Jeremiah O’Connor, Brigadier General (deceased), was born in 1920 in Sneem, county Kerry. He joined the Air Corps in April 1940 where he trained as a pilot on aircraft such as the Miles Magister and Avro Cadet. During the Emergency he served with Fighter Squadron based in Rineanna, Shannon. He became the first General Officer Commanding the Air Corps and was Director of Military Aviation from 1974 until his retirement in 1980. He was interviewed in 2008 by then Airman Michael J. Whelan before the Military Archives Oral History Project was formally established. Brig Gen O’Connor passed away in April 2016.

In this clip (poor sound quality), Brigadier General Jeremiah O’Connor, a native of Kerry, records that in April 1940 his father opened a letter informing him that he had been called for the Air Corps on 07 May 1940. He recalls his father telling him while they were draining a field on the farm that 'here in God's name. Get out of that place and clean yourself', which according to Jeremiah was his father's way of telling him he had been successful. Brigadier General O’Connor remembers his father buying him a suit of clothes and a suitcase in Kenmare and recalls that forty-six years later, he saw the entry into the shop sales from that day.