In 1944/1945, the men and women of the 6th Bomb Group trained in Grand Island before leaving for the Pacific Theatre of War, where they flew 1,750 World War II B-29 combat missions over Japan as part of the 20th Air Force. They regarded themselves as the first to use air power to end a major war without an invasion of the enemy's homeland. A 16' 7" propellor [sic] represented one of the four that pulled each giant B-29 into the sky.