When he was a major, Air Force Colonel Bernard Francis "Bernie" Fisher volunteered for a tour in Vietnam when that conflict was just beginning to expand beyond US troops advising South Vietnamese fighters.
In March 1966, the day after actions that would see him awarded the Silver Star, Fisher saw a fellow pilot shot down by enemy fire. Lieutenant Colonel "Jump" Myers survived the crash but was still in terrible danger. Thousands of enemy soldiers were quickly closing in on him and an evacuation helicopter would not be able to reach him in time. Unwilling to leave a comrade behind, Fisher landed his plane, pulled Myers up into the cockpit, and managed to take off again after his own plane took serious damage from small arms fire while on the ground.
The fallowing January, Fisher and his family traveled to the White House where the pilot was awarded the Medal of Honor by President Lyndon B. Johnson.
The Air Force became an independent service in 1947, but used the Army's design of the Medal of Honor until 1965. Bernie Fisher was the first Air Force pilot to receive the service's newly designed medal. He was also the first pilot in the Air Force's history to survive the action for which he was presented the nation's highest award for valor.
Fisher retired from the Air Force in 1974 as a colonel and settled in Kuna, Idaho, about 20 miles southwest of Boise. He remained active in the veteran community and often traveled to share the story about his Medal of Honor.
Colonel Bernard Francis Fisher passed away in 2014 at the age of 87. He was interred at the Idaho State Veterans Cemetery in Boise, ID in Section 12-1-142.
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