Howard E. Kleinsteuber.

The pilot of Hot Freight was stationed with the 330th Bomb Squadron of the 93rd Bomb Group, 8th Air Force. His crews knew him as "Tarzan"—not for any fierce reputation, but because he brought exercise gear along wherever the war took him and worked out regularly. He was also known for his "Kraut crewcut," and somewhere in the pages of Ted's Travelling Circus, there's a photograph of him getting his hair cut, a small moment of ordinary life captured during extraordinary times.

On March 18, 1943, he flew Hot Freight, a B-24, on a mission to the Vegesack shipbuilding works in Germany. His plane held the diamond position in the lead element. Over the target, ME-110 fighters came in from the front while flak burst around them. The plane was damaged beyond recovery and went down west of Seefield.

He was killed in the crash. His mission that day was recorded in the files as MACR 15595.