JOHN K. MIRES
1918 – 2002

Decorated U.S. pilot had taught at BGSU

LIBERTY CENTER, Ohio -- John K Mires, 83, a decorated bomber pilot of World War II who later worked at The Blade and taught journalism at Bowling Green State University, died of congestive heart disease Friday in Harborside Healthcare-Swanton nursing home.

Mr. Mires joined The Blade in 1949 as an employee in the composing room, the production center where the newspaper's pages are put together, and advanced to a supervisory post.

During his 18-year stint at The Blade, Mr. Mires made a daily commute from Liberty Center, the Henry County village he lived in all his life except during his military service, his son, Craig, said. Mr. Mires had earlier worked at the Liberty Center Press, a weekly newspaper his family owned until 1947.

As a B-24 pilot in the Pacific, Mr. Mires logged 2,400 hours of flying time and flew 73 missions, many of them night armed-reconnaissance runs and low-altitude bombing runs.

He and his crew did an aerial reconnaissance of the Japanese city of Hiroshima two days after the atomic bomb was dropped on it. "He always said it looked as if God had reached down from the heavens and removed everything," Craig Mires said.

During one tough bombing mission against a hydroelectric dam in what today is Taiwan, his plane lost two engines to flak and limped back 700 miles to Clark Field, its home base in the Philippines.

Mr. Mires' wartime decorations included the Distinguished Flying Cross, an Air Medal with three clusters, a Philippines campaign ribbon with two stars, and a Pacific theater ribbon with seven stars. He returned home a major in 1945 and was in the Air Force Reserve until 1957.

During his military service, Mr. Mires edited four post newspapers and helped produce a photographic history of the 22nd Group of the U.S. 5th Air Force.

’It sounds corny, but I've always considered him my John Wayne, an all-American hero,’ his son said.

A graduate of Liberty Center High School, Mr. Mires won an appointment to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point but instead enrolled at Ohio State University, where he graduated in 1940 with a degree in journalism.

At Ohio State, he met Rita Miller, whom he married in 1942.

After returning from the war, he worked nights at The Blade and taught journalism at Bowling Green State University during the day. He also earned a master's degree in economics from BGSU.

Mr. Mires left The Blade in 1967 after buying the Paryski Publishing Co., a Toledo printing firm that closed two years later. He then worked as an independent publisher for several years, producing newspaper advertising inserts for businesses.

His was a member of Liberty Center United Methodist Church, the Liberty Center Rotary Club, Henry County Sportsman Club, Gilbert-Baughman American Legion Post 492, and VFW Post 6596.

Surviving are his wife, Rita, daughter, Karen Inks; son, Craig; sister, Louisa Strock, and two grandchildren.

Services will be at 11 a.m. tomorrow in the Wright Funeral Home, where the body will be after 2 p.m. today. The family requests tributes to the Liberty Center Public Library.

(photo included) Mires: In 1960 photograph