Saluting the uncle Rockies

owner Monfort was named after 

May 27, 2018

FREI03.jpg 

Terry Frei


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Greeley’s sprawling Linn Grove Cemetery was virtually deserted

Friday. Sprinklers seemed noisy. After a visit to the main office

to get a map and directions from Jackie at the reception desk,

I pulled up to Block 14, Lot 50 and got out of the car.

 

There it was.

 

Among the graves of other Monfort family members, the white marble,

U.S. military-style headstone announced:

 

RICHARD

LEE

MONFORT

COLORADO

2D LIEUTENANT

401AAF BOMB GROUP

WORLD WAR II

JANUARY 11, 1923

JANUARY 29, 1944

A single bouquet of flowers already was at the foot of the headstone.

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Richard Lee “Dick” Monfort was the son of Greeley cattle feedlot

innovator Warren Monfort and Edith Monfort. Dick’s sister,

Margery, was two years older. His brother, Kenneth (“Kenny”),

was nearly six years younger.

 

After graduating from Greeley High in 1939, Dick was a junior at

Colorado State College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts, or what

now is Colorado State University, when he entered the Army Air

Forces in 1942.

 

While in training, he married Viola Swanson of Greeley.

In late 1943, Monfort was deployed to Deenethorpe, England, with

the 8th Air Force’s 401st Bomb Group, 615th Squadron, joining the

fight against Germany. He was the navigator on Capt. Lee Van Syckle’s

B-17 “Flying Fortress” bomber crew.

 

A massive 800-bomber daylight raid over Frankfurt was the 10-man

crew’s third mission. It also was the first U.S. bombing foray to the

central German city following many earlier British raids.

 

The date was JANUARY 29, 1944.

 

Denver radio personality Rick Crandall tirelessly champions

veterans causes. His efforts led to the opening of the Colorado Freedom

Memorial in May 2013 in Aurora. Before its dedication, Crandall

alerted me Richard L. Monfort’s name was on the memorial, among

those of nearly 6,000 Coloradans killed or missing in action while

serving their country.

 

Crandall also obtained and forwarded to me the “Missing Air Crew

Report,” opened after the mission and supplemented over the next

18 months. It was declassified in 1973, and as is the case with most

reports of that era based on interviews with survivors, it is remarkable

in its narrative detail, especially given the staggering number of

similar reports that had to be done.

 

That day, Monfort was in the nose of the B-17 with

bombardier Stanley Groski. Van Syckle’s plane dropped

its bombs and turned away. Soon, a group of German

pilots in Messerschmitt fighters attacked the B-17 and

others in the lower box of the American wing. The

Germans’ planes were equipped with machine guns and

cannons firing 20mm rockets.

 

Rockets struck Van Syckle’s Flying Fortress in the wing

tanks, which caught fire, and the tail. Tail gunner Charles

Duke yelled, “I’m hit!” And then, “I’m done for!”

 

In the nose, Groski, having completed his role as bombardier,

was firing the chin turret gun when the plane was hit. The

impact knocked him back into Monfort.

 

The bailout order came amid the chaos. Groski later said he believed

Monfort was hit before they jumped. Also, as Groski and Monfort left

the front of the plane, the German pilots in the Messerschmitts still

were firing on the B-17.

COLORADO FREEDOM MEMORIAL

 

756 Telluride Street

Aurora

Near Buckley Air Force Base

Dedicated: 2013

http://www.coloradofreedommemorial.com

After other crew members

jumped from their areas of

the bomber, ball turret gunner

Donald Lamb was horrified

to see radio operator Joseph

Glonek speed past him on

the way down. The lines of


Glonek’s chute were deployed, but the canopy was unopened.

 

Duke, the tail gunner who had cried out, likely still was in the

plane when it exploded during its free fall.

 

On the ground, seven of Van Syckle’s crew members — or all except

Monfort, Glonek and Duke — were captured alive. The Germans

took co-pilot Mitchell Woods to a village and told him two dead

members of the B-17 crew had landed there. He was shown their

escape kits and watches and a navigator’s map. Woods concluded

the dead Americans were Monfort and Glonek. The Germans

refused to let him see the bodies.

 

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 The co-pilot also was told the chute of one American, which he assumed

was Glonek, hadn’t opened enough to save him, even if he was alive

when he reached the ground; and the chute of the other American,

presumably Monfort, was unopened.

 

The next day, Stars and Stripes, the U.S. military newspaper, reported

15 bombers — or fewer than 2 percent of the 800 on the mission —

were lost. The story noted: “Preliminary reports of the Frankfurt

raid gave no indication last night of the opposition encountered

or the damage done, but some returning crews said they were

‘puzzled’ by the lack of German resistance on the way in. Neither

fighter nor flak opposition was heavy, they said, until the Forts had

made their bombing run and were headed for the coast — a further

indication of the success of the recent concerted assault on Nazi

fighter factories and airfields.”

 

Regardless of how many lost planes there were, Monfort was

in one of them. And he didn’t survive. Two weeks later, he was

reported to be among those Missing in Action. Then his death

was confirmed. Other crew members became prisoners of war.


Dick had just turned 21. Kenny was 15. Walt Barnhart later

wrote in his 2008 book, “Kenny’s Shoes,” that Kenny was fine

with Dick being ticketed to head the family business and was

hoping to become a journalist. In 1948, Kenny and his

Colorado A&M fraternity buddy, future Colorado Governor

Roy Romer, visited Dick’s grave in the military cemetery at

Nancy, France, near the German border. The remains were

brought back to  Greeley.
 
 

Kenny had four children, including sons Dick and Charlie,

plus daughters Kay and Kyle. When he served two terms

in the Colorado Legislature in the tumultuous 1960s, Kenny —

who had been so affected by his brother’s death — was

known as an anti-war Democrat. In 1980, he switched

parties. He died in February 2001.

 

Kenny’s son Dick needs no introduction in Greeley, and it goes beyond

Dick’s long-time linkage to the Monfort family business, including after

its 1987 sale, until his retirement from ConAgra in 1995. He’s involved

in other business pursuits and is active in charity and civic ventures,

currently serving as chairman of UNC’s board of trustees.

 

Outside of Greeley, he and Charlie are best known as the primary

owners of the Colorado Rockies. Dick is the team’s managing

general partner, chairman and chief executive officer. Charlie is

listed as an owner/general partner.

 

Dick was born in 1954. His birth name is Richard Lee Monfort.

On Sunday, Dick said when he was “7 or 8,” Kenny sat down

with Dick and Kyle, two years older, and told the kids about

their uncle. Dick came away honored to have been named Richard

Lee Monfort, and that feeling lingers.

 

“He told us how (my uncle) died in the war and how my dad really

looked to him,” Dick said Sunday. “And how my uncle was going

to be the one who was going to run the business and my dad was

going to do something else. He said that he and his sister (Margery)

had both agreed they’d call their first male child Richard.”

 

Margery’s son, or Dick’s cousin, was Richard “Ricky” Wilson.

 

He died of leukemia at age 19.

 

“On a day like (Memorial Day), I feel for anybody that died

in any type of war that we’ve had,” Dick said. “God bless

them for doing all they did so we could have our freedom.”

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I also paid a return visit to the Colorado Freedom Memorial

last week. The glass panels on the sweeping memorial in Aurora

variously angle forward or backward.

 

There it was, on Panel 15 near the center of the memorial. Second

column, sixth row of names, against a backdrop of puffy clouds

visible through the glass.

 

“RICHARD L MONFORT”

 

One name among the many.

 

Here, he represents all those we salute on Memorial Day.