{"id":63219,"date":"2022-01-17T08:09:00","date_gmt":"2022-01-17T18:09:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/retireenews.org\/?p=63219"},"modified":"2026-04-28T20:08:38","modified_gmt":"2026-04-28T20:08:38","slug":"check-six-mid-1950s-james-ashford","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/retireenews\/2022\/01\/17\/check-six-mid-1950s-james-ashford\/","title":{"rendered":"Check Six \u2013 Mid-1950s: James Ashford"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/retireenews\/files\/2022\/01\/f86egroundcolor1.jpg?w=1024\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-63221\" style=\"object-fit:cover\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><em>Hawaii Air National Guard photograph<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This undated photograph shows&nbsp;<strong>James Ashford<\/strong>&nbsp;getting ready to get into the cockpit for a mission. The crew chief could not be identified.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Jim Ashford was born in Honolulu, Hawai\u2018i on July 13, 1923. He grew up in Honolulu and graduated from Punahou School in 1941. In World War II, he served as a fighter pilot in the Ninth Air Force in Europe. He attained the rank of Captain and was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross and several Air Medals for his service. He was a member of the Hawai\u2018i Air National Guard and a jet pilot for 26 years. Jim retired as a Colonel and the Commander of the 154th Fighter Group in 1978.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Related Retiree News posts:<br>Taps: James Ashford\u00a0\u2013 complete obituary and more photographs<br>Colonel Ashford&#8217;s Services\u00a0\u2013 more photographs<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The 199th Fighter Squadron flew the North American F-86E Sabre from 1954 through 1958, when they converted to the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.pearlharboraviationmuseum.org\/aircraft\/north-american-aviation-f-86-sabre-interceptor\/\">F86L Sabre Interceptor<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:100px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-paragraph\" style=\"font-size:10px\"><em>The appearance of external hyperlinks did not constitute endorsement by Retiree News, this included the linked websites, information, products, or services contained therein. Retiree News did not exercise any editorial control over the information you may find at these locations. Additionally, some of the sites linked to may limit the number of stories you can access without a paid subscription. All links were provided with the intent of meeting the mission of Retiree News.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This undated photograph shows&nbsp;James Ashford&nbsp;getting ready to get into the cockpit for a mission. The crew chief could not be identified.&nbsp; Jim Ashford was born in Honolulu, Hawai\u2018i on July 13, 1923. He grew up in Honolulu and graduated from Punahou School in 1941. In World War II, he served as a fighter pilot in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":189,"featured_media":63221,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"41570,6496,48491,30321,27864,18163","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[12400,12386],"tags":[126,217,675,2156,3299,4953,5973,8296,8360,8363,9258,11933],"class_list":["post-63219","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-1950s","category-check-six","tag-154th-fighter-group-154-fg","tag-199th-fighter-squadron-199-fs","tag-air-medals","tag-check-six","tag-distinguished-flying-cross-dfc","tag-hawaii-air-national-guard-hiang","tag-james-r-ashford","tag-ninth-air-force","tag-north-american-aviation-f-86-sabre","tag-north-american-aviation-f-86l-sabre-interceptor","tag-punahou-school","tag-world-war-ii"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/retireenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63219","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/retireenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/retireenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/retireenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/189"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/retireenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63219"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/retireenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63219\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":87071,"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/retireenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63219\/revisions\/87071"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/retireenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63221"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/retireenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63219"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/retireenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63219"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/retireenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63219"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}