John Lee Levitow (November 1, 1945 – November 8, 2000) was a United States Air Force (USAF) Loadmaster who received the Medal of Honor for exceptional heroism during wartime. He was awarded the Medal of Honor for his acts of heroism while serving on board a Douglas AC-47 Spooky gunship of the 3d Special Operations Squadron USAF on February 24, 1969. An Airman First Class at the time of his actions, he became the first enlisted serviceman in the Air Force to receive the Medal of Honor, the United States military's highest honor.{{efn|name=fn1|The US Air Force was created in 1948, so the four US Army Air Forces enlisted personnel awarded a Medal of Honor (MOH) during WWII were not from the US Air Force. All four US Air Force MOH recipients in the Korean War were officers. The first nine US Air Force MOH recipients in the Vietnam War were officers. Levitows was the 14th MOH ever awarded to someone from the Air Force and the first to an enlisted serviceman. Overall, the MOH has rarely been awarded to Air Force personnel of any rank; , only 19 have been awarded, to 14 officers and 5 enlisted personnel. See also: List of post-Vietnam War Medal of Honor recipients}} Biography Born in Hartford, Connecticut, he originally intended to join the United States Navy, but changed his mind and joined the USAF in June 1966. His first job was civil engineering, then he cross-trained into the loadmaster career field. On February 24, 1969, Levitow was asked to fill in for the regular loadmaster on an armed AC-47, call sign Spooky 71. It was Airman Levitow's job to set the ejection and ignition timer controls on Mark 24 magnesium flares and pass them to the gunner for deployment. These flares were metal canisters long that would burn at 4,000 degrees, illuminate with the intensity of two million candlepower and burn for two and a half to three minutes. Spooky 71 was flying night missions near the Tan Son Nhut Air base area when Long Binh came under attack. As the crew of Spooky 71 manned their aircraft patrolling the area, the pilot Major Kenneth Carpenter had seen muzzle flashes outside Long Binh Army Base. The pilot threw the AC-47 and its eight-man crew into a banked turn to engage the Viet Cong in the Tan Son Nhut Air Base area. On the pilot's