Adam Wiley, a full-blood Muscogee Indian, was born July 9, 1921, in Dustin, Okla. He married Elda Marie Wood of Drumright, Okla. on March 6, 1943. They had one child Pamela Kay, on August 11, 1944. Wiley attended the University of Tulsa, the University of Oklahoma and graduated from the California State University at Los Angeles.

Wiley was a retired lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Air Force who enlisted in the U.S. Army on July 23, 1942. He graduated as a sergeant from the Aerial Gunnery School on September 4,1942 and graduated as second lieutenant from the Army Air Corps Bombardier School October 23, 1943.

He spent five months during World War II in Italy with the 459th Bomb Group in the 15th Air Force in 1944. He flew 35 combat missions and 200 combat hours as a Bombardier on 15 missions. He was shot down leading approximately 1,500 planes of the 15th Air Force over Ploesti Oil Fields in Romania. His plane was hit by heavy flak on the bomb run and blew up, killing all crew members except the co-pilot and Bombadier Wiley who were both blown out of the plane during the explosion. He spent five weeks as a POW in a Romanian hospital and returned to the U.S. in September, 1944.

He requested and received a release from active duty in October, 1956 after spending 10 years in SAC and then went to work for the County of Los Angeles. He remained in the Reserve Air Force until he completed 21 years of service to his country.

After graduation from Oak Ridge Institute of Nuclear Studies, he was hired as a radiation physicist for the Los Angeles County Health Department. In 1969, he was appointed by Gov. Ronald Reagan as a member of the Governor’s Task Force for the State of California Disaster Council.

He was honored by the Muscogee (Creek) Nation as an elder of the tribe and still retained his original land allotment at the time of his death on May 16, 2010.

He is preceded in death by Melissa Wiley, Harmon, Manny and Harriette Wiley.

He is survived by his wife of 67 years, his daughter Pamela (Frank) Honish and two grandchildren, Frank Lee Honish, Jr. and Kalieh Honish (Karl Elhert), and two great-granddaughters, Mckenzie Honish and Riley Elhert.

He will be interred at Arlington National Cemetery August, 25, 2010 with full military honors as a Purple Heart recipient and a POW.