By JOSEPH B. NADEAU

WOONSOCKET — John T. Godfrey didn’t have much time to ponder where he might seek his fame and fortune upon his graduation from Woonsocket High School as class president in 1940. World War II had already begun in Europe and like many young men of his day he looked to the military to make his mark on history.

What a mark that turned out to be.
Godfrey, a native of Canada brought up and educated in the city, sought to join the Army Air Corps’ flight school initially but needed time in college to qualify as a trainee. Instead, Godfrey applied to the Royal Canadian Air Force, and earned his wings flying propeller-driven fighter planes.
He and other Americans of the same mind then headed to England to help that country stave off attacks by Nazi Germany.
After the United States entered the war in 1941, Godfrey transferred over to the Army Air Corps and went on to become one of the top air combat aces of the war.
His story as a top P-51 fighter pilot has been recorded in books in both United States and England and he already holds a place in the Greater Woonsocket Hall of Fame with a plaque in the foyer of Woonsocket High School.
Now Godfrey is being remembered in another way at his old school by students who are setting their sights on future careers in the U.S. Air Force.
During the past semester, two members of the school’s Air Force Junior ROTC wing worked on a new mural outside their avionics classroom that is dedicated to the late fighter ace’s memory and notes his year of graduation.
“I love the Air Force and I love flying so I thought it would be a good idea to honor him,” Daniel Livant, a freshman working with sophomore Jody Girard on the project, explained.
The mural connects Godfrey’s role as a P-51 pilot, the state of the art aircraft of its day, with the Air Force’s current state-of-the-art jet, the stealth designed F-22 Raptor.
Godfrey was credited with destroying 36 enemy planes while fighting in Europe, the second highest tally for a U.S. pilot, and is also famous for his teamwork with wingman and fellow P-51 ace Don Gentile of Ohio, for handling one the largest onslaughts of enemy planes in a single air combat fight.
The ace’s older brother, Reginald, another graduate of Woonsocket High School, died at sea when his ship was torpedoed by a U-Boat in 1941. The younger brother named his fighters “Reggie’s Revenge” in memory of that fate.