Word: possum
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...already moved its headquarters to Guam. The 21st had far outgrown its elder brother, the 20th, based in India and China, and burly, black-jowled Curtis E. LeMay (at 38 the Army's youngest major general) had flown from Chengtu to Guam to take over. Haywood S. ("Possum") Hansell, a specialist in planning, was recalled to Washington...
...outskirts was hit three times before year's end. Said the 21st's commander, Brigadier General Haywood S. Hansell Jr., after the second assault: "We haven't destroyed the plant-not by a damn sight." After the third blow, he still was not satisfied. "Possum" Hansell's flyers had better luck against the two Mitsubishi plants at Nagoya. The Hatsudoki factory had 600,000 square feet (40% of its built-up area) destroyed or gutted by fire. At Kokuki, photographs showed heavy concentrations of bomb hits directly on the assembly buildings and machine shops...
...boss of Saipan's newly announced 21st Bomber Command, 41-year-old Brigadier General Haywood Shephard ("Possum") Hansell Jr., had to sweat out the mission on the ground. He was not alone; ground crews had all preparations made for the homecoming and were out strolling uneasily around the runways hours before the big silvery planes were due back. But the returning airmen brought less blood-and-thunder narrative than an hour's mission in Europe might produce...
Skunk, Squash. The DAE pudding, however, contains many a juicy plum. It shows English being enriched, from the earliest days, by borrowings from the U.S. From the Indians came possum, persimmon, punk, skunk, squash, succotash; from the Dutch, cruller, sawbuck, scow, slaw, snoop, stoop, waffle; from the Spanish, cafeteria, calaboose, lariat, mustang; from the German, cranberry...
Airedales (Navy airmen) were disappointed. Mourned a bomber pilot: "We were loaded for bear and bagged a possum. What a flotilla to waste on a postage-stamp air ferrying base...