisible, though, and gives a fuller view of the professional experiences of these alumni in Memorial Hall.

References