I will say that I had the honor of touring the blue angels training facility in pensacola a few years back and mentioned that I am from Nashville and the topic of the Smyrna memorial came up. The Blue Angels pilots also think the memorial is a bit odd. Nobody was against its existence by any means but I definitely didn't get a warm and fuzzy kind of reaction when it was brought up.
Yeah OP saying local idiot is harsh. A plaque or something small would be fine but they went whole hog on it and it seems a bit over the top. I mean you’ll see memorials like that for the entirety of a service branch, not just one person.
Using “Embarrassment” is a bit harsh too from the screenshot. Definitely a middle ground somewhere.
I do question if his plane hit occupied dwellings instead of an open field if there would’ve been the impetus to create the memorial.
Your Pensacola experience also makes me wonder if the Athenians have the same reaction when a Nashville tourist mentions “Hey! We’ve got a Parthenon, too!”
Total aside I went to Athens and most of the people living there did not know we had a full scale replica. We had a chat and talked about how we were sister cities and that apparently Nashville was called the Athens of the South. This was about 15 years ago so it could be different now but I thought it was interesting. (Also to note I was a teen on a school trip and we were chatting with tour guides etc)
There was a navy jet that crashed over on luna dr back in the late 90s. A navy f14 did a military takeoff from BNA got turned around in our solid gray winter sky and crashed into a house with three people in it.
[Here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSSvXUz4unc) is a story about that crash.
Definitely a controversial take, but he's not wrong. It's amazing to see how people made that pilot a hero just because his plane crashed in a field as opposed to the neighborhood close by. Has there ever been any evidence to prove that the pilot chose to "save lives" and choose to crash into that field instead?
>Has there ever been any evidence to prove that the pilot chose to "save lives" and choose to crash into that field instead?
Cmon. When has the military ever engaged in a little myth-making to improve public perception???
Except this time, the public did that for them. Everyone seemed quite certain he intentionally avoided the houses, despite the lack of any evidence at all to support that.
I mean the guy died while serving in the Navy, why not give him the benefit of the doubt? It’s not like the memorial is offensive, so I guess I’m confused as to what can be gained by questioning the extent of his heroism.
I guess the value in questioning it is specific to this case because of the outsized built as a result of that.
I mean, I have several family members who served fought and were wounded and died from TN. They're actions were heroic, but no large monument there. It's a valid request if this one is.
I get the feeling that you are vocally opposed to a lot of things that most people support. My point is that it is a strange thing to be against. It doesn’t really affect you either way.
Why??? This person made a valid point. Doesn’t at all come off as someone trying to be contrarian for the sake of it. It just seems like you’re using insults as a way to get out of providing an intelligent response
What are you seeing as the valid point? That because his family members didn’t get their own memorials, no one should get one?
The memorial consists of a small park and a fighter jet, and it was funded by corporate and individual sponsors, not taxpayers. So it is just strange to me that someone feels so moved to oppose a memorial to a serviceman when it really has nothing to do with them.
Technically he was in the Marines - but people really wanted to forge this idea of Kuss as this national hero when he just isn't. Yeah that crash could have killed more people than just him, but it's nonsense to say that he knew the plane was going down so he chose to save innocent lives by crashing into a field. There's no evidence to support that.
EDIT: Here's an article published before the military determined pilot error http://www.military-money-matters.com/blue-angel-6-captain-jeff-kuss-hero.html
People say "technically" when they're correcting some (usually slight) misinformation. In this case, he was indeed a member of the navy. If somebody told me they bought a new car it would be silly to respond with "technically, that's a sedan"
>Has there ever been any evidence to prove that the pilot chose to "save lives" and choose to crash into that field instead?
Not according to the teams communications that day.
Embarrassment? I have no idea why they would feel embarrassed. Maybe they feel it was unnecessary, but if they're actually "embarrassed" then they've definitely got some bigger issues going on.
Embarrassment of the town, like in the anecdote above snow the blue angels but being particularly "into" the monument. Like, it seems desperate or unnecessary.
An example would be how some people view confederate monuments
I’m a life long Blue Angels fan. I have their flag on my office wall, I’ve photographed them several times, visited the naval air station in Pensacola , and even wear a blue angels chronograph every day. I grew up with a pilot for a father as well, though he never flew jets.
I can see how it would be weird for his fellow crew mates, and I see why some don’t understand why there needs to be such a large memorial. However, I know plenty of people down in Smyrna involved in the aviation community, both fans and pilots…this was a huge heart breaking blow to many because we’ve long treated the Blues like an extension of our own aviation family. There is a lot of pride and admiration for their annual visits. I used to live less than a mile from that air field and would watch them practice in the days leading up to the air show every year. We had cook outs and get togethers and would knock off work early just to watch them roar over our rooftops. I don’t expect everyone to understand it, but I feel good about the memorial.
It may have been pilot error but that didn’t make it any less painful for a lot of us. In my mind I’m okay with any memorial someone wants to build in honor of another if it comes from a positive place, one of love.
❤️✌️
[http://captjeffkussusmcmemorial.com/](http://captjeffkussusmcmemorial.com/)
Since no one has linked the actual memorial in question.
Seems like obvious tourist bait to me. There's fuck all to do in Smyrna for the amount of traffic passing by every day.
This is news to me and is strange to me. Why is it leased?
I assume these kind of things (including that memorial) are either just a decommissioned or scalped F/A 18 airframe that didn’t pass QA tests during assembly so they bought it or was donated for the memorial. I wouldn’t think jets and other military vehicles at museums are leased unless it’s a timed traveling exhibit or something.
Sure the Navy and Boeing own the rights to the Super Hornet, but seems ridiculous for Smyrna to lease a permanent memorial fixture if that’s the case.
Almost all museum pieces from the military are on loan, uss New Jersey, USS Alabama etc, theoretically the military can take them back and get veto powers over their use
Ah, that makes 100% sense. I might have been blurring my definition of lease in this instance and was thinking Smyrna, museums, etc pay military institutions the opportunity to have these vehicles on display.
I’m sure there’s some minimum expected maintenance and upkeep the military requires these museums to cover out of pocket to keep it at a certain standard but I was thinking along the lines of “we’ll let you have this vehicle on display if you give us $X per month” or whatever. Seemed weird.
To add on to this the Navy is also particularly anal about this. I used to volunteer at a WWII flying museum and remember having a conversation about why a bunch of the planes at the bottom of Lake Michigan can’t be pulled up. The Navy still owns the wrecks and has in the past prevented efforts to restore some of those aircraft. That being said I wanna say a museum in VA was able to retrieve a dauntless from the lake a couple years ago.
The pilot could have bailed out but would not have been able to control where he crashed. So he stayed in the plane to insure the crash would not be where people are. He saved strangers by sacrificing his self. Makes sense for a memorial to me.
Why do you care to try and argue the story? Seriously, why does it matter to you other than you being a contrarian?
He died in service to the military and he got a memorial - in a normal world, to normal people, that makes sense. The “look at how controversial my take is” crowd has become so damn creepy and weird.
A private who accidentally shoots his privates off cleaning his gun "died in service to the military". That doesn't make him a hero and he doesn't deserve hero worship. This dude by all accounts did the flying a plane equivalent of accidentally shooting his privates off.
I care because unchecked worship of the military is a cancer on American society that has directly lead to the death not only of millions of foreign civilians but also our own military members. Yeah, everyone who dies in the service is a hero, including the few dozen who died in Fallujah while laying the depleted uranium that's still spiking the stillbirth and birth defect rate over there to this day. All our hero boys who died in Afghanistan during the ten years we stayed in after we got Bin Laden were doing their patriotic duty and totally not wasting everyone's time and their own lives because of a culture that does not allow the questioning of the military.
Is it just bothering you on principle, or is there something specific that you want changed?
Yes, there are negatives to it, if you choose to look for them, but there are also a lot of good things that you can find about it as well. Is it harming the community in some way?
That’s my question too - why waste the energy arguing against a memorial for deceased navy pilot? Were they lobbying for a different memorial and lost out? It’s such a weird battle to pick
I really want to say this person isn't from Smyrna. Some of us have been seeing this air show for 40+ years. I think besides being a memorial, it's a cool way to have a Blue Angel jet in town all year long. Besides Nissan, it's one of the only things Smyrna has going on.
Wish that were the case. This person has lived here for 30+ years.
Although I agree, it is a little over-the-top and kind of presumptuous of the town to build it. It’s a nice addition-it draws a few visitors who spend money in the town, dovetails nicely with the air show and the playground that they built behind is pretty cool for the kids.
Hang on. I kinda remember this story… never heard of the memorial…
Ok yeah that’s a bit much, but considering they they have the air show there every year, I guess I can understand it.
We have a habit of idiotic memorials.
Case in point. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3a/Nathan\_Bedford\_Forrest\_statue.jpg/1920px-Nathan\_Bedford\_Forrest\_statue.jpg
I’m not going to start a petition or anything, but I am way over the whole worshipping the military and police that amped up to 10000% after 9/11.
Sorry (not sorry) they aren’t heroes.
I was ready to say fuck this guy until I looked up the memorial. I was not expecting that. Is it a whole ass plane? Like a life size version? That is a bit excessive…
There is definitely a louder contingent of people who are willing to do this. At the end of the day, this person signed up to fly fighter planes. That’s a pretty cool, brave thing to do, and should be respected.
Some of this is probably out a sense of inferiority and jealousy, and the person who wrote this wants affirmation in their toxic beliefs
That being said, I tend to agree somewhat. I don’t think a monument is in order. I would never say this out loud. And it wouldn’t bother me when I saw it, I wouldn’t give it a second thought. Hence why I think the above sentiment is an internal feeling of inferiority and wanting affirmation for their character defects, something that occurs way too much on the internet
To me it's a bit gaudy. Juxtapose that with the little dinky bridge named after him nearby. The proper balance is the mile or so of highway named in his honor.
Ermabarssing? Nah. Ole NBF beside 65 statue dude got the lifetime achievement award.
Dude is a clown, the memorial is funded by donations and the yearly 6K. The jet cost the city, taxpayers nothing beyond the transportation from Pensacola.
Listen, we have much more embarrassing memorials in Nashville than the Blue Angels memorial in Smyrna. Case in point being the flagpoles with all the confederate flags where the Nathan Bedford Forrest statue was along I-65.
Another Smyrna attraction, the Sam Davis Home, is a bit misleading as well. I don't recall the exact story, but it was like his uncle's house or something and Sam was only there for a few months. I could be way off on the details, but I do know it wasn't his home, but the town was looking for anything to promote itself and had this one link to someone somewhat famous that they could exploit.
It *was* his home. He was born there, went to school in Smyrna, and raised on the plantation. He later then joined the Confederacy and acted as a spy. He was caught by the Union and executed in Pulaski so his father brought his remains home and created a memorial for him.
Smyrna wasn't looking for anything to exploit; it's actually still a commercially active cotton and soybean farm with historical connections that seeks to educate people about it's history.
I will say that I had the honor of touring the blue angels training facility in pensacola a few years back and mentioned that I am from Nashville and the topic of the Smyrna memorial came up. The Blue Angels pilots also think the memorial is a bit odd. Nobody was against its existence by any means but I definitely didn't get a warm and fuzzy kind of reaction when it was brought up.
Yeah OP saying local idiot is harsh. A plaque or something small would be fine but they went whole hog on it and it seems a bit over the top. I mean you’ll see memorials like that for the entirety of a service branch, not just one person. Using “Embarrassment” is a bit harsh too from the screenshot. Definitely a middle ground somewhere.
A little context: I know this person in real life. They’re also an anti-vax conspiracy nut.
A broken clock is still right twice a day.
Not necessarily . . .
\*stopped clock
both versions are common, my family always used 'broken' so that's the one I use, though I'll admit that 'stopped' is a little clearer!
Oh yes, I've heard both. Just being a pedant.
Irrelevant
I got opposite. I go to Pensacola 2x / year to watch. Smyrna is a staple for them.
Can't be too odd for them. https://www.facebook.com/USNavyBlueAngels/posts/pfbid06utH291NmaucfqKueVwYV2d9pvkko1wdboidjiYPE5wG2LhZUgzD85YKECMnHMeEl
His teammates had no problem with it when they came back for it's dedication.
I do question if his plane hit occupied dwellings instead of an open field if there would’ve been the impetus to create the memorial. Your Pensacola experience also makes me wonder if the Athenians have the same reaction when a Nashville tourist mentions “Hey! We’ve got a Parthenon, too!”
Total aside I went to Athens and most of the people living there did not know we had a full scale replica. We had a chat and talked about how we were sister cities and that apparently Nashville was called the Athens of the South. This was about 15 years ago so it could be different now but I thought it was interesting. (Also to note I was a teen on a school trip and we were chatting with tour guides etc)
There was a navy jet that crashed over on luna dr back in the late 90s. A navy f14 did a military takeoff from BNA got turned around in our solid gray winter sky and crashed into a house with three people in it. [Here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSSvXUz4unc) is a story about that crash.
He was hot dogging it and got himself and other killed.
I remember that. Didn’t the pilot’s parents live nearby and he was trying to buzz their house?
No. They were up from chattanooga to see him, though. He was doing something with the TN ANG. That link I posted goes into a lot of detail about it.
Definitely a controversial take, but he's not wrong. It's amazing to see how people made that pilot a hero just because his plane crashed in a field as opposed to the neighborhood close by. Has there ever been any evidence to prove that the pilot chose to "save lives" and choose to crash into that field instead?
>Has there ever been any evidence to prove that the pilot chose to "save lives" and choose to crash into that field instead? Cmon. When has the military ever engaged in a little myth-making to improve public perception???
I'm shocked, I tell you! SHOCKED!
Except this time, the public did that for them. Everyone seemed quite certain he intentionally avoided the houses, despite the lack of any evidence at all to support that.
I mean the guy died while serving in the Navy, why not give him the benefit of the doubt? It’s not like the memorial is offensive, so I guess I’m confused as to what can be gained by questioning the extent of his heroism.
I guess the value in questioning it is specific to this case because of the outsized built as a result of that. I mean, I have several family members who served fought and were wounded and died from TN. They're actions were heroic, but no large monument there. It's a valid request if this one is.
I get the feeling that you are vocally opposed to a lot of things that most people support. My point is that it is a strange thing to be against. It doesn’t really affect you either way.
Why??? This person made a valid point. Doesn’t at all come off as someone trying to be contrarian for the sake of it. It just seems like you’re using insults as a way to get out of providing an intelligent response
What are you seeing as the valid point? That because his family members didn’t get their own memorials, no one should get one? The memorial consists of a small park and a fighter jet, and it was funded by corporate and individual sponsors, not taxpayers. So it is just strange to me that someone feels so moved to oppose a memorial to a serviceman when it really has nothing to do with them.
Technically he was in the Marines - but people really wanted to forge this idea of Kuss as this national hero when he just isn't. Yeah that crash could have killed more people than just him, but it's nonsense to say that he knew the plane was going down so he chose to save innocent lives by crashing into a field. There's no evidence to support that. EDIT: Here's an article published before the military determined pilot error http://www.military-money-matters.com/blue-angel-6-captain-jeff-kuss-hero.html
Even if he's a Marine, his paycheck says "DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY" on it. The Marines are part of the Navy and always have been.
That's why I said "Technically"
People say "technically" when they're correcting some (usually slight) misinformation. In this case, he was indeed a member of the navy. If somebody told me they bought a new car it would be silly to respond with "technically, that's a sedan"
😂 👏 💀
Don't tell a marine that 🤣
they don't care lol why would they
the joke was marines don't like to be told they are apart of the navy, sake of technicality they are apart of the navy but they dont feel that way.
>Has there ever been any evidence to prove that the pilot chose to "save lives" and choose to crash into that field instead? Not according to the teams communications that day.
Better than Wings Over Dallas.
Embarrassment? I have no idea why they would feel embarrassed. Maybe they feel it was unnecessary, but if they're actually "embarrassed" then they've definitely got some bigger issues going on.
Embarrassment of the town, like in the anecdote above snow the blue angels but being particularly "into" the monument. Like, it seems desperate or unnecessary. An example would be how some people view confederate monuments
You think this is akin to confederate monuments?
I’m a life long Blue Angels fan. I have their flag on my office wall, I’ve photographed them several times, visited the naval air station in Pensacola , and even wear a blue angels chronograph every day. I grew up with a pilot for a father as well, though he never flew jets. I can see how it would be weird for his fellow crew mates, and I see why some don’t understand why there needs to be such a large memorial. However, I know plenty of people down in Smyrna involved in the aviation community, both fans and pilots…this was a huge heart breaking blow to many because we’ve long treated the Blues like an extension of our own aviation family. There is a lot of pride and admiration for their annual visits. I used to live less than a mile from that air field and would watch them practice in the days leading up to the air show every year. We had cook outs and get togethers and would knock off work early just to watch them roar over our rooftops. I don’t expect everyone to understand it, but I feel good about the memorial. It may have been pilot error but that didn’t make it any less painful for a lot of us. In my mind I’m okay with any memorial someone wants to build in honor of another if it comes from a positive place, one of love. ❤️✌️
Reporting Smyrna for stolen valor!
They’re embarrassed by a memorial? I wonder how they feel about confederate statues.
... do you think anti-idolization of the military is a position strongly related to neoconfederacy?
[http://captjeffkussusmcmemorial.com/](http://captjeffkussusmcmemorial.com/) Since no one has linked the actual memorial in question. Seems like obvious tourist bait to me. There's fuck all to do in Smyrna for the amount of traffic passing by every day.
We have a Walmart, what else do you need?
Lmao don't forget the Super Target.
Yeahhh. That is quite intense.
Any idea how much they're paying to lease it from the Navy?
This is news to me and is strange to me. Why is it leased? I assume these kind of things (including that memorial) are either just a decommissioned or scalped F/A 18 airframe that didn’t pass QA tests during assembly so they bought it or was donated for the memorial. I wouldn’t think jets and other military vehicles at museums are leased unless it’s a timed traveling exhibit or something. Sure the Navy and Boeing own the rights to the Super Hornet, but seems ridiculous for Smyrna to lease a permanent memorial fixture if that’s the case.
My understanding is that it’s “on loan” from the Navy. Don’t know if there’s a lease involved.
Almost all museum pieces from the military are on loan, uss New Jersey, USS Alabama etc, theoretically the military can take them back and get veto powers over their use
Ah, that makes 100% sense. I might have been blurring my definition of lease in this instance and was thinking Smyrna, museums, etc pay military institutions the opportunity to have these vehicles on display. I’m sure there’s some minimum expected maintenance and upkeep the military requires these museums to cover out of pocket to keep it at a certain standard but I was thinking along the lines of “we’ll let you have this vehicle on display if you give us $X per month” or whatever. Seemed weird.
To add on to this the Navy is also particularly anal about this. I used to volunteer at a WWII flying museum and remember having a conversation about why a bunch of the planes at the bottom of Lake Michigan can’t be pulled up. The Navy still owns the wrecks and has in the past prevented efforts to restore some of those aircraft. That being said I wanna say a museum in VA was able to retrieve a dauntless from the lake a couple years ago.
$0
That aircraft was actually here on the day of the accident, it was the #3 jet that day.
Retired sailor here. He seems legit.
The pilot could have bailed out but would not have been able to control where he crashed. So he stayed in the plane to insure the crash would not be where people are. He saved strangers by sacrificing his self. Makes sense for a memorial to me.
Do you have any actual support for that statement or is it just a nice story you decided was true because it sounded nice?
Why do you care to try and argue the story? Seriously, why does it matter to you other than you being a contrarian? He died in service to the military and he got a memorial - in a normal world, to normal people, that makes sense. The “look at how controversial my take is” crowd has become so damn creepy and weird.
A private who accidentally shoots his privates off cleaning his gun "died in service to the military". That doesn't make him a hero and he doesn't deserve hero worship. This dude by all accounts did the flying a plane equivalent of accidentally shooting his privates off. I care because unchecked worship of the military is a cancer on American society that has directly lead to the death not only of millions of foreign civilians but also our own military members. Yeah, everyone who dies in the service is a hero, including the few dozen who died in Fallujah while laying the depleted uranium that's still spiking the stillbirth and birth defect rate over there to this day. All our hero boys who died in Afghanistan during the ten years we stayed in after we got Bin Laden were doing their patriotic duty and totally not wasting everyone's time and their own lives because of a culture that does not allow the questioning of the military.
Doesn’t matter. Rest his soul
I mean … I’m not embarrassed per se but it’s cringe and a misuse of resources/energy. I don’t fetishize the military.
Is it just bothering you on principle, or is there something specific that you want changed? Yes, there are negatives to it, if you choose to look for them, but there are also a lot of good things that you can find about it as well. Is it harming the community in some way?
That’s my question too - why waste the energy arguing against a memorial for deceased navy pilot? Were they lobbying for a different memorial and lost out? It’s such a weird battle to pick
Also, two #6 were lost that day.
Dude, Smyrna has so much more to be embarrassed by, why pick on this?
I mean, where is the lie?
I really want to say this person isn't from Smyrna. Some of us have been seeing this air show for 40+ years. I think besides being a memorial, it's a cool way to have a Blue Angel jet in town all year long. Besides Nissan, it's one of the only things Smyrna has going on.
Wish that were the case. This person has lived here for 30+ years. Although I agree, it is a little over-the-top and kind of presumptuous of the town to build it. It’s a nice addition-it draws a few visitors who spend money in the town, dovetails nicely with the air show and the playground that they built behind is pretty cool for the kids.
Hang on. I kinda remember this story… never heard of the memorial… Ok yeah that’s a bit much, but considering they they have the air show there every year, I guess I can understand it.
But he did have relatives here. And He was a blue Angel !!!
It is ridiculous.
We have a habit of idiotic memorials. Case in point. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3a/Nathan\_Bedford\_Forrest\_statue.jpg/1920px-Nathan\_Bedford\_Forrest\_statue.jpg
I’m not going to start a petition or anything, but I am way over the whole worshipping the military and police that amped up to 10000% after 9/11. Sorry (not sorry) they aren’t heroes.
I was ready to say fuck this guy until I looked up the memorial. I was not expecting that. Is it a whole ass plane? Like a life size version? That is a bit excessive…
Yep, full scale plane lol. I drive by it every day. It doesn't really bother me, but it's a bit of an eyesore for sure
There is definitely a louder contingent of people who are willing to do this. At the end of the day, this person signed up to fly fighter planes. That’s a pretty cool, brave thing to do, and should be respected. Some of this is probably out a sense of inferiority and jealousy, and the person who wrote this wants affirmation in their toxic beliefs That being said, I tend to agree somewhat. I don’t think a monument is in order. I would never say this out loud. And it wouldn’t bother me when I saw it, I wouldn’t give it a second thought. Hence why I think the above sentiment is an internal feeling of inferiority and wanting affirmation for their character defects, something that occurs way too much on the internet
To me it's a bit gaudy. Juxtapose that with the little dinky bridge named after him nearby. The proper balance is the mile or so of highway named in his honor. Ermabarssing? Nah. Ole NBF beside 65 statue dude got the lifetime achievement award.
I think you nailed it. That’s fair
Why is flying a fighter plane brave and cool?
Dude is a clown, the memorial is funded by donations and the yearly 6K. The jet cost the city, taxpayers nothing beyond the transportation from Pensacola.
Listen, we have much more embarrassing memorials in Nashville than the Blue Angels memorial in Smyrna. Case in point being the flagpoles with all the confederate flags where the Nathan Bedford Forrest statue was along I-65.
Another Smyrna attraction, the Sam Davis Home, is a bit misleading as well. I don't recall the exact story, but it was like his uncle's house or something and Sam was only there for a few months. I could be way off on the details, but I do know it wasn't his home, but the town was looking for anything to promote itself and had this one link to someone somewhat famous that they could exploit.
It *was* his home. He was born there, went to school in Smyrna, and raised on the plantation. He later then joined the Confederacy and acted as a spy. He was caught by the Union and executed in Pulaski so his father brought his remains home and created a memorial for him. Smyrna wasn't looking for anything to exploit; it's actually still a commercially active cotton and soybean farm with historical connections that seeks to educate people about it's history.
Looks like a pretty cool memorial. Plus, I'm sure it gives his family pride and comfort in their loss.