Donald L. Merlie

Donald L. "Donnie" Merlie, a "flyboy" who often claimed his World War II years were the best of his life, died Thursday night (July 30, 2015) at Country Health Care, Gifford. He was 93. Merlie, who acknowledged he hadn't been much of student, graduated in 1939 from Westville High School and recently was inducted into its Wall of Fame. After school, he worked as a delivery man for an Italian grocery in Westville, where he lived all his life. He once told a veterans group he had always drawn pictures of airplanes in school, so in January 1941 he enlisted in the Army Air Corps at Chanute in Rantoul. After basic training he studied airplane carburetion - the process of mixing air and fuel in the correct proportion for engine combustion - and taught that subject. Wanting to fly, he took and passed the cadet test and while in flight school in Texas learned to fly in Thunderbolt P-17 trainers. Later, he went through bomber training. "We trained in Cessna AT-17 Bobcats," he once said. "They were nicknamed bamboo bombers' because they were so flimsy." Stationed at an Allied base in England, Merlie during the war co-piloted C-47 cargo planes, carrying paratroopers for the 301st Troop Carrier Squadron, 441st Troop Carrier Group. He flew in the D-Day Invasion of Normandy and Operation Market Garden and dropped supplies to American solders including during the Battle of the Bulge. In Operation Market Garden in September 1944, the largest airborne military operation up to that time, Merlie's C-47 was to drop paratroopers over Nazi-occupied Holland in daylight. When they were less than 2 miles from the drop zone, a German shell hit their plane, knocking the propeller off the right engine. "All I heard was a thump," Merlie told his reporter daughter in 2009. "I didn't see it. I remember the guy next to our wing saying, Oh, Merlie got it.' After the propeller came off you could still fly on one engine." Three or four seconds later, another shell hit between Merlie's seat and that of the radio operator, blowing a hole under the operator's feet. "We knew if the plane exploded the paratroopers would die so I pushed the button and the red light went on in back telling them to jump," Merlie recalled. The pilot, Lt. Earl Peters of Watseka, landed the burning aircraft. While escaping, Merlie forgot and returned for his leather pilot's jacket, noticing then that the radio operator was crawling toward the cargo door with one his feet hanging on by a flap of skin. Merlie dragged him by the collar to the door and asked for help taking him off the plane. Over the next few days Merlie and his plane's navigator wandered around Groesbeek, Holland, where Allied troops had established a base and were capturing fleeing Germans. Armed with a pistol, the two Americans slept one night outside under a tarp, helped guard German POW's another night, and spent another in a basement, listening to German shrapnel hit the tiled roof of the church next door and watching an old women pray the rosary. The last night behind enemy lines, Merlie and his navigator reluctantly manned a foxhole. Because they weren't called to battle, they hurriedly left the next morning, hitched a ride to Brussels in a British military truck and eventually returned by air to their base in England. At Christmas 1944, Merlie was in the first squadron to drop supplies to the Allied troops socked in at Bastogne, France, by bad weather and German troops, in the Battle of the Bulge. "I can still see the Americans waving up at us," he said in 2009. Merlie, who never considered himself a hero, downplayed his role in D-Day, saying it happened at night and his mission of taking and dropping paratroopers lasted a total of four hours. He received the Air Medal for his part in the invasion. Merlie was born Feb. 28, 1922, in Brooks, Pa., the only son of Vester, a coal miner, and Rose Fava Merlie. On July 10, 1948, at St. Mary's Church, Westville, he married Eleanor Dowiatt. She died last year. Also preceding Merlie in death were his son, Michael J., in 2013, and his three sisters, Caroline Merlie, Dora Vanzo and Geraldine Balbach. Survivors include daughters Melissa Merli of Urbana; Patty (Cliff) Merlie of Leawood, Ks.; and Carol (Mike) Hatfield of Savoy; four grandchildren, Tony (Katie) Merlie and Jimmy (Tina) Merlie, both of Indianapolis, and Angie Hatfield (Dan) Marker of Savoy and Nic Hatfield, Champaign; six great-grandsons, Joseph, Will, Kyle and Max Merlie and Johnny and Dean Marker; a niece, Dana Clary; and a nephew, Brian Vanzo. Also, a daughter-in-law, Nancy Fadale Merlie. After his honorable discharge as a lieutenant, Merlie went on the GI Bill to the University of Illinois, where he received his bachelor's and law degrees. He practiced law in Vermilion County for 55 years, retiring in 2008 at age 86. During his legal career, he represented the village of Westville and Westville schools and was instrumental in the forming of the Westville-Belgium Sanitary District. He also was a member of the Vermilion County Airport Authority board, and of the Westville Lions Club and Jaycees. He never lost his love for flying; for years he and other enthusiasts co-owned a Cessna 182. He often flew it to his military squadron's reunions and to go quail-hunting, putting in the back of the plane his bird dogs - English pointers in recent years. He continued to hunt quail - his passion - into his elderly years; after his contemporaries died, he hunted with a younger friend, Jerry Davis. He also enjoyed walking, golfing and tending a large vegetable garden. In his late 80s, he planted a mini-orchard of fruit trees in his backyard. A memorial visitation will take place from 1 to 4 p.m. Sunday, Aug. 9, at Sunset-Urbas Funeral Chapel, 414 S. State St., Westville, with a celebration of his life at 4 p.m. Memorials may be made to the Alzheimer's Association or the Chez Family Foundation Center for Wounded Veterans in Higher Education at the UI. Merlie's daughters thank the staff of Country Health Care for the attention and care they gave their father after he moved there in early February. Please join his family in sharing memories on his tribute wall at www.sunsetfuneralhome.com.