Dyess movie to be shown Saturday morning

Albany native Lieutenant Colonel Edwin Dyess is the focus of “4-4-43,” a documentary produced by historian John D. Lukacs, and directed by Lukacs and Tim Gray, that will be shown at the Aztec Theater on Saturday morning, Oct. 13, during the Ex-Students Association’s 10:00 a.m. business meeting.

The hour-long movie is based upon Lukacs’ book Escape From Davao subtitled the Forgotten Story of the Most Daring Prison Break of the Pacific War.

Dyess has long been accepted as one of the true heroes of WWII, and Lukacs produced the movie, in part, to share Dyess’ story with a larger audience in hopes of convincing the U.S. government to posthumously award Dyess the Congressional Medal of Honor, an honor that he and many others feel is long overdue.

Lukacs noted that the Albany-raised fighter pilot had dueled with Japanese planes in aerial combat, led air raids on enemy ships and on Subic Bay, survived the Bataan Death March and almost a year of captivity, and helped lead a POW escape from Davao. 

Dyess died in the U.S. when the plane he was flying developed engine problems and he chose to sacrifice his own life in order to prevent the plane from crashing into civilians on the ground. 

“I thought the Albany alumni would enjoy the movie,” said Albany Ex-student Association president Betsy Rose Senter, Class of 1967. “People my age remember Judge and Mrs. Dyess. Their grandkids were in Fandangle with us.”

There is no charge for admission to the movie, and Senter hopes that it will help increase attendance at the alumni business meeting, also held at the Aztec this Saturday morning, as well as inform Albany graduates more about the life of the hero from their hometown that Dyess Air Force base is named after.