Semper Fi Skies
Semper Fi Skies by John Shaw
Main Edition
Featuring the original signature by Col. Archie Donahue USMC
Print Image Size: 22" x 27" • Overall size: 27" x 32.5"
Col Archie Donahue becomes an "Ace-in-a-Day" over Guadalcanal during the days the mighty F4U Corsair made its Pacific debut. Features the original signatures of Col. Donahue and Medal of Honor recipient Col James Swett.
Captain Archie Glenn Donahue of VMF-112’s “Wolfpack” becomes an Ace-in-a-Day in the skies near Guadalcanal in May 1943. He would repeat this remarkable feat two years later, after shooting down 5 enemy planes while serving aboard a carrier, establishing himself as one of the finest aces in U.S. Marine aviation history. With the debut of the effectively lethal F4U Corsair, Marine and Navy pilots would soon gain fame and maintain air superiority throughout the Solomon Island region during the war in the Pacific.
The painting Semper-Fi Skies was completed in 2006. The original 4’ x 5’ oil painting was commissioned by the Cavanaugh Flight Museum, located just north of Dallas, Texas, in the city of Addison. It is a “companion” painting created to match another painting by John Shaw in the Cavanaugh collection, Debden Eagles. These two paintings, of similar size and design, feature aircraft bearing the same markings of two planes in the museum’s impressive collection of flying restored WWII aircraft.
