Pyle death shocks Aero Club head
Knew Ernie before he started rambling
Wednesday, April 18, 1945
The death of Ernie Pyle was a great shock to Clifford Ball, president of the Aero Club of Pittsburgh, and Mrs. Ball, who were intimate friends of the Pyles for 16 years.
Mr. and Mrs. Ball met Ernie Pyle and his wife Geraldine, or Jerry, in 1929 when they went to Washington on their honeymoon.
Became close friends
“Ernie then was aviation editor of The Washington Daily News,” Mr. Ball recalled. “I was arranging for an airmail line into Washington and he came to see me, bringing Mrs. Pyle with him.”
Started roving job
Mr. Ball said:
We became very close friends, like brothers and sisters. We visited each other for years and corresponded frequently.
This is how Ernie came to be a roving reporter. As aviation editor, he wrote human interest stories about people who fly. Then they made him managing editor and he stopped writing. When 18 out of 22 subscribers in one small community stopped the paper because he wasn’t writing anymore, the management decided to make a roving reporter out of him.
When he left for overseas the first time, he came here to get his outfit and Mrs. Ball went with him while he shopped.