Peter G. Palmos was born in March, 1921 and grew up in Sacramento, California. He entered the Army Air Corps in April 1943 as an Aviation Cadet at Ontario, California. 

After receiving a Commission and pilot rating, he was assigned to B-25 Transition Training at Mather Field, CA (His home town), to Florence Army Air Base in South Carolina for A-20 training; and to the Pacific Theater. He flew combat missions in A-20’s and A-26’s over New Guinea, Philippines, Formosa, Borneo and Japan with the 89th BS  3rd BG from September 1944 until November 1945. 

In the Phillipines (Mindoro Island), the Officers built a Officers club. We named it after Mindys, the bar that the Damon Runyon characters congregated at in New York, but in actuality was known as Lindy's. When Edmund Suor became CO, the 89th had adopted The Characters and named our planes after them Little Isadore, Good Time Charley, Nick the Greek, etc.

Peter has the distinct honor as being the pilot of one of the 12 aircraft representing the 3rd Bomb Group during the flyover of the USS Missouri at the surrender ceremony on September 2, 1945.

In 1946, Peter was offered and accepted a Commission to the Regular Army. 

 Peter Palmos & Patricia Barton  1948    San Jose State College

Military assignments included tours at the Pentagon, France, Germany and several bases in the USA. He was assigned to The Western Development Division Organization in 1956. This Organization was assigned the responsibility to develop Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles on an expedited basis. The missiles put into the military force were the Atlas, Titan, an intermediate range missile that was deployed to England, and the Minuteman Missile. Peter was later assigned to the Air Force Satellite Test Center in Sunnyvale CA. This organization was responsible for tracking, and servicing all the military satellites in the A.F. inventory.  It had several remote tracking stations throughout the world, from Guam, Alaska to the Seychelles in the Indian Ocean, and a flying squadron in Hawaii that recovered payloads ejected from satellites in mid air. He was with that organization for eight years and was the Deputy Commander of the organization in the later years. 

Johnson Island

Peter also had a remote one year tour as the Base Commander at Johnson Atoll which is approximately 800 miles southwest of Hawaii. That organization was established to be a ready base for the U. S. to test nuclear devices in the atmosphere as a deterrent to the Soviets in case they broke the moratorium on testing nuclear devices in the atmosphere as they had done previously. It was also had missile launch pads to launch anti-satellite missiles if was deemed necessary by the U. S.  to launch the missiles.  They  were kept in a ready state and could respond to orders within hours. Practice launches were carried out regularly.

Peter G. Palmos retired from the United States Air Force as a Colonel in 1974 after 31 years of active duty.

He and Pat lived in Saratoga, CA and San Jose, CA for 34 years before moving to Paradise Valley Estates (PVE) in 1997.

In 1992, he joined the NCROC Board (a governing board) and was active in developing plans for PVE. This Continuing Care Community caters to retired military officers from all branches of the service. Since moving into PVE he has been active in PVE matters, as a member of committees, and the Residents’ Council.