The Final Goblet Ceremony

Over 70 CDR members, family, and friends gathered for the final Doolittle Raider Goblet Ceremony to honor Col. Richard E.  Cole and all of the Doolittle Raiders on the 80^th anniversary of the raid on April 18, 2022.   A recording of the ceremony is available on Youtube.  In addition to the Goblet Ceremony, attendees participated in several activities over the weekend (see Schedule of Events):

The annual CDR Board meeting was held on Saturday afternoon.  Then on Saturday evening, the documentary, “Unsettled History: America, China,  and the Doolittle Tokyo Raid” was screened.  This film features several interviews with members of the Children of the Doolittle Raiders and has been aired extensively on PBS.  As of this writing, the documentary is currently available for viewing here.

In 2018, Tom Macia and other CDR members traveled to China.  During that trip they attended the grand opening of the Memorial Hall to the Doolittle Raid in Quzhou, where they came to know Luo Shiping, a "grassroots historian" residing in Jiangxi province where a number of Doolittle Raider crews landed.  During the Final Goblet weekend, Tom and several members of the Bourgeois family met via Zoom with Mr. Luo, Chinese descendants of people who'd helped the Raiders in 1942, and other interested Chinese citizens. A short video clip recorded on the Chinese side can be viewed here.  Both sides were pleased with this “virtual seminar,” hosted by the Jiangxi Provincial Friendship Association.  The event was reported by CHINANEWS.COM  and Jiangxi Foreign Affairs.  Computer-generated English translations of these articles can be viewed here.

After the goblet ceremony, a beach flyby, dubbed “Thirty Seconds over the Emerald Coast,” featuring B-25, civilian and military aircraft, was executed over Okaloosa Island in Fort Walton Beach.  A video of the flyby can be viewed here.

The Greater Fort Walton Beach Chamber of Commerce hosted the Final Goblet Ceremony, working closely with Doolittle Raiders Security Director Wes Fields, and coordinated many of the surrounding events.  CDR is also grateful to Northwest Florida State College and The United States Air Force for their support, along with the many volunteers who made the events possible.