Throwback Thursday: Horse Cave Aviator Lieutenant Charles Moran

As Aviation Heritage Park in Bowling Green prepares to open its new museum to the public this
weekend, we thought it would be fun to share another story of a southern Kentucky aviator. We’ve
covered the stories of the planes and helicopters on display at the park, but there are many other
southern Kentucky heroes too, like the late Lieutenant Charles Moran from Horse Cave.
Born in Horse Cave 99 years ago, Charles Moran II was the grandson of the famous Centre
College football head coach, “Uncle Charlie Moran.” According to Aviation Heritage Park,
Charles was raised primarily by his grandfather, and he had a passion for basketball and flying.
In 1942, he even played on Western State Teachers College’s basketball team for legendary
Coach E.A. Diddle, with teammates Dero Downing and John Oldham. Just the right age to be
drafted in time for World War II, Charles joined the Army Air Forces in 1943.

He flew bomb missions until the end of war, met his wife while training in Houston, then
remained active and moved his family to Japan in 1948 to learn night fighting combat. He
trained in the new F-82 Twin Mustang All-Weather fighter planes, and was one of the first round
of fighters to answer the call in 1950 when the Korean War began. He shot down an enemy
plane and received an Air Medal for his actions during the war’s very first air combat mission.
Forty days later, he went on a night intruder mission over Sunchon and was never heard from
again. Eighteen months later, the remains of his body and plane were found, and he was buried
in his family’s plot in Horse Cave in 1952. His historic marker can be found at the intersection of
North Dixie Street and State Highway 218 in Horse Cave.

More details on Lieutenant Charles Moran and other southern Kentucky aviators are available at
the all-new Aviation Heritage Park Museum in Bowling Green.