An original ‘Top Gun’

Former cop, librarian uncover story of World War II hero

BRANFORD — On Tuesday, June 26, 1945, a B-29 Superfortress on a flying mission to Nagoya, Japan, was struck by a Japanese fighter plane, setting an engine on fire. Using “superhuman strength,” as the Branford Review later reported, Staff Sgt. Austin Ryer Jr., a 19-year-old aerial gunner, unjammed the escape hatch and held open its door as his crewmates scrambled through the flames and parachuted into the sea before being picked up by U.S. ships.

The remains of Ryer, a 1943 graduate of Branford High School, were never found. World War II would end barely six weeks later. Ryer’s name is on a World War II plaque at the high school.

Although his name is remembered through Austin Ryer Lane, a street off Brushy Plain Road; the annual Austin Ryer Memorial Scholarship for a graduating BHS senior; as well as a 2002 induction into the Branford Sports Hall of Fame for his football prowess at BHS, the daring exploits of Ryer, who was posthumously awarded a Distinguished Flying Cross, Silver Star, and Purple Heart, were lost to history.

Until, that is, this January. Branford resident Leno Torelli was having dinner at the house of his ex-wife, Clare Torelli, when a framed portrait on her counter caught his eye.

“It’s a young guy of about 15 or 16 sitting on a horse, no shirt, with his dog next to him in front of his house,” said Torelli, a retired Branford policeman. He studied the photo more closely. “Austin Ryer was the last Branford resident killed in World War II,” the right bottom corner read.

The portrait was from a collection of memorabilia that had accumulated over the years from the annual Veterans

Arnold Gold / Hearst Connecticut Media Leno Torelli holds a photograph of Austin Ryer Jr., the last Branford resident to die in World War II as a Marine aerial gunner with a bombing squadron in the Pacific campaign. He is photographed in front of John B. Sliney School, formerly Branford High School.