Talmadge O. Epps, 94, foreman

Talmadge O. Epps, 94, of Wayne, a World War II aerial gunner and retired electric company foreman, died Wednesday, Aug. 12, of respiratory failure at Coatesville VA Medical Center.

In 1942, the Radnor High School graduate was drafted and deployed with the Army Air Force as a flight engineer aboard the B-25 Mitchell bomber. He served with the 500 Bomb Squadron, 345th Bombardment Group, in New Guinea and Australia.

Mr. Epps, who had never been on an airplane, fired a gun or traveled more than 100 miles from home, operated a pair of 50-caliber machine guns, either from the top machine gun turret or from the rear of the plane.

"We lived in a turbulent environment of thundering, roaring, powerful engines of the aircraft that was at the heart of our purpose and very existence - the B-25," he told the News of Delaware County in 2006. "You were always scared, but it was OK to be scared, as long as you were determined to get the job done."

Mr. Epps and his exploits aboard the B-25 were the subject of newspaper articles and a segment filmed by cable TV's History Channel as well as an oral history on file in the Library of Congress.

Although he could have mustered out after completing 50 bombing runs, he flew 109 missions. Part of his rationale was to stay on active duty so he could court Ruth Pearson, an Australian, while on leave in Sydney. He flew until they married in 1945.

He stayed out of harm's way by not joining a planeload of bomber crewmen on an Aug. 7, 1943 excursion for rest and recuperation to Sydney; he had lost $1,700 pay in a dice game the night before. The C-47 transport crashed en route from Garbutt Air Field in Townsville, Queensland, to Sydney, killing all 27 aboard.

Staff Sgt. Charles J. Zahora from Coaldale, Schuylkill County, a winner of the dice game, took Mr. Epps's place.

"I escaped death many times after that," he told the Townsville Bulletin in 2004. "It seems like fate was there. I believe there is a God. It would have been impossible to make it without some power beyond ourselves."

As a civilian, Mr. Epps was a foreman in the gas division of what is now Peco Energy Co. He and his wife lived in Upper Darby and raised three children. He mentored them, plus eight grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren, by the force of his example, said his son Talmadge O. "T.O." Epps Jr.

In 1957, a stolen car moving at a high rate of speed hit the Epps house. The car thieves fled. "Dad leaped out of his chair, jumped off the porch, and saw that the car had pinned a woman up against the house," he said.

"While a neighbor tried to back the car away, Dad crawled under the car and saved the woman's life. Her leg was completely severed at the knee, so Dad applied pressure to the arteries feeding the leg while waiting for the ambulance to arrive."

Later, Mr. Epps and his wife moved to Wayne. She died in 2013 at age 86.

Besides his son, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, he is survived by son Brad J. and daughter Christina A. Rush.

A viewing at 9:30 a.m. Tuesday, Aug. 18, is to be followed by an 11 a.m. Memorial Service at Lower Merion Baptist Church, 911 New Gulph Rd., Bryn Mawr. Interment is in the church cemetery, with military honors.

610-313-8102