Jan Cress Dondi

Online ticket sales close at 5pm EST on the day of the event. Tickets will be available at the door prior to the event start time.

The Navigator’s Letter brings to light one of the best untold and dangerous stories of World War II, chronicling a moving and heroic story of patriotic duty, familial bonds, brotherhood, and love.

One of the riskiest air raids of World War II occurred on August 1, 1943, over the oil fields at Ploesti, Romania—Nazi Germany’s primary fuel source. The Allies believed that the destruction of Hitler’s oil refineries would shorten the war. Using an untested strategy, it was worth the gamble, but the mission did not go according to plan—with 53 aircraft and 532 crewmen lost, it was the costliest US air raid of the war.

A true story, The Navigator’s Letter is a tale of uncanny coincidences: two friends from the same small Illinois town; both joined the Air Corps; both became navigators; both were assigned to B-24 Liberators; both flew missions over Europe; both of their planes were forced down over Ploesti; and both went missing-in-action.

Intertwined with events of WWII, the story follows the two B-24 navigators coursing through wartime, both with ties to the same woman. Their lives unfurl with the Air Force’s darkest day, Operation Tidal Wave. It was the first-ever zero-altitude air raid, which lead to Operation Reunion, the largest evacuation by air in history repatriating 1,162 POWs from Romania back to American air bases in Italy.

Jan Cress Dondi grew up just a walk-away from the Atlanta History Center in Garden Hills, where she attended elementary school before graduating from North Fulton High School. She earned her bachelor’s degree from the University of Georgia; completed post-graduate studies at the University of Alaska; and built a career as a litigation paralegal — spending more than three decades engaged in in-depth research, writing, and firsthand interviews. She has spoken about her father’s POW experience at the U.S. Embassy in Bucharest, Romania; recounted her uncle’s wartime missions in Washington, D.C.; and flown in one of the only B-24 Liberators still operating. The mother of two and grandmother of four, Jan has been married for nearly forty years. She now lives in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, while maintaining deep ties to family and her Atlanta roots.