Colonel John Acree Reeder was born in January 1921 in Indianapolis, Indiana. He attended the Boeing School of Aeronautics in Oakland, California and when Reeder heard that the Clayton Knight Committee was looking for American pilots to join the Royal Canadian Air Force, he applied. After taking a physical and a test flight in the latter part of 1940, he was accepted in the program. He went from his home in Montezuma, Indiana to Toronto's Number 1 Manning Pool for officer training for six weeks. Then, at Picton, Ontario, he checked out for various types of aircraft, and after graduating, he was assigned to Number 8 Bombing and Gunnery School in Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada. Although it had been Reeder's hope to go into the Eagle Squadrons in England, the group had already reached its quota, and Reeder ended up a staff pilot training air gunners and bombardiers from April 1941 to March 1942. Taking advantage of an offer to join any branch of the United States Armed Forces, he applied to the Marine Corps, was accepted, and he reported to Quantico, Virginia in May 1942.

Arriving at Corpus Christi, Texas, John Reeder underwent "primary training," which was made difficult by some of the Navy officers who weren't too happy about his unusual entry into Marine Corps. Nevertheless, in December 1942 he graduated from primary instructor school and was stationed in Dallas, Texas, where he became an instructor with the Marine Air Detachment. He also served as assistant operations officer, test flying the SNJ [Annotator's Note: North American At-6 Texan advanced trainer aircraft] aircraft that North American built at the Naval Air Station there. Reeder tells of an unfortunate accident in which the plane he was flying was clipped on its tail and upper right wing, and the cadet he was flying with died. In January 1944, having attained the rank of Major, Reeder received orders to report to Jacksonville, Florida for fighter training and to checkout the early F4Us [Annotator's Note: Vought F4U Corsair fighter aircraft] whose landing problems were killing cadets every day. From there he went to El Centro, California to take over Training Squadron 472, which was for readying for overseas deployment. In September of 1944 he left San Diego, California, arriving on Guam on 15 January 1945, assigned to VMF-225 [Annotator's Note: Marine Fighter Squadron 225 (VMF-225)], and was made executive officer of that squadron.

Flying combat air patrols out of Guam, John Reeder flew missions of two hours duration every day during daylight hours. Shortly after he arrived, Reeder helped to plan and execute an attack on Saipan that was so successful that the Japanese copied it the next day on the American B-29 [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-29 Superfortress very heavy bomber] field. He described how they used the island of Rota as a practice area, and it had one gun emplacement that had shot down several planes. In preparation for the amphibious landings on Iwo Jima, Reeder made several trips from Guam to Pagan to neutralize the field and got very little antiaircraft fire there. The Navy was training forward observers for naval gunfire, and he asked to tag along on a destroyer, the USS Swanson (DD-443) to observe. On the way back, the skipper took his ship right into the harbor at Rota, and Reeder was in the fire control center. They showed him how to swing the crosshairs around and told him to "hit the red button" when the crosshairs were where he wanted them. He took aim at the cave he believed sheltered the troublesome gun emplacement and fired. On close inspection they could see the barrels sticking up, but bent. And the next morning Reeder flew back and forth over the cave, but was not fired upon. When the Kamikazes decimated the destroyers and carriers at Okinawa, and the Allies were short of aircraft, Reeder led six replacements on an grueling route, that included friendly fire, but got the planes through. After moving a load of Seabees [Annotator's Note: members of naval construction battalions] from Iwo Jima to Guam, Reeder brought his squad back to the United States.

John Reeder remained on active duty, and was sent to the Naval Air Station at Mojave, California for a month, then transferred to the Marine Corps Air Station in Santa Barbara, California and helped close the base there. Reeder was in flight around Santa Barbara when he learned that the war had ended. In September 1945 he moved to the main Marine Corps Air base at El Toro, California, and was assigned to VMF-323 [Annotator's Note: Marine Fighter Squadron 323 (VMF-323)]. Reeder was released from active duty in June 1946. Almost immediately, he went into the organized reserve and became squadron commander of VMF-111 [Annotator's Note: Marine Fighter Squadron 111 (VMF-111)] in August 1946. He was active with the squadron, but also held a job with Ford Motor Company. On 1 August 1950, Reeder was recalled and sent to Japan [Annotator's Note: he had been recalled to active duty for the Korean War]. Brought back to his recollections of World War 2, Reeder said one of the reasons the United States kept hammering away at the island of Rota was that the Japanese had radar there. Rota was able to give Iwo Jima and the mainland advanced warning when American B-29s [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-29 Superfortress very heavy bomber] were on their way to Japan. Reeder said the radar installations were probably mobile, because the Americans were never able to locate and destroy them. At the time, Reeder was flying Corsair [Annotator's Note: Vought F4U Corsair fighter aircraft] aircraft.

As commanding officer of fighter squadron VMF-111 [Annotator's Note: Marine Fighter Squadron 111 (VMF-111)] in Dallas [Annotator's Note: Dallas, Texas], John Reeder was called up for the Korean War on 1 August 1950. He was on active duty in Cherry Point, North Carolina when he got the news, and when he got back home to Dallas, he notified his squadron. One pilot refused to report, and Reeder sent a captain and a "very large master sergeant" to pick him up and put him in the brig. Reeder doesn't know what happened to him in the end. From the west coast, the squadron shipped out to Atami, Japan. After the Incheon landing, they went into the K-1 area just outside of Seoul, South Korea. The squadron was broken up, and Reeder was no longer in command. He was replaced by regular officers. Reeder went to the operations section of the 1st Marine Aircraft Wing, and moved to Wonsan. The harbor there was so heavily mined that it took two weeks before the troops could come in, and Reeder said the men on the ground were fighting the guerillas every night. Reeder moved on to Hamhung in enemy territory, where they controlled the bomb line. In October, he was promoted to lieutenant colonel. Headquarters were in "a little red schoolhouse," and he and a major moved into a house recently evacuated by the Russians. Reeder said they were "on edge" all the time. Several civilians the unit hired ended up with their throats cut; not all of the Koreans were friendly people. Just before the area fell, the North Koreans herded all the Catholics into the church, set it on fire, and threw hand grenades into the flames. Reeder notes that he had very little with which to defend himself, and sometimes took liberties to defend his countrymen. He told a story of a warehouse that was arming insurgents, and how he gave the command to destroy it, without first having permission from command.

John Reeder was unhappy with the way the reserve officers were being treated; he had overheard his commanding officer discriminating in favor of the regulars. But soon Reeder was called upon to fly again, without having been checked out, when a Chinese attack commenced on 1 December 1950. Supplies were desperately needed, and wounded required removal. He made a total of six landings, and on the last trip he flew out the dead, frozen in the positions in which they died. Reeder related how the Americans evacuated many civilians who otherwise would have been doomed to death, and how he was taken out. He was glad to surrender his weapon to a soldier who would be staying. Reeder was approved to fly again, and did a little flying in the R4D [Annotator's Note: Douglas C-47 Skytrain cargo aircraft]. He also related a story of a good friend who was cracking up, and how he requested to take him away from the fray for a rest, and the close call he had on takeoff for that flight.

In late summer of 1951 John Reeder returned to the United States. He was immediately sent to Quantico, Virginia for a senior officers' training course that lasted six months. He was then assigned to a Marine air group at an outlying field at Edenton, North Carolina, made operations officer of the group, and started flying jets. When things were "getting hot with China," Reeder was put on a top secret mission to hold the Kasserine Pass with tactical-weapons; he had been loaded on a ship to northern Italy, but before they arrived, there was a change in political power in Italy, and the mission was scratched. On returning to the United States, he went to Cherry Point, North Carolina, and took command of the Marine Detachment there until 1 June 1955 when he returned to inactive duty. Reeder went back to work for Ford Motor Company in Houston, Texas and was serving in the reserves, reporting to Dallas, Texas one weekend of every month, when he made full colonel. Reeder retired from federal service after 38 years.