ALBANY, N.Y. — A 75-year-old yearbook photo of four New York high school classmates serving during World War II is spurring an effort to locate the lost airplane flown by the only man in the picture not to make it home.
The photo taken in 1943 in Troy, New York, shows John McGrath and three of his classmates in uniform. McGrath was killed when his fighter plane crashed near the shore of a Pacific island in 1945, just weeks before the war ended. His body was never recovered.
The photo was brought to the attention of Justin Taylan, a WWII researcher with extensive experience searching Pacific islands for wartime plane crash sites. He’s talking with officials at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy about partnering on a project that would enlist students in an effort to locate McGrath’s plane.