Captain Ralph Rosen / US Navy

What is an Ace or Flying Ace? We have all heard the term… but what is it? What makes someone an Ace?

During WWI, French aviator Adolphe Pegoud shot down 5 German aircraft. When French newspapers reported his story, they coined the term “Flying Ace,” drawing on the card-game connotation that an “Ace” was a top performer. The term and the criteria of 5 “kills” as the minimum to become an Ace stuck through WWI and WWII. During WWII, between the Army Air Force (735), Navy (381), and Marines (122), there were only 1,238 Aces. Captain Ralph Rosen, US Navy, was among the 381 Navy pilots to be called an Ace – quite an elite group. This is even more impressive when considering that during WWII, there were between 250,000 and 300,000 Navy pilots.  

Ralph Rosen, a native Chicagoan, always had a love of flying and airplanes. He started flying as a teenager. By the time the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor in 1941, Rosen was already a certified flight instructor. In fact, Rosen met his then-future wife, Joan McMahon, when her sister took flying lessons from him. 

Despite the certification, Rosen took the military training anyway, earned his Navy commission, and began flying Hellcat fighters off the USS Bunker Hill, an Essex-class aircraft carrier, in the Pacific in 1943.

Commissioned in 1943, the Bunker Hill was brand-new when Rosen first stepped onto her flight deck. From late 1943 through 1945, the USS Bunker Hill took part in some of the most savage air and sea battles of the war including the Gilbert and Marshall Islands campaigns, the raid on Truk, the capture of the Mariana and Palau Islands, the Battle of the Philippine Sea, the air raids on Formosa and Japanese home islands, and the battles of Iwo Jima and Okinawa during the final drive toward the Japanese mainland. The Bunker Hill received the Presidential Unit Citation in recognition of her distinguished service throughout the Pacific Theater.

Like many men of his generation, Rosen rarely talked about his service. However, in one story he related, he was in a fierce dog fight against multiple Japanese aircraft over Formosa when he took down three enemy aircraft. But his own F6F Hellcat was so badly shot up, he was afraid he would not make it back to his carrier. Following a rough landing, one of the deck crew counted 130 holes in the plane’s fuselage and wings. It was just too much damage to repair, and the plane was “totaled” and pushed over the side, to remain forever on the bottom of the Pacific Ocean. Rosen suffered several wounds during the fight.

After the war, the Bunker Hill was employed as a troop transport bringing American service members back from the Pacific, and was decommissioned in 1947. Like the ship, most service members just wanted to be “decommissioned” after the war and be sent home to pick up their lives where they left off, get a good job, and maybe raise a family. Ralph Rosen had other ideas. Rosen re-enlisted in the Navy, becoming a career Navy officer, and continued to fly. He was a jet test pilot in experimental squadron VX-2, worked in guided missile development, was Air Operations Officer of the aircraft carrier USS Saratoga, and commanded three fighter squadrons. He rose from his original commission rank of Second Lieutenant to Captain. Among many honors, he received three Distinguished Flying Crosses, nine Air Medals, and the Purple Heart. 

Ralph Rosen retired from the Navy in 1973 and moved from his duty post in Germany to Laconia, NH. He was a substitute math and science teacher in Laconia and Guilford. Being an avid skier, he served on the governing body of the Gunstock Ski Area for many years. He represented the City of Laconia in the State House of Representatives for eight terms and also served on the Veterans Committee and the Transportation Committee. He was a member of the Fighter Aces Association and was honored by the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. 

Later, Rosen and his wife, Joan, moved to Vinson Hall, a Navy retirement community in Virginia. Ralph Rosen passed away on May 11, 2010. He is buried at Arlington National Cemetery.

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US Service Personnel ProfilesCaptain Ralph Rosen / US Navy
By Gary Ledoux January 8, 2026