Gilbert Bonn Chambers

Gilbert Bonn Chambers was born on May 23, 1918 in Yakima, Washington to George and Florine Bonn Chambers. By the time Chambers was twelve, his family relocated to Okanogan in central Washington, where George worked as a district manager for an oil company.  The Chambers family again relocated to Wilbur, Washington, where George found a position as a salesman. Gilbert graduated from Wilbur High School in 1935. 

Chambers attended Washington State College (WSC) from 1935 to 1940, graduating on June 3, 1940 with a Bachelor of Arts in Business Administration, Advertising. He was a member of the Chinook Business club and Alpha Phi Omega, a national service fraternity; Kappa Psi, a business honorary society; Crimson Circle; Scabbard and Blade; and the Gamma Chi Chapter of Alpha Tau Omega, a leadership development fraternity, for which he served two terms as president of the organization. He was also president of his senior class. Chambers was a cadet colonel in the R.O.T.C. at WSC during his senior year of college (1939-1940), and was chosen Chief of the Mens' Big Five for outstanding men on the WSC campus. Before embarking on his military career, he briefly worked in California as an advertising manager for Western Grower and Shipper magazine, and at Lockheed. 

Chambers was commissioned a reserve officer in the United States Army Air Corps in August of 1941. He arrived in the Philippines in September 1941, and during his time there he was assigned to Fort Stotsenburg and Clark Air Field. Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, Japanese pilots of the 11th Air Fleet attacked Clark Field in the Philippines on December 8, 1941, achieving "complete tactical surprise" and destroying most of the American heavy bombers. A simultaneous attack on Iba Field in northwest Luzon achieved success, as well; combined, the Far East Air Force lost one-half of its planes on the first day of the war.  This allowed for the first Japanese amphibious landing to take place at Bataan on the same day. American and Filipino forces held of the Japanese for three months, but by June 9, almost all American and Filipino forces had surrrendered.  Second Lieutenant Chambers was reported missing in action on Bataan effective May 7, 1942, but in May 1945 the War Department confirmed that Chambers died on May 8, 1942. 

Chambers was posthumously awarded the Purple Heart, and his remains were interred next to his sister, Marguerite Florine, who died in infancy in 1917, in Tahoma Cemetery in Yakima, Washington on November 8, 1948.