VF-74 Be-Devilers

VF-74 "Be-Devilers" (Fighter Squadron 74) · USN · 1950s-1960s

Fighter Squadron 74 traced its lineage to VBF-20, commissioned in April 1945, and carried the designation VF-74 from January 1950 until its disestablishment on 30 April 1994. Its leering devil — the work of Ensign John P. Humphries — is framed here in a gunsight reticle, a fitting emblem for the squadron that in 1961-62 became the Navy's first fleet unit to carrier-qualify and deploy the F-4 Phantom II, earning the boast "First in Phantoms." Flying from USS Forrestal and USS Saratoga, the Be-Devilers logged Korean War combat, Vietnam-era operations, and Desert Shield/Desert Storm, and in 1983 became the Atlantic Fleet's first F-14 Tomcat squadron. This chain-stitched, felt-edged example reflects the hand-made cruise patches of the squadron's Skyray and early Phantom years.