Robert Helding '48
Date of birth: March 15, 1924
Date of death: February 18, 1952
Age: 27
Lucky Bag
From the 1948 Lucky Bag:
Robert Wendell Helding
Janesville, Wisconsin
When the icy winter winds whip across Bancroft terrace and someone yells, "Collars down," that's the Bear. Maryland winters don't even make him shiver compared with a real Wisconsin winter. Bob came here as a Boilermaker from Purdue Univ. and seems to do everything without a strain. He is always happy and conducts a famous one man advertising campaign for a certain Janesville pen manufacturer that sells the '51.' His favorite indoor sport is hibernating, but he is a husky opponent on the athletic field where he feels very much at home. Bob fits well into the tradition that Wisconsin sends fine men to the Academy.
He graduated with the class of 1948-A, the last of the wartime-accelerated classes, in June 1947. (The bottom half of the class by academic standing, designated 1948-B, completed an extra year and graduated in June 1948.)
Loss
From McKinney Daily Courier-Gazette (Texas) on February 20, 1952:
The Corpus Christi air station has identified the six Navy airmen who were killed when two training planes collided in mid-air near Rockport, Tex. Victims were listed as Ensign Mahlon Devere Busha, Jr.. of Sherwood. Ore.; Lieut. Cmdr. M alter Thomas Fitzpatrick. Jr.. Texarkana, Lieut. (JG) Frederick Eugene Arthur of Redwood. Calif., Ensign Neil August Armstrong II of Chalmette, La., First Lieut. Robert Wendell Helding, Marine Corps, Janesville, Wis., and Lt. (JG) Frederick Jeffrie Blodgett of St. Paul, Minn.
The crash was on February 18, 1952.
Related Articles
Frederick Blodgett '49 was also lost in this crash.
Class of 1948
Robert is one of 46 members of the Class of 1948 on Virtual Memorial Hall.
The "category" links below lead to lists of related Honorees; use them to explore further the service and sacrifice of the alumni in Memorial Hall.
