This site was created in Montreal, Canada, by Nicholas Robinson, working in conjunction with Mario Martinez, in London, England. The impulse for its assembly grew from Nick's long-standing interest in the Lady Be Good, and from his reading of "Lady's Men," Mario's book based on the bomber and crew. This well-researched book so greatly differed on vital points from other accounts of the ship's story-and rang so true-that Nick decided a new and special website on the bomber was called for that reflected the views in "Lady's Men". After contacting Mario in London, the two joined forces and this website is the result. Its menu offers food for thought and viewers are welcomed to comment according to their taste.

This site examines the circumstances and probable reasons why the Lady Be Good vanished. It also pinpoint and challenges the "claims" made throughout the years about the bomber's location during her mission, and it examines and also cast doubt on the "reason given" as to why the Lady Be Good overflew her base and continued out over the desert. Other relevant points are also covered as well as the ongoing mystery of the ship's missing gunner, Staff Sergeant Vernon L. Moore. And finally, in the "Believe It Or Not" section of the site, Martinez recalls strange chain of events and coincidences he encountered during his lengthy period of research.

Two books have been published about the Lady Be Good. "The Lady Be Good", by Dennis E. McClendon,1962, and "Lady's Men",1995. For those with deep interests in the ship's saga, the Martinez book is recommended. A book of many insights and revelations, "Lady's Men" was drawn together from numerous sources over many years of research. It must be said however, that it is not the ambition of this site to promote the sales of "Lady's Men"—but its reading is important. Those who have not read it and care to do so can borrow it from a library. Its publishers are Leo Cooper, in Britain, and Naval Institute Press in America.


New York-born Mario Martinez has had an interest in the haunting story of the Lady Be Good since the ship's discovery in 1959. Over the years, with no specific intention in mind of writing about Lady Be Good, he collected anything he could get his hands on dealing with the Liberator's story. They were all to prove useful in years to come.

A product of George Washington High School, NYU and the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, he has, until recently, spent many years working as a fundraising consultant in far and wide places, sometimes against the background of unusual conditions and conflicts. He now devotes himself almost fully to writing.

Prior to his fundraising work, he was a documentary filmmaker. Among other places, at the height of the Cold War, this work took him to the Soviet Union. Another assignment took him to the remote area of Kadugli, in south central Sudan.

Martinez says, "My trip to Russia was full of intrigue like a John Le Carré novel; the FBI questioned me before I flew to Moscow. And the trip to Sudan was filled with danger—a civil war was developing just south of Kadugli."

His money raising efforts for Catholic groups have taken him throughout the United States, England and Ireland. The latter country for example, Northern Ireland in particular, was in the grip of sectarian violence when he arrived in Belfast during 1970 to help an Order of priests and brothers in financial crisis. The results of this challenge were astonishing and are the subject of his recent book, "Hell, Fire and Damnation."

He began his the Lady Be Good research in the early 1980s and "Lady's Men", which he wrote in 9 months, followed 10 years later. Between these years—prior to writing Lady's Men—Martinez wrote "The Mystery Of The Lady Be Good," a screenplay for a major film he hoped to produce.

No studio had the slightest interest in backing the film. He wrote Lady's Men at the suggestion of John Martin, one of the Lady Be Good's finders.

He is currently working on his third book, and his contributions to this site are rich with insights, revelations and priceless documentations.

His quest for the answers to Vernon Moore's fate are a clinic in determination and detection. Perhaps more than most, he has helped keep the story of Lady Be Good and her crew alive—and in that sense the Liberator's crew will always be with us.

"They died yet continue to live in the freedoms we often take for granted," says Mario.

With regard to a film about Lady Be Good Martinez says simply: "Its day will one day come."



Nicholas Robinson was born in Calcutta, India, in 1957. The son of a Pan American executive, he had travelled twice around the world at age five, in an era of Boeing 707s and Fokker Friendships.

While shuttling to and from boarding school in England in the 60s and 70s, Robinson lived in Zaire and Senegal, Africa, as well as a brief stint in Manhattan, where his father worked in the now-forgotten Pan Am building.

After a five-year period in Osaka, Japan, teaching English in the 80s and early 90s, he has settled in cosmopolitan Montreal, where he resides with his Japanese wife and young son, working as a graphic designer.

He says about this site:

"My father was a radio operator on a B-24 during World War II flying out of Rackheath, England, with the 790-791st squadrons of the 467th Bombardment Group, 2nd Air Division, Eighth Air Force.

"All my life, I was fascinated with the image of my dashing dad, cigarette-holder firmly clamped in jaw, flying across the Channel to bash the Nazis.

"I know now that life was not that simple, and it was much more than a simple affair of derring-do and youthful hubris.

"In 2002, I attended a convention of my father's bomb group in Pooler, Georgia, and was struck by the quiet and unassuming heroism of his former colleagues—at least, those who remained to tell the tales. They all reminded me of facets of my dad.

"The story of the Lady Be Good crept up on me, originally planted in my youthful brain by a popular television drama in 1970, and then the Internet came along. I stumbled across a story of the Lady Be Good, and I immediately bought the book by Mario Martinez. I was galvanised by his harrowing account of the lives and deaths of the crew of the Lady Be Good. They were ordinary men, but they served their country in extraordinary ways, thus becoming unwitting icons of courage and determination in spite of their tragically callow and innocent youth.

"As a website designer, I knew this story had to be told in the modern style, with links, images and a forum for further dicussion. The Internet is a unique tool to gather and understand information; I only wish it had been around thirty years ago.

"In the making of this website, now stretching to well over a year, Mario has provided me with a multitude of priceless photos, anecdotes and testimonials that, I believe, will turn out to be the most comprehensive account of the story of the Lady Be Good in our time."